Holidays means photos, and there's nothing that can stop you in recording memories specially now that they can be stored digitally on a stick without worrying about the cost. But the temptation to share it to the world through social media or emails can be hindered by sluggish upload, specially when your photos are taken with a high resolution camera. Not to mention the bandwidth your ISP provides, as they usually deliver lower digits for uploads compared that for the download. This means the speed when you are uploading is just a quarter or less than when you are downloading..
To compensate on this situation, one of the solution is to reduce the file size of the load. You might already be thinking of photoshop or other premium paid for application, but believe it or not, you do not need one to do this. It is already built in to every windows computer, an under rated application that in fact the most common tool that I use when I open up my laptop.
This is under the accessories (1)on earlier versions of windows up to windows 7 and can be accessed using the search function(2) on windows 8 and newer versions by typing paint or mspaint.
The Paint application is a "basic" photo editing program built in to every windows operating system. Though it can't do extensive editing task that other premium apps can, reducing file size of a picture with it is very easy. Here's are the steps.
Another way is whilst paint is active, you can load the photos by using it's built in browser, click the dropdown menu at the top left corner(9), open, choose the correct folder(10) and the correct photo file(11), then open.
The good thing about using paint when reducing file size is, it renders the original size of the picture. Not like other applications that pictures are automatically rendered to fit the screen, no matter how large the file size is.
Below is an original picture size using Irfanview. I can also use this program to reduce it's size but because it is rendered full blown, it will be hard to know how many pixels or percentage I am going to reduce it to.
The paint version might not be attractive at first as it shows the raw size of the image. This rendering is very useful and the the information below, size of the file(A) and the picture view percentage(B) are important in determining how far would you go to resize it without compromising the the picture's rendition..
Resizing is not just cropping though you can do this first to eliminate unwanted features. This also reduces the amount of pixels from the chopped portion. To find the suitable resize value, drag the slider(B) towards negative until the whole picture is fit to the viewer window. The resulting figure gives me 25%(D) of the original size. This means I can resize the photo down to 25 % (1/4)of the original 2.6MB(C) size and still gives me a viewable picture. Note that at this stage the photo is not yet resized.
Click the resize button(12) and tick percentage(13), type the value(25) then click OK.
To see the correct rendition, slide the percentage to 100%(G), the whole picture at 187 KB(G)! As this file is way lighter than its original size, this will upload faster, uses less bandwidth, but the rendition will still be the same.
The only downside for this is when you are planning to further manipulate or enhance the image, smaller file is limited to what you can do so before you resize your photo's, it is recommended to make a backup of each picture you will be editing. I found out that creating another folder side by side to the original is easier, Just rename it any name you like, then from the original folder, copy the pictures you will be manipulating and paste on to the new folder.
To compensate on this situation, one of the solution is to reduce the file size of the load. You might already be thinking of photoshop or other premium paid for application, but believe it or not, you do not need one to do this. It is already built in to every windows computer, an under rated application that in fact the most common tool that I use when I open up my laptop.
The Paint Program
This is under the accessories (1)on earlier versions of windows up to windows 7 and can be accessed using the search function(2) on windows 8 and newer versions by typing paint or mspaint.
The Paint application is a "basic" photo editing program built in to every windows operating system. Though it can't do extensive editing task that other premium apps can, reducing file size of a picture with it is very easy. Here's are the steps.
- Load photo to paint.
There are many ways to do this, one is going directly to the picture folder where you keep the photos you are planning to upload . As you will be using the paint to edit the photos from this folder, it is more practical to set them all to open with paint. To do this, right click one of the pictures, and if you see that paint is not selected as default (4), click change, select pait(5), OK(6), then apply(7). Now, all files with the same extension as the recently changed default program will open with paint(8).
Another way is whilst paint is active, you can load the photos by using it's built in browser, click the dropdown menu at the top left corner(9), open, choose the correct folder(10) and the correct photo file(11), then open.
- Paint compared to other photo editors.
The good thing about using paint when reducing file size is, it renders the original size of the picture. Not like other applications that pictures are automatically rendered to fit the screen, no matter how large the file size is.
Below is an original picture size using Irfanview. I can also use this program to reduce it's size but because it is rendered full blown, it will be hard to know how many pixels or percentage I am going to reduce it to.
 |
| Rendered by IrfanView |
- Find Suitable Resize Value
Resizing is not just cropping though you can do this first to eliminate unwanted features. This also reduces the amount of pixels from the chopped portion. To find the suitable resize value, drag the slider(B) towards negative until the whole picture is fit to the viewer window. The resulting figure gives me 25%(D) of the original size. This means I can resize the photo down to 25 % (1/4)of the original 2.6MB(C) size and still gives me a viewable picture. Note that at this stage the photo is not yet resized.
- Resize.
Click the resize button(12) and tick percentage(13), type the value(25) then click OK.
The photo seemed too small(14) for the time because the viewer is still set to 25%(F). The size has been reduce to 187.KB from the original 2.6MB.
- Last Words
The only downside for this is when you are planning to further manipulate or enhance the image, smaller file is limited to what you can do so before you resize your photo's, it is recommended to make a backup of each picture you will be editing. I found out that creating another folder side by side to the original is easier, Just rename it any name you like, then from the original folder, copy the pictures you will be manipulating and paste on to the new folder.
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