how to shrink a jpg without losing quality

[nikky]

Hello,
I am always receiving jpg's to post on websites - but they are always huge, and I have to shrink them. Once they have been shrunk 30-40%, they don't look very clear anymore. Especially pictures that have had text overlaid on them.

How do I do this ? Can you do this in Photoshop?

 

[apepp]

...you can do it is photoshop, file save for web...

...or bridge can automate lots of images all in one go using tools > photoshop > image processor...

...or you can create your own action in photoshop and run a file > automate > batch too...

...even create a droplets from custom actions to drag and drop folders onto, this will then automatically launch photoshop and run those actions specified...

Andrew

 

[apepp]

...out of interest, if your not using photoshop to resize, what program do you currently use?

Andrew

 

[nikky]

I do use Photoshop. I just can't seem to get the clarity I need. Is it a matter of the size change ? Sometimes I get images that are 1000 pixels wide - say a logo; I need to shrink them to 150px. After that, you can't read the writing on them any longer.

 

[jimoblak]

This appears to be an issue with not designing for the web.

 

[colorplane]

You're interested not in how the JPG compresses, but in how Photoshop calculates and arranges the pixels while sizing down to 125px, that's what makes the difference between legibility and blurriness.

That being said, Photoshop isn't magic and if your original source isn't made to be scaled you might never get the results that you want without having a logo that was designed to be scaled.

When you resize, Photoshop does give you some options which will effect the legibility of your final logo. After you go to Image > Image Size... there is a dropdown box which lets you select how your image is resampled. You might have better results if you change this to Bicubic Sharper.

Increasing the contrast of the original might help, specifically around the text. There are many "smart resize" filters available on the web, but I do not have personal experience with any of them.

 

[MikeMoss]

Hi

There is a limit to how far you can shrink anything.

I don't think that the compression process has anything to do with your problem.

If you take an image that is 1,000 px in width and shrink it to 150 px it is not going to look the same even if you don't use any compression at all.

Try taking one of you .jpgs and save it as a .tif file in the original size.

Now reduce the size of the .tif file to the same size as the others and take a look at it.

This is as good as it is going to get at that size.

If you are working with logos etc then they should be in .ai format which can be resized with out loss of sharpness but there is no way to do that with photographic images.

Mike