Saving Images for the Web or E-Mail - Paint Shop Pro

It is considered a breach of "netiquette" to place high resolution files with little or no compression in e-mail or on web sites. Sizing and compressing pictures is easy in almost every image processing program or even viewer utilities.

Paint Shop Pro has an effective way to diminish the size of the image and an optimizer wizard that will help in compressing it to any target size.


Resizing the Image
To find Resize on the menu.
On the left is Resize on the Image menu. Select it and the requester below comes up.
The Resize dialogue
Under pixel dimensions enter a width. Generally a value between 480 and 640 width is polite. As long as "Maintain aspect ratio of:" is checked, Paint Shop Pro will enter the other dimension automatically. For Internet preparation, you can ignore "Percentage of original" and "Actual/print size". "Actual/print size" is only relevant if you are making prints. Resolution in dots per inch (dpi) is also of no relevance whatever for the Internet.


Optimizing and saving the compressed image
Under the File menu select "Export -> JPEG Optimizer..." and the optimization wizard will come up.
To find the Optimizer on the menu

The optimization wizard lets you set the amount of compression and therefore the size of the image file.
JPEG Optimizer
For a 480 pixel wide image, a size of 48K or less would be polite. Compare the image in the Compressed window with that in the Uncompressed window. Play with compression values until you have both an acceptable size and an acceptable image. Buttons between the windows allow you to zoom in or out on the images, and the cross in the very middle allows you to select the part of the picture you want to view
Save Copy As...

When you click OK on the wizard above, the standard "Save Copy As" dialogue box appears. Name the file and click on Save.

Note: This saves a COPY, leaving the original intact. When you close the original, PSP will ask if you want to save it. If you click "Yes" it will overwrite the original file on the disk.

Thanks to Grace Raboud for tolerating my photographic excesses when I am in her vicinity.

© Larry N. Bolch 2002