Hi Photo experts,

I have a question regarding digital image resizing. I always resize my digital photos for Ebay insertion from their original 1280x960 pixels down to 40% of that size or aproximately 500x300 pixels for quicker loading.

I did that today with three photos from my son's play in order to send them in a e-mail. I saved them at the 500X300 size. However the image quality was sharply reduced.

My problem is I can't figure out how to get back to the original size and quality. If I try to increase the pixels up to the original it just zooms in on the image making it closer/larger but with the same lack of sharpness.

I had reduced them with photo shop editor. Please HELP, as the images have already been deleted from the camera.

Revert doesn't work perhaps because the computer was turned off after I saved them. All I want is the original sharpness & quality, I don't care what size the file is.

Thanks for any help as I am so upset about one photo in particular that was the only shot I had of the Scarecrow (my son) & Toto, (he was in the "Wiz")

If you don't want to post an suggestion, then please E-mail me any help.

Thanks,
Donna

Donna

Sorry Donna - when you work on the original raw image there's nothing you can do to make it larger and maintain the original quality once you've made it smaller.

A good lesson for all of us digital photographers

1. DOWNLOAD Start by creating a folder on your hard drive called - "raw images" then when you move the images from your digital camera to your hard drive, create a new folder within using the date as the folder name. Move all the images from the camera into that dated folder.

2. READ ONLY Now open that dated folder and do a select all (CTRL-A). Right click on one of the images in the group and choose 'Properties'. At the bottom of that window, click on the empty box "Read Only". This will prevent you from overwriting these files.

3. SAVE AS Anytime you work on an image to modify it in any way, always do a "Save As" and not a "Save". I create a new folder within the dated one called "Edited Images".

4. BACKUP If you've got a rewriteable CDROM drive, copy those raw images off periodically. Just because you've made them "Read Only" doesn't mean a crash can't destroy your entire batch of digital photos.


[This message has been edited by JChidester (edited 03-10-2002).]

[This message has been edited by JChidester (edited 03-10-2002).]

[This message has been edited by JChidester (edited 03-10-2002).]

[This message has been edited by JChidester (edited 03-10-2002).]

Well MAYBE there is a way to get back something. Print your smaller image at the highest quality setting and using a high gloss photo paper.

Then scan the printed image at the highest quality setting your scanner is capable of.

Give that a try or email me the image and I'll give it a try for you.

0 :>) St. John of the Internet

Hi DeDo,

John is the bearer of sad but accurate news. I never do anything to alter my original files (although mine are usually digital scans of a 35 mm slide)other than perhaps rotating and cropping to level a horizon. Any modified file should always be stored using a different file name. I assume that you're talking about jpeg files, which is what most digital cameras save the images as. Jpegs are already a compressed format and resizing them downward frequently has the sort of negative effect on quality (resolution) that you've mentioned. It may be possible to partially reconstitute the images - no guarantees here - by converting them to fractal files (.stn extension and requiring a Genuine Fractals 2.0 plug-in to do this) and resize upward, save as a TIFF or BMP file, and then applying unsharp masking to give the visual appearance of a sharper image. This won't restore the original sharpness, but it may help insofar as an image on the computer screen is concerned. This process won't help you to get a sharp print of the image. If you want to e-mail me the shot of your Scarecrow I'd be happy to try to do what I can to get you a somewhat better looking file.




[This message has been edited by lighthouse_photo (edited 03-10-2002).]

I see John and I are at it at the same time... Sorry John about duplicating some of your suggestions... your second post beat me to it!



[This message has been edited by lighthouse_photo (edited 03-10-2002).]

Donna, being the clutz that I am, I would bring and use 2 cameras, at least for those irreplaceable photos. If you mess up the digital images you would have the film images to fall back on. Of course not even that is 100%. One time I took photos of my son's Cross Country team that were going to be used for a special purpose. I took them to a photo lab instead of K-Mart or the drug store hoping to get the best possible pictures. Well, they messed up and ruined my film. I was so upset, they were some I just couldn't duplicate.

It's probably been said, always start with the highest resolution for those important shots. TIFF or RAW and uncompressed, never compress an original image! I save all of my original shots on two different CDR Cd-roms. Any adjusting, tweaking, etc... I do from there comes from my original uncompressed photos from the CDs. JPEGs are fine for the internet but forget that format when it comes to developing enlarged photographs. I readily develop TIFF images that are 11x17 and about 54 megs in size that challenge any daytime shots that a 35mm can produce.

The easy way to think of this if your a 35mm user, you can't get ISO 50 shots if you choose to use ISO 400 film. Think of pixels as grain in film emulsion!


[This message has been edited by SThompson (edited 03-10-2002).]

Donna. I've been working on the image you sent me. You can do this step.

Open the image in Photoshop. Choose IMAGE/SIZE and change the PRINT SIZE to 5" wide. Keep the resolution at 300 dpi.

Now view this image in PRINT SIZE. If you have a color printer, print out the image using the highest quality and highest paper. The image I got with an older Epson Stylus 800 was suitable for framing. If you put the picture a foot from your eye, you will notice some blurring, but if you put the picture on the piano with the others, it looks fine.

I'll try scanning this image tomorrow and see what happens.

Hi everyone,

Thanks for all the tips & help. John, I went to print out your version on HP glossy 4x6 got it jammed, right now I can't get the printer cartridge to move. Tried all the un- jamming, rebooting etc. Got to wait for the Scarecrow to wake up tomorrow to try some other stuff.

I plan on printing out all the tips (once I get the printer up again).

Sue, I did have three cameras for his performances. I'm too paranoid about missing photos to trust just one camera. It was just that the dog's handler was leaving the school with Toto after the matinee and the digital was the first camera I grabbed. The shot was fine it was the afterwards that I messed up.

I think I like my 35mm stuff at least you always have a negative to try again.

I'll always look at that cute picture and remember how litle I knew about digital photography. I guess I had it in my head that if you went larger you lost sharpness like blowing up a negative to 11x14 size. Didn't realize that reducing the size did the same thing.

I'm sure between Gary & John's help I'll have a decent photo!

Donna

Sounds like you should wind up all right, Donna. I don't know about John, but he seems to know what he's talking about. I do know about Gary, though, and definitely between the two of them, you should wind up fine. Good luck!

Donna there are programs that can rescue pictures deleted off a digital card. Luckily I`ve never had to use the program.I`ll post a link for the free program.


terry

Here`s the home of the freeware.
http://home.arcor.de/christian_grau/dir/index.html

terry