Web Image Sharpening…Beating a Dead Horse?

JW
Posted By
Joe_Williams
Oct 31, 2003
Views
412
Replies
6
Status
Closed
OK, I’ve tried just about everything I’ve seen, from automated routines to actions and filters, but I still can’t seem to get acceptable results in downsizing an image.

Most of the images I use are from digital cameras, in 1024 x 768. I have to resize these to ~ 120 x 90 thumbs for use on a site.

No matter what I try, I cannot get results like those on the big, commercial sites (like the news wires, AOL, etc.).

How on earth do they manage such small, crisp images? What am I missing here?

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L
larry
Oct 31, 2003
My work flow would be to convert the original file to a PSD saving the original unaltered. The do whatever post processing is necessary. Then Image>Size and input 72 pixels per inch and your desired long pixel dimensions (120) then save using the name thumb (or similar) in the file name. I actually use the long pixel dimensions at the beginning of the file name so all the thumbnails will group together. Then Filter>Sharpen>UnSharp Mask and start with the default and make some tests. Play with the settings using the amount of unsharp mask in the file name so you can compare. Then File>Save For Web. I use a default setting of 40 quality progressive Jpeg. And most of the time I leave the unsharp mask setting at the installed default.

You might want to resize the original images to your desired enlarged size first before going all the way to thumbnail. That way you can have your copyright show on the images at both sizes. I recommend an enlarged size of 450 to 500 pixels long dimension as a good compromise between size and load time.

Larry Berman
<http://BermanGraphics.com>
DM
Don_McCahill
Oct 31, 2003
Two ideas. First, when downsizing, do so in even numbers. Make the image 1/2, 1/4, etc of the original. The algorithm to make 16 pixels into one has to be better than a case when you are making an image 22% of the original size, for instance.

Secondly, there is no rule saying that you have to use the entire image in your thumbnail. Some work really well by cropping a portion of the original image, either at full size or some partial reduction. This lets you only reduce the image a bit, rather than trying to get the whole thing into the thumbnail.
JW
Joe_Williams
Oct 31, 2003
Thanks for the suggestions.

I still have plenty of hair to pull out 😉
J
JGR
Oct 31, 2003
if you are saving out JPEG files in PS7, quality=52 is the threshold between blurry/sharp lines. Anything lower will not look so good.

For thumbnails, I tend to save out .gif files over JPEGS, usually 64 colors will be fine. And unsharp mask, as suggested above, just don’t overdo it… 60% at .6 pixels is what I tend to use tops. Hope this helps.
T
toby
Nov 2, 2003
wrote in message news:…
Thanks for the suggestions.

I still have plenty of hair to pull out 😉

Careful unsharp masking is important. It’s a subjective thing so you’ll get different suggestions from different people, but the USM settings I use most often are 150% / 0.5 radius / 3 threshold, after downsizing an image.

Re: GIF or JPEG thumbnails, I originally used 32/64 colour GIFs for thumbnails but with "Save for Web" I found JPEGs were almost always smaller, and for that reason I use the latter most often.

Toby
TA
Timo Autiokari
Nov 3, 2003
Hello Joe,

firstly the big commercial sites get their images from high quality digital camera (or from film+high quality scanner), but a 1024×768 digicam photos should do nicely for 120×90 thumbs.

What you need to do is edit the images like the big commercial sites do, in linear RGB working space. Both the Resizing and the following USM suffer from a lot from Gamma Induced errors when you edit in a non-linear RGB working-space such as the
AdobeRGB and the sadRGB are.

If you have a full 1024×768 size image somewhere on the Web I’ll give it a try with complete list of editing operations.

Timo Autiokari http://www.aim-dtp.net/

On Thu, 30 Oct 2003 18:26:28 -0800,
wrote:

OK, I’ve tried just about everything I’ve seen, from automated routines to actions and filters, but I still can’t seem to get acceptable results in downsizing an image.

Most of the images I use are from digital cameras, in 1024 x 768. I have to resize these to ~ 120 x 90 thumbs for use on a site.

No matter what I try, I cannot get results like those on the big, commercial sites (like the news wires, AOL, etc.).

How on earth do they manage such small, crisp images? What am I missing here?

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