Crop, Resize & Compress a JPG

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Crop, Resize and/or Compress a JPG

A reader asked if there is a program that makes it easy to crop and resize digital photos. Yes, these are basic functions of all image-editing programs, and my favorite is Irfanview.

The program is free from www.irfanview.com.

When downloading Irfanview, say YES to making it your default image-editing program. Henceforth, double-clicking any photo's icon will make it appear in the Irfanview window, ready to edit.

To crop a photo is to eliminate unnecessary background and feature just the main subjects. For instance, a child and puppy playing on a lawn normally don't need scads of sky and shrubbery showing around them. Also, printing a picture with a lot of extraneous background can consume lots of expensive ink.

In Irfanview, press your left mouse-button and draw a rectangle around the portion of the picture you want to save. Then click Edit>Cut and Edit>Paste (or use the Cut and Paste icons in the toolbar) to make the cropped section replace the original photo.

Next, click on File>Save As and give the newly-cropped picture a name. Choose one that's different from the original, since using the same name can overwrite the first photo, thus deleting it completely.

To resize a picture, click on Image>Resize/Resample. Then choose a new size by changing the picture's actual height and width dimensions or you can elect to change it to a certain percentage of the original size.

Edit

Undo

While cropping or resizing an image you can also choose its DPI (dots per inch) resolution. For printing on paper, 300 DPI is a popular choice. A higher resolution will make a print even sharper and crisper. For a picture that's intended only to be seen online (such as in an email or on Facebook) a resolution of 96 DPI is usually adequate.

Reducing an Image's File Size

One of the advantages of using the JPG photo format is that a file size can be compressed to make it take up less disk space. As a rule of thumb, a JPG can be compressed to about 80% of its original file size without losing too much sharpness and clarity. Here's how to do this in Irfanview:

Click on File>Save As to name the photo. Then make sure Show Options Dialog at the bottom of the window is checkmarked. This will display another dialog box with a sliding bar going from Low to Good (0% - 100%). Slide the bar to 80% and click Save. If not satisfied with the result, re-open the original photo and try a different ratio. Give each attempt a different name, because a compressed photo cannot be restored to its original file size.