Confused about resizing

[christal]

I am really confused on resizing. What size pixels do I use for resizing to a 8x10, 5x7 etc. I have downloaded FastStone Photo Resizer. Has anyone used this before to resize? Thanks!

I don't resize.... ever.

Let the software for the printer figure it out, besides, the larger and therefore more detailed the image you start with, the better the out come when it's printed.

[fletch]

Just crop to the correct ratio, don't worry about resolution of pixels or DPI/PPI.

If you want a 7x 5 photo then the width needs to be 7/5ths the height, in pixels. So if you have a photo that is 2500 pixles high it needs to be 3500 wide. For an 8x10 a 3500px wide image will need to be 2800 high etc etc. Most software lets you set the crop ratio as you want it. Just ensure you don't set a specific resolution and crop ratio together as that may re-size your photos.

Originally Posted by maxharvard

I don't resize.... ever.

Sometimes it is better to resize yourself. Like if your posting online or emailing. You don't want to let upload programes do it as more often than not they will screw it up. Printing is a different matter though.

[dcclark]

You never need to *resize* for printing. You may need to *crop* (trim off one side or another) to get things into the correct aspect ratio -- which fletch covered nicely.

Leave as many pixels in as you can. Your printer (or an online service) will gladly squeeze all of your pixels into the correct size -- the more the merrier. Photos do NOT have an inherent "size" at which they can print -- pixels can be squeezed or stretched into many different print sizes.

Originally Posted by fletch

Sometimes it is better to resize yourself. Like if your posting online or emailing. You don't want to let upload programes do it as more often than not they will screw it up. Printing is a different matter though.

I was referring to printing. Not online stuff, no one wants to down load a 10 meg file of my cat

[Jamfke]

Ooh, ooh, I do, I do!

[wulf]

Are you printing the photos yourself? It may be worth thinking about resizing, especially if you have control over all the variables. For example, at what DPI setting will you be printing? If your printer produces excellent results at 300dpi, then an 8"x10" photo would ideally require an image at 2400x3000 pixels (multiply the number of dots by the number of inches).

A particular reason for doing this would be sharpening, which gets smudged in the process of resizing. Get your image to the right size for printing and then apply the final sharpening. Also, you want to make sure you have enough pixels. The biggest size that comes out of my D40 is 2000x3008 (slightly more with RAW photos but not by much). That means that the highest resolution I could print one of my pictures for an 8"x10" result would be 250dpi (2000 / 8). To be honest, that should be plenty but the lack of resolution might become more noticeable if I wanted a 16"x20" result and also means I have to be careful in cropping for composition if I want to print any of my photos.

Wulf