Email size of pictures - Adobe Photoshop Elements

[Patti Nykamp]

I can't seem to get my pictures the right size. I take them with my digital camera and they are on my computer. I then go through PSE to pull them up. For some reason I cannot send email via photoshop, it keeps giving me errors, so I save the pictures to the desktop and then send them that way through AOL. But they are being sent too big. How and what should I save them as so they are the size you can just open up and have the whole picture on the screen without having to scroll. Thanks.

[Byron Gale]

Patti,

There is no "one size fits all" when it comes to distributing your images
for others to display on their own equipment.

Of course you know that the image is just pixels... each pixel of your
image requires a screen dot to display it. A 1024x768 image will perfectly
fill the screen if the system displaying it has that resolution set for
their monitor. If they have, for instance, 1280x1024 set, then your
1024x768 image will take up less than their whole screen, even though it is
still using the same number of pixels. Conversely, if someone has their
display set to 800x600, they would have to scroll to see all of your image.

UNLESS, they use a graphics viewer which automatically resizes the image for
display...

I fear that the truest answer is that it depends on the settings of your
recipients' monitors, as to what size image will display entirely without
scrolling.

Ideally, you would know the display resolution of the other person's
monitor, and use Save For Web to generate a copy of your image with
dimensions appropriate for them, and quality adjusted to make the file size
more comfortable for email.

Byron

[Nancy S]

Patti,

All bets are off trying to do something 'common' when using AOL because of their proprietary software. Even the IE browser within AOL is not the 'standard' IE browser.

When sending emails it might be best to plan image size for the lowest common demoninator, a screen resolution of 800x600 pixels, some people still use that res. Anyone will be able to see the image in its entirety, without scrolling, if you size your image to about 800 pixels for the horizontal plane (and the vertical is less than 600), or saying it the other way around for a portait orientation image...resize your image to be no more than 600 pixels in height.

Make sure you are working on a copy before you prepare an image to send, as it will be reduced and not really fit to print (this is assuming you are resizing to fit on screen). You can use File>Save For Web>fill in the appropriate number of pixels for screen size as mentioned earlier.

I don't have AOL, but another poster has mentioned that if you are attaching images to send someone who is not on AOL, it is best to just 'Zip' it so it doesn't get scrambled.

[Patti Nykamp]

I sent the picture to myself at 800 x 600 pixels - I went to image resize and did it that way. It didn't stay at that size because when I put in one of the dimensions the other one popped up differnt. I did have the resoulution at 300.
When I received it, I had to scroll to see the whole thing, so I am still doing something wrong.
Any more ideas.
Also, how do you "zip" a picture. Gosh, this is all greek to me.
Thanks.

[Patti Nykamp]

One more thing - when I went to save for web, it showed a part of the picture on the screen, not even the whole thing? What is that all about? I wasn't sure how to work that page, so I didn't try it. How come in the boxes they only show a portion of the picture?

[Patti Nykamp]

I just tried it again with a smaller resolution of 200 and it still had to be scrolled. I really think I am forgetting an important step here, just don't know what it is.

[Beth Haney]

I don't have Elements open right now, Patti, but I think you're getting what you're supposed to have. I think it gives you a "peak" so you can see what the image quality will be - and a chance to change it if it looks like it's getting too pixelated.

Trust it, Patti! Do one as an experiment and e-mail it to yourself. You'll feel better when you see how it looks on both ends. :)

[Patti Nykamp]

I tried saving it to web at a small pixel size and I still had to scroll. I do send all of them to myself first to see if the size is good. I've read the "help" portion to try and figure it out too.
Thanks for your help.

[Schraven Robert]

Patty,

After a bit of getting used to I quite like "saving for the web".
As far as I understand, it gives you control over the volume of bytes you want to sent in relation to the image quality.
With other words if you want to sent an image of 600 by 800 then that you can control youself. You can also steer on byte size by reducing the total amount of bytes to say 200 kB. Then you click on save (or was it OK) and are asked to give the file a name. After that you can sent an e-mail with that one file attached and off it goes. At least that is how I use and do it.
The picture on the screens: The left one is your original; it is displayed in Mb's and the one on the right is the same file but then in the reduced "save for the web"-size. If you put your mouse on the image you can move it around. Also in the bottom left side you can fiddle the magnitude of the images. Mine always comes up at 100%, depending on what I want to see I reduce it to 25%.

I hope this helps you to get a bit further with "save for he web".

Robert

[Barbara Brundage]

Patti, try this. Do a save for web, and this time, go to the right hand side of the window about halfway down and you will see a box that says "new size." Be sure that "constrain proportions" is checked, and enter a size of 450 for whichever is the longest side of the photo. Wait till it recalculates, then click okay. (When you are back in the main PE window do "control/command + z", because you just resized your original as well and you don't want to keep that).

Your web-saved version should now fit easily on any screen.

[Patti Nykamp]

I thought I had written to say that IT WORKED. But I cannot find it on this post site. With everyone's help, I finally got it to work and the pictures are great.
Thank you everyone for your help.