| Full Name | Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine (DICOM) |
| Extension | DCM |
| Type | Image |
| Mime Type | application/dicom |
| Format | Binary |
A DCM file is an image file format commonly used in the fields of medical imaging. The format may store multiple images within a single file, with each of these images capable of storing complex medical-related metadata within the image.
The specialist nature of the DCM format means it is not widely supported outside of specialist image viewing software. In order to view a DCM file, you will need to either use specialist software or use a converter to convert the DCM file to something more common, such as JPG. Indeed, our DCM to JPG conversion tool does exactly this.
| Full Name | Portable Network Graphics |
| Extension | PNG |
| Type | Image |
| Mime Type | image/png |
| Format | Binary |
A PNG file is a two-dimensional image file format often used to store high-quality logos, icons, and other imagery. PNG files first emerged in the early 1990s as an alternative to the GIF format, which was in widespread use at the time. PNG files have garnered support over the years to at least equal or surpass that of the GIF format. You will find all modern image editing or viewing applications will support PNG files.
Part of the success of the PNG format is its use of special compression techniques that allow a high-resolution image to be compressed into a very small file size. The compression used in the PNG format is lossless compression, ensuring no image detail is lost when an image is saved to the PNG format.
Uses
The PNG format is ideally suited for storing images that require no loss of detail or have transparent areas, such as company logos and computer graphics icons. It is not suited for storing general photos as, due to the nature of the compression, it will result in very large file sizes. Other formats, such as JPEG, use a lossy compression method, and this format is better suited to full-color photographic images.
