Aliasing and anti-aliasing

In digital signal processing, spatial anti-aliasing is the technique of minimizing the distortion artifacts known as aliasing when representing a high-resolution image at a lower resolution.




This image shows the difference between bitmap images and vector images. They both look similar from a far, but when you zoom in close to a bitmap image (image on the right) it becomes very pixelated and distorted as they are not of a high quality like the vector images. If you zoom into a vector image it is still of the same quality and very clear.


Since bitmap images are just a grid of pixels, they can’t be easily scaled up. The only way to enlarge the image is to make the pixels larger, which makes the images look blocky. With vector images, the shapes that make up the image can be scaled up or down smoothly.



Anti-aliasing is the process of making the edges in images/video smoother. For example, the jagged edges in the bitmap image can be deteced and smoothed out so it is more pleasing to the eye and looks for better quality.