Red eye image formats

Here's my final product from MIDTERM #1 Removing red eye . It is a JPEG image.

Using GIMP, I converted the file to GIF format. As you can see, the quality of the image deteriorated quite a bit (look at the purple tube in the upper left corner and the child's cheeks).

I also converted the image to PNG format (with a compression level of 9). The quality of the image remained stable from the JPEG. However, the PNG file is 348 kB, while the JPEG is only 77.2 kB - a great deal smaller. Interestingly, even though the quality on the GIF is noticeably worse than the JPEG, is still is a larger file at 121 kB.

Process Screenshot (on a 5 minute timer)