photo size

[ccgirl48]

I have been trying to make flipcharts that include photos of my children. When I import the photos the pictures are very large, both in file size and actual size within the flipchart. This makes my flipcharts into absolutely massive documents. Is there a way around this? :confused:

[kevhogg]

Hi CC
There are lots of different ways to do this and everyone has their own favourite way.

Check what sort of file your image is being saved as - it's usually a jpeg which is good for compression. Other formats may or may not produce bigger filesizes.

If you are going to be doing this on a regular basis I would get your school to invest in some image manipulation software so that you can crop/resize your snaps quickly and efficiently. If your institution is short of cash then do a search for free software. Most of this type software will also provide tools for lightening images - pictures can be a bit dark when projected onto the whiteboard.

As you have discovered when you take an image from a camera the filesize is pretty big (since they are intended for printing out) and it's a pain to resize manually a whole classful in AS (or AP). If you do have to do that - take a snapshot of the image with the camera tool. That will reduce the filesize enormously (see stats below).

You could use Paint (Windows - Programs>Accessories) to reduce each image. Use the Stretch/Skew option to get the size you want and resave as jpeg. The filesize should be much smaller.

If you want to do a whole batch at once you can let Windows Outlook Express do the work for you, if you have it. Select all your photos from their folder. Right click and (with Outlook Express loaded) choose send to mail recipient. Check that the 'Make all my pictures smaller' option is selected and send the email to yourself (you will see how much smaller they are in the email attachment box). When they come back save the pics to a different folder so you can load them into AS or AP.

Best of luck.

Stats:
Original Photo (5.6mb) - resized and saved as flipchart (4.31mb) - snapped with the camera tool to one quarter screen size and saved as flipchart (92kb)

Same photo resized in Paint by a factor of 10% (8.9kb)
Same photo resized by Outlook Express (34kb) - saved as a flipchart (36kb)

[rexboggs5]

I use Photoshop to enhance and re-size photos. But an impressive free alternative is Picasa, which is a combination of free software and a website: http://picasa.google.com/

It probably does more than you need, but it is worth checking out nonetheless.

Cheers

Rex

[kevhogg]

Agree with you Rex - Photoshop is King of the imaging jungle. Pricey but a good discount for educational use.

Another alternative is paint.net - free to download.

[markrobinson]

Another easy trick...Check the quality/pixel size setting on the camera... BEFORE you take the pics...

There will almost certainly be a setting that allows "lower resolution" images to be saved.. This eliminates the need to process them. If you are not planning to print them at highest quality - then this is perfect for general flipchart and website use.

The Immediate advantage is if you set it to 800x600 or 640x480 (which may be offered) - they will easily drop into a flipchart.

They are also much, much smaller file size perhaps 100-200K each and you will be able to get several times more of them on the Camera - hundreds instead of a couple of dozen - great for a fieldtrip.

Also - if the projector is only displaying 1024 x768 pixels.... then all those extra camera pixels will never be seen. I used an 800x600 max camera for all my school digital work - never needed more.

[ccgirl48]

thanks for the suggestions. I will do some playing and figure out what works best.