I just got a digital camera for Christmas. I need some help posting pictures from the camera onto the website. They are always more than 100000 bytes. I also have a scanner, so I am wondering how to put pictures onto the site from my computer. They are always too large. The camera is a 3.2 megapixel Vivitar.
Thanks, and I’ll be posting like crazy as soon as I figure it all out.
Well lets see…here is a couple of things to do..
1) take picture on it’s lowest setting this will help..
2) crop and size your pic and save it in your computer..remember 450 pixils on it’s largest side.
once saved to your computer go in and post a message in the forum of your choice,
after your post is typed in leave the box checked that says “I want to preview my post and/or attach a file” then there will be a box marked “browse” click this and it will take you to “your computer”
select the picture you want to post by clicking on it, this will put the picture in the browse box…
click continue and your all done….
http://www.irfanview.com/
not to contradict ECNOOK he knows what hes talking about…
but I always shoot in the highest quality mode… if you ever want to print your shots dont waste those MPs you paid to get on your digital camera….. the link I posted above will get you to some software that does a great job reducing your shots to internet size so you can post them.. if you reduce size to 6480 x 480 you will nearly always get your size down to the correct size….
if you take your pix at low res they will never look good printed…. but they will still look good on the internet if you take them high res and reduce them…. why take the chance?
How about those scanned pictures? I’v been trying to get decent results and stay under 100k. The 2 choices are to reduce the pixels/inch or go with 8 bit color. I have to get below 100p/inch at true color on a well cropped image or go with 8 bit color at something over 100p/inch to stay under 100k. Either way the images look lousy. Also, is the 100k limit before or after JGEG compression?
RiverEyes, your photo of the squirrel is only 65,000 bytes,is that due to the software?
I know a lot of the problem is I carry a disposable camera and most of my fishing partners are lousy photographers but I’m trying to salvage some pictures so I need help!
Rivereyes has nailed it right on the head…that is the BEST way to do pix…
but…
The quick way would still be to take the pix on it’s lowest setting…all my pix are taken on the lowest setting on my camera(Olympus 2.3 Mega Pixel)then all I do is crop and post..thats it…
But if you want the excellent quality that Rivereyes has, most definitely take the pix on the cameras highest setting…
Some day I have to have Rivereyes give me a class in photo editing…
and i’m guessing that that is a type error..6480 x 480
s/b 480 x 480 
I can help…
Producing good quality images at a small file size for sharing on the web comes down to having the needed software to adjust compression rates. One of the more common pieces used is PhotoShop in one of its various versions. I use PhotoShop 6.0. Setting your camera to the lowest setting will work but it won’t allow you the option to print the photos later should that need arise.
Here’s what I do. I take all my photos at a medium resolution setting. I’ve compared print quality between the medium and high settings and can see no real noticeable difference so to save space on my memory cards, I opt for the medium.
After taking the photo, the file needs to be transfered to my pc and opened in PhotoShop. Once in PhotoShop, I crop out any material that is unnecessary to the subject matter of the photo (or might give away where I was fishing when I caught that last piggie 
).
Next I resize the image to a max PIXEL dimension of 450. Why 450 and not leave it at the 1200 pixels as it comes off the camera? Most monitors are set to display 800 horizontal pixels and no more. I don’t want to force people to have to scroll up and down to see the whole image AND the large pixel size (sometimes refered to as PHYSICAL size) will result in an unnecessarily large file size that will require long download times.
Last, I mess with the amount of compression used when saving the file. I’m looking for a balance of quality and file size. In PhotoShop, I use the “save for web” option. This feature gives me access to an easy to use “slide bar” that I can play with to achieve that balance of quality and size. Once I’m happy with this balance, I chose a file name and save it to my hard drive.
I have included a screen capture of the “save for web” feature in photoshop. Notice I have the “quality” setting on the slide bar set to 60%. The resulting image from that setting will be posted immediately below followed by a second file, same image, saved at a quality setting of 30%.
Compare the quality of the two photos? How much difference can you see between them? Not much in my opinion and the second photo is a little less than half the file size of the first.
So… the answer is software. To post good quality photos on the web and have control of the file size, you need to lay hands on some software that will allow you to adjust the amount of compression used before saving the file.
Likely people are reading this and thinking the whole process sounds complicated and time consuming. It is not. Once you know your way around the software, an image can be sized, adjusted for color and contrast, brightened/darkened and saved for web in about a minute.
Any other questions, just holler.
Screen Shot – Save For Web Feature
Quality Setting @ 60% – File Size = 60Kb
Quality Setting @ 30% – File Size = 26Kb
For scanned photos you just skip all the messing with settings on the camera and start the process at the scannr bed. I would suggest scanning them in at a high resolution setting and using the software for the intended purpose of down-sizing and adusting quality / file size.
Ahh..HA!!
I wondered if you guys ever cropped some of the background on those awesome trophy shots!! 
As someone thinking of making the jump to digital photography this site is proving very helpful as always!!
Thanks,
Chris
Ken, Dave, and James, using all your good explainations, that was a good review on resizing pictures and file sizes. Thanks guys, Jack.
Very clear posts guys. It does sound complicated…but if I can do it anyone can. About the only thing differant than I do that H20 is I don’t bother with looking at the pixal size (maybe I should and maybe it’s just my software) I go by file size. Scale it to anything below 100k use the “save as” feature…one for the net or email one for printing if I need to.
For use on this site one wouldn’t even need to change the dimensions / size of the image as I have in place a limitation on display size. Anything uploaded larger than 500 pixels will be “constrained” down to 500 pixels max in the width dimension. When that happens, it affects the appearance of the image. It basically looks a little blurry and “scrunched.” So, to avoid this I just size ’em and save the extra file size and avoid the display limitations built into the upload feature of the site. But as long as it’s under 100 K, it will upload to the site.
Thanks a lot for all of your help. I figured out the digital camera and scanner pictures. Here is a scanned picture of a 13″ July crappie. 
on the subject of picture resolution… first you must understand that Im dealing in the professional arena… for me there is NO alternative but to shoot everything at MAX resolution… the digital Rebel from Canon has a 6.1MP resolution…. what do you get out of all those MP? well.. thats where you get the ability to ZOOM in… there is TONS of detail hidden in the photo that you wont see in an internet shot… or a normal 4×6 print….. James is of course quite correct.. for most of your prints you will NOT be able to see a difference in your MP size… Ive heard that a 2MP size is sufficient to print an 8×10 print… in my book it would be BARELY sufficient.. and thats with ZERO cropping…. and when you get into photo manipulation you can often use those extra pixels to bring out hidden colors or sharpness or other things…. but for the most part you DONT need them… still if your taking the pic of a lifetime… of the trophy of a lifetime… your going to want all the detail you can get.. cuz your probably going to want a really large print….. so two things you get from high resolution shots are LARGE prints… and the ability to digital ZOOM or CROP….. if your not going to do those things then shoot in a medium resolution… using the correct software conversion Ive had no problem converting my 6.1 MP shots down to internet size to post on this site….. they look pretty good to me… and Im pretty picky about such things…..
Beautifully done!
What kind of digi camera do you have? Does it have a mulit-point focus feature? The reason I ask, and please don’t take this as me being critical of your photo as I think it’s great, is that many digi cameras offer a feature that will keep multiple points in the photo in focus. My cheap little cyber shot p-71 does a good job of this and it’s as simple to set up as browsing the menu options and selecting multi-point vs. center/single point focus. What that will do for you is keep the fish AND your face in focus in most instances. Pretty darn neat actually.
This is a good tip for all anglers as we typically hold our catches out in front of us and most cameras will focus on that point unless set to do otherwise and leave objects slightly in the background (our smiling mugs) out of focus.
Gotta’ see those smiles guys! 
To be sure the guys need to understand that my approach detailed above focuses on web use first and foremost. I also have a ultra-high end digi and would offer completely different advice should people plan on using their shots in catalogs, photo contests, etc. and my approach mirors yours almost word for word.
Quote:
on the subject of picture resolution… first you must understand that Im dealing in the professional arena… for me there is NO alternative but to shoot everything at MAX resolution… the digital Rebel from Canon has a 6.1MP resolution…. what do you get out of all those MP? well.. thats where you get the ability to ZOOM in… there is TONS of detail hidden in the photo that you wont see in an internet shot… or a normal 4×6 print….. James is of course quite correct.. for most of your prints you will NOT be able to see a difference in your MP size… Ive heard that a 2MP size is sufficient to print an 8×10 print… in my book it would be BARELY sufficient.. and thats with ZERO cropping…. and when you get into photo manipulation you can often use those extra pixels to bring out hidden colors or sharpness or other things…. but for the most part you DONT need them… still if your taking the pic of a lifetime… of the trophy of a lifetime… your going to want all the detail you can get.. cuz your probably going to want a really large print….. so two things you get from high resolution shots are LARGE prints… and the ability to digital ZOOM or CROP….. if your not going to do those things then shoot in a medium resolution… using the correct software conversion Ive had no problem converting my 6.1 MP shots down to internet size to post on this site….. they look pretty good to me… and Im pretty picky about such things…..
geeee… I “sit” corrected on the issue of megapixels… heres an article on how a mars robot is using a 1MP camera that kicks the cr@p out of any of our digitals…. kind of interesting… seems size of pixel and CCD and quality of lens are really the biggest factors for picture quality…
of course I think they are still talking digital display rather than printing… so that WOULD make sense….. I have to believe that printing is another matter…. though there is NO substitute for quality of original picture…. Ive come to find out the myth of how post processing with photoshop can correct “anything”… in the hands of an expert… I can truthfully say that taint so… you might be able to make something terrible into something not too good…. or something not too good into something below average…. but you cant really make the jump from bad shot to good shot.. the reason is that a bad shot is simply lacking the colors, contrast and focus of a good shot.. and there is nothing that can put those in… since they were never there to begin with…..
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