Picture Quality

[Casey]

Greg how do you get your pictures to retain there quality when they are only a few hundred KB?

I'm having a hard time with this. I always set the camera for large and fine jpegs and download them on the computer never resaving that folder. I then copy, resize and adjust the quality of the ones I want in a different folder for posting, but those end up looking terrible. would I be better off setting my camera to take smaller jpegs and never resave them once there on the computer and just upload them straight to the web?

I have Photoshop Elements, Photoshop 7 and Acdsee 9, but I prefer to use Nikon View for it's simplicity

What am i doing wrong?

[Scream And Fly]

Casey,

Never set the camera to a lower quality or resolution - you're just shooting yourself in the foot by doing that. :) Always shoot at maximum quality. The more pixels you have to work with, the better your end result.

First, stay away from Nikon View. It's very basic software that will produce basic results. Just use it for RAW image browsing, if anything.

Photoshop is your answer. You'll need a good, sharp image to start with, but your images seem very well focused, so that doesn't appear to be a concern.

I have many macros (actions, in Photoshop talk) that I wrote for quick edits. I run those for posting here, and many times the colors are not perfect as a result. But, that's an ideal solution for the mass-posting I do after events. When I process for prints I work out the color corrections manually.

Anyway, I always use Photoshop for everthing I do - and I mean everything. Always resize then sharpen as a last step. I generally apply the Unsharp Mask at 88%, Radius: 0.4 pixels, Threshold: 4 levels. Use the "save as for web" option and set to "high".

I hope that helps :)

Greg

[Fish]

thanks greg, I was wondering the same thing.

[Casey]

Greg thanks for the info. Should I continue to use Nikon View as the downloader and viewer? Then set it's default editing program to Photoshop 7 instead of Nikon Editor?

Is PS7 good enough or would I be better with a newer program? I also have a copy of Elements 4 that is not being used.

[hsbob]

the 4.0 should be good enough and it will run the macros greg talked about. learn to use the windows explore to down load the file. elements 5.0 is now out you may want to get a copy. PS 7 is ok but cs is much better if only for the midd exposure fix routine. i waiting for the next release after cs+. ps it will run $600+- for your first copy. find a college student to buty it for you at a reduced cost.

[Scream And Fly]

Casey,

I never use Nikon's Editor or whatever they include with their camera bodies. I just use Windows XP's camera wizard to transfer the images to my PC, then load up Photoshop. I always set my camera bodies to "Mass Storage", which allows the camera to be seen as nothing more than a removable drive on the computer.

Photoshop 4 is good enough, so 7 is easily good enough.:) There are very few differences between Photoshop 7 and CS, the most notable being the fact that Photoshop 7's RAW support is an extra-cost option, whereas CS has it integrated (as well as CS2).

Or - download The Gimp for free. www.gimp.org (http://www.gimp.org)

The Gimp is surprisingly powerful - almost as powerful as Photoshop (really), and it will even run many Photoshop plugins. I think Gimp even opens and edits PSD files. I keep it on my machine because it's just amazing.

A shot of The Gimp in action (reduced in size):
http://img297.imageshack.us/img297/8500/gimpimageim5.jpg

[Casey]

i took this picture of amanda on friday from a moving boat. i did exactly what you said to do and this is what i got, works for me :D

http://www.byuboyz.com/casey/amanda.jpg

here's a link to the original untouched file.

http://www.byuboyz.com/casey/DSC_2916.JPG

[hsbob]

looks good. be sure to use shutter priority set to as fast as possible. the f stop should be set so shutter speed is better than 1/mm the lens.