I used to work in the group that produced that animation and I can tell you that the TIFF format is alive and well in the 3D graphics world. It is supported by

I used to work in the group that produced that animation and I can tell you that the TIFF format is alive and well in the 3D graphics world. It is supported by most high-end graphics software, has an open, extensible spec, and can be losslessly compressed if desired. It's also popular in Earth Sciences work due to the GEOTIFF format that adds georeferencing data tags. PNG is a reasonable alternative, usually, but TIFF is entrenched. TIFF had legal issues in the past with respect to the LZW compression, which is a shame. PNG might never have been needed if TIFF had been free of patent encumbrances.