Reducing Photo File Size
September 14, 2005 11:52 AM Subscribe
What is the quickest way to reduce a .jpg file size? I am trying to upload photos to eBay and meet their requirements to stay under 1.2MB per file. I have a lot of photos and need to do this quick.
I would say either Mihov's Image Resizer (or similar image resizing program):
http://www.mihov.com/eng/ir.html
Or, if you want to keep the dimensions the same and just drop quality, using a batch image converter.
This one looks pretty good, but I've never used it. If you have photoshop this would also be pretty easy -- you could create a batch for that as well.
posted by ducksauce at 12:04 PM on September 14, 2005
http://www.mihov.com/eng/ir.html
Or, if you want to keep the dimensions the same and just drop quality, using a batch image converter.
This one looks pretty good, but I've never used it. If you have photoshop this would also be pretty easy -- you could create a batch for that as well.
posted by ducksauce at 12:04 PM on September 14, 2005
If you're using Windows, Microsoft has an image resizer that's a part of their PowerToys. Dead simple to use for basic batch resizing.
posted by zsazsa at 12:14 PM on September 14, 2005
posted by zsazsa at 12:14 PM on September 14, 2005
ImageMagick does this (and a hell of a lot more) without fuss even if you're using Windows.
posted by majick at 12:22 PM on September 14, 2005
posted by majick at 12:22 PM on September 14, 2005
IrfanView = teh best
posted by letterneversent at 12:23 PM on September 14, 2005
posted by letterneversent at 12:23 PM on September 14, 2005
Another vote for IrfanView, assuming you're using a windows OS
posted by de void at 12:34 PM on September 14, 2005
posted by de void at 12:34 PM on September 14, 2005
A 1.2MB .jpg is huge for the web. What dimensions (in pixels) are you starting from? Something unedited straight from a digital camera?
Just for example, pictures I use for ebay are typically reduced down to about 400-500 pixels in their longest dimension (and you can go a bit smaller than that without losing much) and maybe 50-60 KB file size. If you're not over-fussy about image quality you can get that down to 30-40 KB by turning up the compression a bit.
Without worrying about compression settings, I suspect that just by resizing to something sensible you'll get your images well within ebay's requirements. Many image editors have the ability to record actions or macros that can then be applied to, say, a whole directory of pictures. I second (third, fourth....) IrfanView. If you're using a Linux machine, there's Gimp.
posted by normy at 1:20 PM on September 14, 2005
Just for example, pictures I use for ebay are typically reduced down to about 400-500 pixels in their longest dimension (and you can go a bit smaller than that without losing much) and maybe 50-60 KB file size. If you're not over-fussy about image quality you can get that down to 30-40 KB by turning up the compression a bit.
Without worrying about compression settings, I suspect that just by resizing to something sensible you'll get your images well within ebay's requirements. Many image editors have the ability to record actions or macros that can then be applied to, say, a whole directory of pictures. I second (third, fourth....) IrfanView. If you're using a Linux machine, there's Gimp.
posted by normy at 1:20 PM on September 14, 2005
you might also think about lowering the number of colors in the picture, say from several million to 64K.
posted by moz at 1:33 PM on September 14, 2005
posted by moz at 1:33 PM on September 14, 2005
moz, reducing the number of colors in a JPG won't make it more compressible (in fact, it will make it less compressible due to either hard posterized edges or noisy dithering). Color reduction only really works with lossless formats like GIF or PNG.
posted by zsazsa at 1:52 PM on September 14, 2005
posted by zsazsa at 1:52 PM on September 14, 2005
It would be good to know what hardware and software tools you have at your disposal.
If you have a Mac, there's a free program called QuickImage that will let you resize all your photos at once by right-clicking them and going through some menus. If you have a PC and Photoshop, you can create a batch process where you, say, resize all your photos to 400px wide maximum and then do the "save for web" mojo to them. You can do them all at once with either of these programs. If you're in a bind, a lot of the rinkydink software that comes with cameras often has some variant of "email this picture" which will resize the picture to acceptable size limits [iPhoto also does this, I bet picasa does to] and you could do this and save your email as a draft and then dig the smaller pictures out that way.
posted by jessamyn at 3:14 PM on September 14, 2005
If you have a Mac, there's a free program called QuickImage that will let you resize all your photos at once by right-clicking them and going through some menus. If you have a PC and Photoshop, you can create a batch process where you, say, resize all your photos to 400px wide maximum and then do the "save for web" mojo to them. You can do them all at once with either of these programs. If you're in a bind, a lot of the rinkydink software that comes with cameras often has some variant of "email this picture" which will resize the picture to acceptable size limits [iPhoto also does this, I bet picasa does to] and you could do this and save your email as a draft and then dig the smaller pictures out that way.
posted by jessamyn at 3:14 PM on September 14, 2005
Check the resolution. If they are only for the web, they should not be higher than 75 dpi.
posted by wsg at 3:17 PM on September 14, 2005
posted by wsg at 3:17 PM on September 14, 2005
Photoshop (and photoshop LE (elements)) has a feature called "save for web" that will compress the file size greatly (with an adjustable amount) and give you a preview. It leaves the dimension alone, so you may want to cut the size down to 400 pixels wide (or less, I think ebay also has a size limit in pixels). Photoshop LE was like $80 at staples.
posted by 445supermag at 4:07 PM on September 14, 2005
posted by 445supermag at 4:07 PM on September 14, 2005
Graphic Converter for OSX -- Batch "Resize" under "Convert & Modify" in the File menu.
posted by squirrel at 4:15 PM on September 14, 2005
posted by squirrel at 4:15 PM on September 14, 2005
If you only need to do this once (or only for a 14 day period), I recommend Ulead Smartsaver Pro. If you want to use it forever, you need to buy it like I did.
posted by krisjohn at 5:38 PM on September 14, 2005
posted by krisjohn at 5:38 PM on September 14, 2005
Check the resolution. If they are only for the web, they should not be higher than 75 dpi.
The resolution has nothing at all to do with the file size. The number of pixels is what counts, not how many of them are supposed to fit in an inch.
posted by ook at 9:09 AM on September 15, 2005
The resolution has nothing at all to do with the file size. The number of pixels is what counts, not how many of them are supposed to fit in an inch.
posted by ook at 9:09 AM on September 15, 2005
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by Optimus Chyme at 12:00 PM on September 14, 2005