TIPS ON RESIZING PHOTOS
The following tips about resizing digital photographs are intended to help budding photographers understand how photos can be manipulated and resized to meet the requirements of the BAPC.
While there are numerous computer applications intended to allow photographers to manipulate photos, there are a few that are most well known. We are most familiar with Adobe's Photoshop and to some lesser degree Corel's Paintshop Pro. Numerous others function in a similar manner and use similar terminology.
The following step-by-step directions are provided as a guideline for resizing photos but may not use precisely the terminology your software uses. Rather, it is important to understand the intent and not the exact word-for-word directions below.
- Images are transmitted and displayed on the internet at 72 dots per inch (dpi). Most cameras will take the image at 300 dpi or 150 dpi and perhaps some other in-between resolutions.
- The object is to save the image at the highest dpi setting as possible FIRST. Usually that is 300 dpi. This file should become your archive and is never used again unless you want to revisit and print the photo.
- Then, each program provides options under different names to manipulate the image's size. Find the option to "RESIZE" the image.
- After selecting (or turning off) the resize/resample option, change the dpi/resolution setting to 72 dpi.
- Then turn ON the resize/resample option. You should see the width and height of the image increase greatly in the menu from which you are working.
- Change the height and width to the measurement you desire.
- Then using "SAVE AS," save the altered image UNDER A NEW NAME. Using the same name will overwrite the original file and you will lose the higher resolution image.
It is that file, saved with a new name, that you can use to submit to the BAPC.
If a photo wins the BAPC, we will contact the photographer and ask for the original file at 300 dpi (or whatever the original dpi was) so we can print high quality prints for public display.