rastrowym

Rastrowym is a form of the Polish adjective rastrowy, meaning raster-related or pixel-based. It is used to describe items connected with raster graphics and grid-based representations. In grammatically standard Polish, rastrowym appears in the instrumental singular masculine and is used in phrases such as formatem rastrowym or obrazem rastrowym, while the base adjective takes other endings to agree with gender, number, and case.

In computing and digital imaging, rastrowy describes images and data that are stored as a grid of pixels. This contrasts with grafika wektorowa (vector graphics), which are described as wektorowy. Common terms include obraz rastrowy (raster image) and grafika rastrowa (raster graphics). Raster formats such as TIFF, JPEG, and PNG are often referred to as raster files or dane rastrowe, emphasizing the pixel-based nature of the data.

Outside of pure computing, rastrowy is used in GIS, remote sensing, and printing to distinguish between raster data and other representations. In printing, for example, rasterization converts vector information into a raster image for rendering. The term reflects a broader distinction between grid-based, pixel-oriented representations and alternative, geometry-based (vector) approaches.

Etymology traces rastrowy to raster, borrowed from English, adapted to Polish spelling and morphology. The instrumental form rastrowym is one of several inflected forms that enable precise grammatical integration in Polish sentences.