Re-Sizing Pictures For Forum Use

[Guest shadetree77]

One of the first problems encountered by new members to the forum is uploading pictures. More often than not, the problem is that the picture is too large. The forum has specific criteria that must be met for the picture to be uploaded. What follows is a guide to (hopefully) help in the re-sizing of pictures to allow them to be uploaded to the forum. I will include two different methods. The first uses the Paint program that is included with almost every version of Windows. Using paint is good if you only have one or two photos to upload at a time.

The second uses a free, downloadable program and is extremely convenient if you want to upload a lot of photos. It is easy to use and incredibly time saving.

Both methods require Windows. Perhaps I can convince someone with an Apple to add a supplement to this thread at some point with instructions for Apple users.

Using Paint

!!PLEASE NOTE!!

Re-sizing the picture and then saving it will permanently re-size your picture. If you wish to keep your original you must either make a copy and then re-size the copy OR click "Save As" and save the photo under a different name.

1. Open the "Paint" program, go to "File", "Open".

2. Find the picture on your computer. Double click on it to open it up in Paint.

3. Click on "Re-size". You might have to hunt around for the "Re-size" option because it is in different locations on different versions of Paint.

4. There should be a place in the box that pops up for you to re-size the photo based on pixels. Make sure "pixels" is selected and not "percentage". Should be two boxes with numbers. One for length and one for width. Change the "horizontal" number to 2000(or less if you want them a little smaller) and the "vertical" number will change automatically. Then click "OK". Make sure you save the picture after this and then close Paint.

Using Image Re-sizer Program

1. Determine if you are using 32 bit Windows or 64 bit Windows. If you are not sure how to do this, Google search "how to tell 32 bit or 64 bit in Windows (insert name of your operating system here)".

2. Go to the following link and download the appropriate version of the program for your operating system: Image Resizer for Windows - Download: Image Resizer 2.1

3. Install the program and restart your computer.

4. Find the photo (or photos) that you want to re-size, select it (or them) and right click on the photo (or photos).

5. You will now see an option labeled "Resize Pictures" within the box that pops up. Click that option.

6. The program box will pop up and looks like this.

Click the button on the bottom left labeled "Advanced".

7. You can now select one of the preset sizes or select "Custom" to enter custom values. Also take note of the bottom two options. Make sure that the "Make pictures smaller not larger" option is checked. Then you must decide if you want the original photo altered permanently or if you want the program to make a copy of the photo, alter the copy, then save it for you leaving the original untouched. Select the appropriate option by either check marking the bottom box or leaving it blank.

8. Click "OK" and the program will go to work in the background. If you have selected more than one photo at a time, the program will take a little while to complete. There will be no progress bar during this time and the program might even seem like it is hanging up, but it just takes time so be patient.

• If you chose to alter the original by checking the bottom box, the program will re-size your original photo and then automatically save it.
  
• If you chose NOT to alter the original by leaving the bottom box unchecked, the program will make a copy of the photo, alter it, and then save it in the same location as your original with the word CUSTOM in the title.
  

This program is easy to use and you can re-size a large amount of photos at once saving lots of time. I can now re-size upwards of 50+ photos in the time it used to take me to do just 1. Please contact me through forum private messaging if you have any questions and I will try to help. Good Luck!

Edited July 25, 2013 by shadetree77 (see edit history)

[dei]

Robert,

Thanks for taking the time to post this information!

Now that I have my computer back up & running, will take the time I need tonight and give it the old college try (I'm somewhat of a visual learner...).

After asking you about resizing your pictuers originally, we had a bad storm hit and even though I have my equipment on a battery back-up/surge protection unit, it blew the power supply in the computer after a REALLY close lightning strike! At first I though it was totally fried and would lose everything! Fortunately that was not the case but my "I T" guy was away with family obligations. Did find out that my Windows Vista 32 bit system will soon be obsolete in about 9 months to a year.....

Here I go, just when I start to get comfortable using it, now another change!

(definately showing my age I guess...)

Many thanks again.

[MrEarl]

Thanks for the great tutorial Robert. Especially the part of how to re-size multiple photos at one time. Any thoughts from the members of this being made a sticky? The General Forum seems to get overloaded on sticky's is why I ask. There is already an old and somewhat technically outdated thread in the Me and My Buick forum titled "Inserting Photos into Your Text". Perhaps this could be moved in to take the place of that and new that subject revisited. Thoughts?

[BUKE]

Thanks shadetree for showing us. It something i was having trouble with.

Have a great BUICK day

FRANK (Buke)

[Eric W]

I think this is a good one to make sticky in either location. I've resized photos quite a bit, generally to 450-800 pixels wide for REAL fast uploads & downloads. At that smaller size, to not lose the "goodie" that you're taking the picture of, I first crop the useless background, then resize. So though the picture is smaller, often times, the gizmo that is the intent of the picture is bigger.

So if it's just a couple of photos of a detailed subject, I'd recommend crop then resize. If it's a whole bunch of photos (like at a car show or something), where you've already done a good job (maybe) of sizing the subject in the image, then the many-at-one-time method could be the better way to go.

[hotrod1940]

For the Apple crowd, double clicking any photo will bring up Preview that comes with Macs. Go to tools, image size, and it is the the same as Robert described above to resize by size or pixel.

Also add Preview to the dock and you can drag and drop a folder of photos and they will all open in preview. Do a command A to select all and do the process above. it will resize all of then and when you close it will ask if you want to save all. say yes and you are done.

It is a good idea to make a copy of the original size folder before resizing.

[smithbrother]

Robert,

Nice info to know, Thanks for posting such. BUT!

Where did you find that 41 with the ORIGINALLY INTENDED hood ornament, those sectioned bumper guards, and the 42 upper lic. plate bar? I don't recall 17" wheels as an option either...., also where are those door handles anyway?

Strange owner I bet,

Dale in Indy

[smithbrother]

YOU, are such an INFORMATIVE fellow.

We are lucky to have you and the Mrs.

Dale in Indy

[Thriller]

Another possibility is many cameras come with software for photo editing. I've had Olympus cameras for a long time now and find their editing software quite nice, although it isn't as tidy for doing a large number of images. It does give a lot of control for cropping and such.

Frankly, I do find that 1024x768 is a good enough size for the forum. Anything bigger starts to consume bandwidth without a whole lot of extra value...of course, that is just my opinion.

Thanks for putting together the tutorial Robert.

[Terry Wiegand]

Give that man a thousand 'Attaboys"!! These are the kind of instructions that even a dufus can understand. I keep tellin' everybody that one of these days all of this high tech stuff is gonna murder high tech. And then where will we be? OH WELL. Terry Wiegand Doo Dah America

[Guest Skyking]

Robert, thank you for this info!! I have a Sony Cybershot camera that's a few years old and never have a problem posting photos because the size isn't an issue. Before driving to Macungie I grabbed my wife's new Sony Cybershot she got as a gift and the photos are now over sized for posting. Newer is not always better...........thanks again!!

[MrEarl]

Bob, can't you (or your wife since it is her camera) select what size pictures the camera takes by going to Menu - Image Mode?

[Guest Skyking]

Bob, can't you (or your wife since it is her camera) select what size pictures the camera takes by going to Menu - Image Mode?

Lamar, I probably can but I find this new camera has more bells and whistles than a new Lacrosse. Way too confusing for me. I see an ebay sale coming........... I'll stick to my older model.

Bob

[dei]

After the helpful information posted here, thought I might post what has finally worked for me.

My new Nikon takes beautiful quality pictures, downloads fine but... way too big for Forum posting. Like Skyking has said, lots of reading the manual to figure how to change the size taken so...

I found that emailing the picture to myself, then saving it in a temporary file automatically reduces the picture size that works for Forum posting. I don't replace the original and choose to save both (just in case?) and then move it to the file associated with the subject. It would be a "pia" to do many pictures this way but for me, usually posing only a few, works.

Just thought I'd add this as the other ways did not seem to work for me (might be my technically challenged mind).

[Larry Schramm]

Thanks for making this an easy exercise. I was going through another program and it was much more cumbersome. :-)