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Format

GEM Image

Summary

Name
GEM Image
Identifiers
PUID: x-fmt/159
Format type
Image (Raster)
Description
The GEM raster format (also known as GEM VDI Bit Image; GEM Bit Image; GEM Image; GEM Bitmap; or IMG) is an image format native to the Graphical Environment Manager (GEM) operating system and developed at Digital Research. The format was used by GEM Paint and Ventura Publisher, and by a variety of Atari ST software. GEM raster images may be color, gray scale, or black and white and are always read and written in the big-endian format. The format of bi-level images is well standardized, but the specification is ambiguous as to the format of color images. As a result, other color formats of GEM raster image were later developed, some of which have their own names, such as XIMG (Extended GEM Bit Image), TIMG (TrueColor IMG), STTT, or Hyperpaint.
Note
http://fileformats.archiveteam.org/wiki/GEM_Raster https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q28206162 https://www.seasip.info/Gem/ff_img.html https://www.fileformat.info/format/gemraster/spec/20e311cc16f844fda91beb539d62c46c/view.htm https://archive.org/stream/mac_Graphics_File_Formats_Second_Edition_1996/Graphics_File_Formats_Second_Edition_1996_djvu.txt
File extensions
img
Source
Digital Preservation Department / The National Archives

Relationships

Is previous version of

Internal signatures

GEM Paint Image

Note
2 byte Version (always 1), number of words in header (8), 2 byte number of planes (1 or 4), pattern size (2)

Byte sequences

Min Frag Length
Absolute from BOF
Offset
0
Max offset
None
Byte Sequence
0001000800(01|04)0002
Endianness
Big-endian

Changelog

  • Updated in V105

    Release date
    29 June 2022

    GEM Image: Updated description and note field. Submitted by Digital Preservation Department, The National Archives (UK).

  • Added in V45

    Release date
    6 December 2010

    GEM Image: Signature submitted by Georgia Tech Research Institute, USA.