# Small, high defenition photos on the internet



## TH0001 (Sep 19, 2007)

I use a Nikon D40x and always shoot in (Fine) mode (3700x2400ish, 10.4 mp). The pictures look incrediable at full size, but when I shrink them down, I loose quality (obviously).

If I shrink to 640-480 it looks like I took the picture with a Point N' Shoot. I have tried resizing using Photoshop, Paint Shop Pro, compressing, etc. How do guys like Clark (and many others) get such high quality photos in such small sizes?

I have though of loading a larger photo to my host (photobucket). Here is the difference between a full sized photo loaded and one that was resized.

Full Sized









Manually resized and uploaded









The full sized one seems better, but is there anything I can do to better capture the detail of the images?


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## Bigpikle (May 21, 2007)

use Photoshop and change the image size manually - you shouldnt see any visible difference that way. I've done it many thousands of times....

Dont leave it to your photo hosting site as they will use all sorts of crap algorithms to squeeze it as small as possible with usually aweful results eg Youtube video compression :lol:.

The top one looks to be much darker than the bottom one and there is no reason why that should happen due to image size? You can get 'jaggies' (straight lines looking all jagged) if you remove too much data when you change the size, but it looks like some image adjustments have been changed/lost?

If you add any layers to your images make sure you 'flatten image' before chamnging to jpeg files or exporting smaller sizes etc.

Maybe a better PS whiz will come with more ideas but that doesnt look like the result of resizing to me


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## -ROM- (Feb 23, 2007)

They look fine to me, both look as sharp and have as mch detail as you're ever going to get at that size. If you really want them to jump off the screen then sharpness is pretty much irrelevant at these sizes, you need to focus on nailing the exposure properly. Your exposure is ALMOST perfect but the magical effect i think you're looking for only really shows when you 100% nail it. 

Also snce you have so few pixels why are you wasting your image real estate with so much background, crop closer to the car.


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## TH0001 (Sep 19, 2007)

Here is super sized


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## parish (Jun 29, 2006)

Experiment with the various types of interpolation when resizing - Bi-linear, Bi-cubic, SINC Lanczos3, etc.

The latter tends to produce "jaggies" on straight lines and interference patterns on things like tiled roofs. Bi-cubic is a good choice.


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## TH0001 (Sep 19, 2007)

Bigpikle said:


> use Photoshop and change the image size manually - you shouldnt see any visible difference that way. I've done it many thousands of times....
> 
> Dont leave it to your photo hosting site as they will use all sorts of crap algorithms to squeeze it as small as possible with usually aweful results eg Youtube video compression :lol:.
> 
> ...


Thanks for the response. So you feel that manually resizing the photos (vs. letting a host do it) is the best result. I know what you mean by jaggies.

Any image adjust meant was done (I agree that the top is darker) in the resizing process, I didn't touch anything else. Wierd, huh.


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## TH0001 (Sep 19, 2007)

Here is full sized


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## -ROM- (Feb 23, 2007)

Before:










After:


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## TH0001 (Sep 19, 2007)

btw, wish me luck guys. That is an original paint Ferrari Boxer that (in the last year and half) has had over 100 hours of detailing done to it in preparation for a very large all Ferrari Concours event a week from yesterday. 

Minus the tires (tyres  ) it is 100% original.


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## TH0001 (Sep 19, 2007)

rmorgan84 said:


> Before:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


You cropped it to save pixels, correct? It looks sharper, but a little oranger, if you will.


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## -ROM- (Feb 23, 2007)

TH0001 said:


> You cropped it to save pixels, correct? It looks sharper, but a little oranger, if you will.


yeah you've got 640 pixels to play with so use the for the main subject. As for the colour it could be a little out i'm using my new 24" apple cinema display and not got round to calibrating it as yet.


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## Bigpikle (May 21, 2007)

what are the images saved as from the outset?

if you save them as a jpg then they are already compressed, and every time you open and resave them you are losing more and more information. Best to use a relatively lossless format like TIFF files that wont suffer in the same way. Keep the original as a TIFF or PSD file and ONLY save a resized/cropped final output as a jpg file. That way you preserve as much info as possible and only compress it at the end.


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## Gary-360 (Apr 26, 2008)

How about this one/:


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## -ROM- (Feb 23, 2007)

Gary-360 said:


> How about this one/:


looks good, but i'm not a massive fan of blurring the backgrounds in post production, it make the cars look like miniature toys.


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## Bigpikle (May 21, 2007)

^^ looks over sharpened to me - jaggies on the highlights on doors, wings & wheels etc Has some serious 'pop' to it though :thumb:


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## TH0001 (Sep 19, 2007)

Gary-360 said:


> How about this one/:


I think it looks amazing, a little 'rough' on the front fender, but wow it pops. Did you use photoshop? (I really need to invest time with this program)


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## TH0001 (Sep 19, 2007)

Bigpikle said:


> what are the images saved as from the outset?
> 
> if you save them as a jpg then they are already compressed, and every time you open and resave them you are losing more and more information. Best to use a relatively lossless format like TIFF files that wont suffer in the same way. Keep the original as a TIFF or PSD file and ONLY save a resized/cropped final output as a jpg file. That way you preserve as much info as possible and only compress it at the end.


I shoot them in fine JPEG. When I save them on the computer should I save them as TIFF (is this possible) or should I shoot in RAW?

I REALLY appericate everybodies help so far!!!


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## TH0001 (Sep 19, 2007)

Here is my best shot...


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## Bigpikle (May 21, 2007)

TH0001 said:


> I shoot them in fine JPEG. When I save them on the computer should I save them as TIFF (is this possible) or should I shoot in RAW?
> 
> I REALLY appericate everybodies help so far!!!


if you dont mind the extra step involved in RAW shooting, and have a bit of skill using the RAW converter, then that is by far the best choice. As RAW is just 'data' you can do most image adjustments on the raw data (white balance, exposure correction etc) without causing any drop in quality. Once converted to a jpg there has been compression and its like 'developing' a negative, so further editing always involves some form of destructive process.

RAW is superb, but will be a little extra learning and time, but once you have the hang of it, really is not very much.

If you dont use RAW, then I would save your jpgs as either TIFFs, or PSD if you use PS anyway. Then keep them in that format and just export jpgs as needed for uploading, clients etc


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## Gary-360 (Apr 26, 2008)

TH0001 said:


> I think it looks amazing, a little 'rough' on the front fender, but wow it pops. Did you use photoshop? (I really need to invest time with this program)


It is a little rough as I used the quick select tool in CS3, not very accurate. It was then inverted to select the background, filter>gaussian blurr @ 30px with a feather of 10px; deselect, re-sized to 800px in length then sharpened with USM.

It's a love or hate effect 

Gary


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## TH0001 (Sep 19, 2007)

Bigpikle said:


> if you dont mind the extra step involved in RAW shooting, and have a bit of skill using the RAW converter, then that is by far the best choice. As RAW is just 'data' you can do most image adjustments on the raw data (white balance, exposure correction etc) without causing any drop in quality. Once converted to a jpg there has been compression and its like 'developing' a negative, so further editing always involves some form of destructive process.
> 
> RAW is superb, but will be a little extra learning and time, but once you have the hang of it, really is not very much.
> 
> If you dont use RAW, then I would save your jpgs as either TIFFs, or PSD if you use PS anyway. Then keep them in that format and just export jpgs as needed for uploading, clients etc


A couple more for you...

Does photoshop work with RAW (I undertand that each company uses a different raw file) in that I can shoot in raw and transfer them directly into photoshop...

OR

Do I need a seperate convertor to pre edit the file before up loading into photoshop?

Also, I believe you are saying (assuming I don't use RAW) that the camera will save them in JPG (to the camera) and I should safe them in a TIFF file (from the camera to the computer) until I am done editing them, correct? Thanks for all your help BP!


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## Gary-360 (Apr 26, 2008)

You can use PS if you have the correct RAW plugin, it's ACR 4.3.1 for your camera.


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## TH0001 (Sep 19, 2007)

Tried again


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## TH0001 (Sep 19, 2007)

Gary-360 said:


> It is a little rough as I used the quick select tool in CS3, not very accurate. It was then inverted to select the background, filter>gaussian blurr @ 30px with a feather of 10px; deselect, re-sized to 800px in length then sharpened with USM.
> 
> It's a love or hate effect
> 
> Gary


I have no idea what you just said


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## Gary-360 (Apr 26, 2008)

TH0001 said:


> I have no idea what you just said


:lol:

Get PS and you'll understand soon enough


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## brad mole (Sep 19, 2008)

not sure if its been mentioned before in the thread but i use irfanview to do mine, i find it very useful and easy to use especially for batch resizing pics.

download_link


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## Bigpikle (May 21, 2007)

TH0001 said:


> A couple more for you...
> 
> Does photoshop work with RAW (I undertand that each company uses a different raw file) in that I can shoot in raw and transfer them directly into photoshop...
> 
> ...


As Gary already said, PS has its own RAW converter programme. If you open a RAW file using PS, it actually opens a different window (Adobe Camera RAW - ACR) that lets you make adjustments to the way the RAW file is 'developed' and when you are ready, you click to export the image and it will then open in PS.

Yes to your other question - Once you opened a jpg file from your camera in any editing software, save it again as a TIFF file or a PSD file if you use PS. No need to save files as a TIFF etc if you aren't going to edit them or touch them in any way. Simply opening and closing a file isnt an issue with a JPG, but if you actually 'save' the file, even if just with a different name etc, you are compressing it again. If you are saving JPGs with max quality etc its not a big issue unless you save the file over and over again, but its a good habit to get into.

HTH


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## MEg-LitU (Sep 26, 2008)

TH0001 said:


> Full Sized


well, if I'm allowed:

_Manually resized and uploaded by you_









Just resized it and had a little sharp










and if the photo was mine, it will look like this:


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## Gary-360 (Apr 26, 2008)

The road tax is now over a year out of date


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