How do I easily & quickly resize pics?

[Anaamika]

I want to post pics on a particular forum (not these boards). The posting requirements say "Not more than 100 KB". I look blankly at my pic, which is on the line of 700 KB. How do I make it smaller?

I've tried re-saving it as a jpg, that worked a little but not enough. I also tried decreasing the color depth. Nope. There must be some easy secret no one's told me.

I've also e-mailed pics to people and asked them to please do it, but I need to learn how sometime, right?

[Duckster]

A quality graphics program has the capability to optimize an image, i.e., shrink the file size down to a manageable level without a discernable level of visual degradation.

What graphics program are you using?

[Anaamika]

Paint Shop Pro.

[Duckster]

Paint Shop Pro.

Super easy!

Assuming your master image is in the PSP native file format, just do a Save As, select a final file format and click on the Options button. Now run the Optimizer and play until you get your image down to a decent file size and compare it against the visual degradation.

Still lost. The PSP Help Files should not be wasted!

[FluffyBob]

There should be a quality option when saving a jpg. I havent used Paint Shop Pro for years so I am not familiar with it, but likely there is an 'advanced' button in the save dialogue. Lower quality gives higher compression.

A better way would probably be to resize the image to something smaller, a decent quality jpg at 640x480 is likely to be well below 100KB.

I use Irfanview (http://www.irfanview.com/). It is good quality freeware and is well suited to simple image editing. There is a resize/resample function in the Image menu

[Bear_Nenno]

PAINT is teh Rox0r

Just use your regular Microsoft Paint program that came with Windows. It's in your Accessories folder. Open the file in that program. Then hit Cntrl+W
A little box titled "Stretch and Skew" will appear. It lets you choose a % for horizontal and vertical. If you need your 700kb file to be 100kb then type in 15% for both horizontal and vertical. Just make sure whatever percent you choose, use the same percent for vert and horiz.

Maybe there are other issues that would cause a filesize to be too big, but this has never NOT solved the problem for me. So it's quick and easy and should solve 99% of your pic file size issues, if not all of them.

[Duckster]

PAINT is teh Rox0r

Just use your regular Microsoft Paint program that came with Windows.

Won't work. The OP is talking about changing the byte size of a file and not X and Y dimensions of an image. Paint cannot optimize an image.

[Queuing]

You can also use th MS office picture manager. IIRC this is a feature of office 2003, if you this. Its simple to do easy editing. Of course it seems paint works as well according to other posters, this is just another option.

[Anaamika]

Super easy!

Assuming your master image is in the PSP native file format, just do a Save As, select a final file format and click on the Options button. Now run the Optimizer and play until you get your image down to a decent file size and compare it against the visual degradation.

Still lost. The PSP Help Files should not be wasted!
OH! Look at that, aren't you the best. Thanks!

[Bear_Nenno]

Won't work. The OP is talking about changing the byte size of a file and not X and Y dimensions of an image. Paint cannot optimize an image.
BULLSHIT! Did you even try it!? Go do it right now. Do what I said and then save the new image. Do a SAVE AS if you dont feel like losing your original large image. The new file will be roughly reduced by the same percent you reduced the dimensions of the photo. I've done it a million freaking times and I would not have posted the method if I was not positive that it works.

Also, I just reduced a 1.5 meg photo to a 44kb, decent size and quality photo. And it takes like three seconds. You dont have to wait for large programs like photoshop or whatever to load all that garbage you dont need. I know I only have a modest 2ghz processor with half a gig of ram but Photoshop still takes its damn time loading up. PAINT is instant, and so is its ability to resize an image and reduce the file size.

Go do it right now, if I am wrong, I owe you the small paperback book of your choice from Amazon.com

;)

[Bear_Nenno]

Oh, and afterwards, come back and tell us if you still think there is a faster way to reduce file size of a photo.

[pulykamell]

Personally, I like Google's Picasa for this kind of application, as it will allow you to batch process files and batch rename them.

[FlyingRamenMonster]

BULLSHIT! Did you even try it!? Go do it right now. Do what I said and then save the new image. Do a SAVE AS if you dont feel like losing your original large image. The new file will be roughly reduced by the same percent you reduced the dimensions of the photo. I've done it a million freaking times and I would not have posted the method if I was not positive that it works.

Also, I just reduced a 1.5 meg photo to a 44kb, decent size and quality photo. And it takes like three seconds. You dont have to wait for large programs like photoshop or whatever to load all that garbage you dont need. I know I only have a modest 2ghz processor with half a gig of ram but Photoshop still takes its damn time loading up. PAINT is instant, and so is its ability to resize an image and reduce the file size.

Go do it right now, if I am wrong, I owe you the small paperback book of your choice from Amazon.com

;)

I'd like The Interpreter of Maladies, please. Anaamika's thread title was somewhat misleading, because she was not trying to change the dimensions of the picture but the filesize and the filesize *only*. Resizing would get the filesize down but it would also leave you with a pitifully small picture. In most advanced image editing programs you can choose the amount of compression you want and thus control filesize. MS Paint does a shocking job at optimisation and for that reason I would not use it to save anything important because Photoshop takes about 10 seconds to load on my computer and can save files that are smaller *and* better-quality.

[Nava]

I use Irfanview (http://www.irfanview.com/). It is good quality freeware and is well suited to simple image editing. There is a resize/resample function in the Image menu

That's the one I was going to recommend too. I've gotten half my coworkers on it already and I've only been at work for two months.

The resize function is very easy to use, so is decreasing the resolution. Often a picture will have way too much resolution for what you need. For example, photographs taken in one of those 8M cameras: to see the difference between 8M and 4M on a computer screen, you need a plasma screen the size of your wall.

[Dorjän]

I'm not familiar with Paintshop Pro, but in Photoshop not only can you reduce the filesize of an image by changing it's quality setting, you can also strip all of the extra information thats sometimes embedded in a jpg file by using the "save for web" or "image only" setting. It can reduce the filesize by quite a bit, so if you can do that in Paintshop Pro, it's worth a look.

[Bear_Nenno]

...was not trying to change the dimensions of the picture but the filesize and the filesize *only*.
ah shit. I'll await Anaamika's call on this one though. If my way works for what Anaamika was trying to do with the pictures, then we'll call it a draw. If my way does not produce the desired results for the, then I owe Duckster a book. Sorry, csharpmajor, the prize is non transferable ;)

And on rereading, I think maybe Duckster was saying exactly what you said. But there was a dubious "and" in this sentence:
The OP is talking about changing the byte size of a file and not X and Y dimensions of an image.
I read this as, "The OP is talking about changing the byte size of a file(, the OP is not talking about) X and Y dimensions of an image."
But maybe it should have read more like, "The OP is talking about changing the byte size of a file, (without changing the) X and Y dimensions of an image" ??

Anyway, that is what I do for posting pictures that come huge and in the 2-3mb size from digital cameras or scanners and reducing their file size to post to websites. So I assumed this is what the OP was looking for. So, Anaamika, what say you.

[Una Persson]

BULLSHIT! Did you even try it!? Go do it right now. Do what I said and then save the new image. Do a SAVE AS if you dont feel like losing your original large image. The new file will be roughly reduced by the same percent you reduced the dimensions of the photo. I've done it a million freaking times and I would not have posted the method if I was not positive that it works.
I tried it, and it does exactly what you say - which does not seem to be what the OP is asking. It reduces both the byte size AND the pixel size. Since the OP was talking about reducing the colour depth, it seems fairly clear they're somewhat interested in reducing the byte size WITHOUT reducing the pixel size.

You dont have to wait for large programs like photoshop or whatever to load all that garbage you dont need. I know I only have a modest 2ghz processor with half a gig of ram but Photoshop still takes its damn time loading up. PAINT is instant, and so is its ability to resize an image and reduce the file size.[/QUOTE[
Irfanview starts and runs as fast as Paint if not faster, and has better scaling and sizing functions, and is free. And has about 16,388 more functions in it as well.

[QUOTE]Oh, and afterwards, come back and tell us if you still think there is a faster way to reduce file size of a photo.
See above.

[Anaamika]

Anyway, that is what I do for posting pictures that come huge and in the 2-3mb size from digital cameras or scanners and reducing their file size to post to websites. So I assumed this is what the OP was looking for. So, Anaamika, what say you.
I'm sorry, Bear_Nenno.
Since the OP was talking about reducing the colour depth, it seems fairly clear they're somewhat interested in reducing the byte size WITHOUT reducing the pixel size.

This is exactly what I need. I still love you, though. :)

[control-z]

Are you sure you really want to reduce the quality of the image without reducing the dimensions though? I can't think of many situations where I would want to reduce an image size 7:1 without making it dimensionally smaller.

A dimensionally smaller image can still look just as good as larger image, while requiring much less storage space. For example, a digital camera photo may be 2400x1800 pixels. Most monitors can only display 1280x1024 pixels; your image would have to be reduced just so you could see the whole thing. Modern web browsers do this automatically, if not the viewing person would have to scroll to the right and down to see the whole image. So if you just want people to view your image(s) on their screen, resizing them down to 1024x768 or so would produce a smaller image that still looks very good on an average monitor.

Also, a way to get around message board size restrictions without compromising is to post the full-size image on Imageshack or somewhere and just post *links* to the images on the message board. That way if people want to see the images they can click the links.

[Bear_Nenno]

Are you sure you really want to reduce the quality of the image without reducing the dimensions though? I can't think of many situations where I would want to reduce an image size 7:1 without making it dimensionally smaller.I can't think of any. Certainly not when the task is sharing on a message board or something. I'm curious as to when or why someone would do this.
Could someone explain where they are getting these normal sized pics that are in the multiMEG range? Every pic I've seen on my computer that is over 500k is just HUGE when viewed at 100% Reducing the size of the photo and decreasing the the filesize, have always seemed like the right thing to do.

[Una Persson]

I can't think of any. Certainly not when the task is sharing on a message board or something. I'm curious as to when or why someone would do this.
Could someone explain where they are getting these normal sized pics that are in the multiMEG range? Every pic I've seen on my computer that is over 500k is just HUGE when viewed at 100% Reducing the size of the photo and decreasing the the filesize, have always seemed like the right thing to do.
Printing is one place where a larger picture can really make a difference. And in online art galleries like the one I run, very often large works with a lot of detail need more pixels to see detail properly.

[Hombre]

I can't think of any. Certainly not when the task is sharing on a message board or something. I'm curious as to when or why someone would do this.
Could someone explain where they are getting these normal sized pics that are in the multiMEG range? Every pic I've seen on my computer that is over 500k is just HUGE when viewed at 100% Reducing the size of the photo and decreasing the the filesize, have always seemed like the right thing to do.

Not sure of the intended situation, but PhotoShop works wonders for me at reducing filesize but not any great visible clarity. But I use it a lot.

Frequently, I drag pics from the internet (me - MacOSX) that have not been properly optimized.

[AHunter3]

Well, if you're on a Mac, the venerable Graphic Converter will batch-process entire folders' worth of files, reducing filesize to a specified parameter, converting TIFFS to JPEGs, optimize colors for the web, etc etc.

High-end graphics shops use Photoshop in conjunction with AppleScript to do batch-processing, but GraphicConverter will do the job for most mortals.

[FlyingRamenMonster]

I can't think of any. Certainly not when the task is sharing on a message board or something. I'm curious as to when or why someone would do this.
Could someone explain where they are getting these normal sized pics that are in the multiMEG range? Every pic I've seen on my computer that is over 500k is just HUGE when viewed at 100% Reducing the size of the photo and decreasing the the filesize, have always seemed like the right thing to do.

What resolution are you using?

Jpegs are small, yes, but a decent-sized gif or png can *easily* run over 500k.

[Rhubarb]

Since no one else has mentioned it, let me put in a plug for Graphic Workshop Professional. Their latest (unregistered) version puts a watermark on images you manipulate with it, but the registration fee is only $30. GWSP will let you convert from pretty much any format to any other with complete control over quality and size. It does batch processing, special effects, thumbnail catalogs, proof sheets, etc. very quickly and easily. Also, the company that produces GWSP, Alchemy Mindworks, is from Canada and seems to have an interesting world-view (judging from their promotional materials). I've been using Graphic Workshop for at least 15 years, and I haven't had a single complaint with their software.



btw, this is not a paid promotion, I just like their stuff.

[Shalmanese]

BULLSHIT! Did you even try it!? Go do it right now. Do what I said and then save the new image. Do a SAVE AS if you dont feel like losing your original large image. The new file will be roughly reduced by the same percent you reduced the dimensions of the photo. I've done it a million freaking times and I would not have posted the method if I was not positive that it works.

Also, I just reduced a 1.5 meg photo to a 44kb, decent size and quality photo. And it takes like three seconds. You dont have to wait for large programs like photoshop or whatever to load all that garbage you dont need. I know I only have a modest 2ghz processor with half a gig of ram but Photoshop still takes its damn time loading up. PAINT is instant, and so is its ability to resize an image and reduce the file size.

Go do it right now, if I am wrong, I owe you the small paperback book of your choice from Amazon.com

;)

MSPaint uses nearest neighbour interpolation when resizing pics which produces horrible image quality. Photoshop is likley to use Bilinear or Bicubic which gives you a much nicer pic for a given reduction.