Web-size your Photos using eMail

With the introduction of ever larger camera resolutions, we're starting to see photos that are two and three times wider than our screens. These are coming in our emails and are appearing on some websites. It is important to remember that a large percentage of users are still on dialup and they simply can't view images that are overwhelmingly huge. If your photos are taken strictly for web use, then set the camera to its lowest resolution setting, preferrably under 1MP. The higher settings are there for making prints.

Making your Photos Smaller

Most cameras come with some sort of image editing software. Use that software to resize the images to something that is comfortable for viewing on a web page.  400-500 pixels across is pretty good for most images and is about half a screen width. When saving the resized image, look for the compression or quality setting on the "save as" screen and set it in the middle if it used words like good better and best. If it mentions "compression" then use something between 10-25% and if it mentions "jpeg quality", use a number between 75-85%. That setting will help make the file smaller and faster without affecting the dimensions of the image.

If you don't have any image editing software for your PC, there are two other methods for resizing images. One is to use your mail program and the other is to use MS Paint on your PC.

The Email Method on Windows XP

This method should always be used as a courtesy to your recipients when emailing unedited images to friends and family.

1. Go to your "My Pictures" album on your computer.
Right-click on a photo and "Send To" "Mail Recipient".
If you hold down the Ctrl-key, you can click on several photos at once.
Then after they are all highlighted, right-click to "Send To" to process the whole group.


2. A popup will ask if you want to keep the original size or make them smaller. Of course, we want to make those giant photos smaller.


3. The smaller image file (or group of photos) will be added as an attachment in a new mail. At this point, you can email to someone, or email to yourself. But if you are using Outlook Express, you can simply drag the image icon from the slot in the email to your desktop and you will have the new smaller photo on your desktop.

4. The new smaller photo can then be uploaded to your online image host. The photo on your desktop can be given a new name and moved back into your "My Pictures" folder, or you can simply move it back into the folder and replace the original large photo that is still there.

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