30 Developer Documentation for QuickTime 3, Apple Computer, Inc., 1997 explains: "Image data requires a large amount of storage space. Storing a single 640-by-480 pixel image in 32-bit color can require as much as 1.2 MB. . . .Consequently, minimizing the storage requirements for image data is an important consideration for any application that works with images and sequences of images. The Image Compression Manager provides your application with an interface for compressing and decompressing images and sequences of images. . . .it takes a large file and makes it smaller, hence requiring less hard disk space to save it, less memory to run it, or less bandwidth to play it over the Internet."