# Help Resize image to print 8x10



## port80 (Mar 19, 2007)

I've got an image that I want to get printed through snapfish on 8x10 paper. When I print the image, as is, it get's cropped and doesn't look good. I've been doing some reading on printing digital images to standard photopaper. (aspect ratio's etc). For the image I want to print I'd like to resize the entire image to fit to 8x10. I'd like to do this by having whitespace on one side of the image and physically. trimming the photo. I'd prefer not to crop. The image just doesn't look good cropped.

I have irfanview, no access to photoshop. It seems like this is pretty easy to do in Adobe PS from tutorials on the web. And playing with irfanview it seems like this should be possible as well. However when I try do it. The image quality is too low for even a 4x6 print. So I know I'm doing something wrong. The stats on the original image are in the 1st attached screenshot jpg.

In irfanview I do the following
1) Select Image Resize/Sample
2) Set new size (to inches)
3) Image size is 27 x 28.56 (see Picture)

4) I change it to 8 x 8.46 (Irfanview's calculation with preserved aspect ratio) (see Picture)

5) I click ok (with resample)
6) Snapfish says image resolution is too low. My plan is to have 1.5 inches of whitespace on the long side and to physically trim the print. 

see the last attached jpg for the IV stats on the processed picture.

What am I doing wrong? Or is it not possible to resize the photo and retain image quality. 


Thanks in advance for your help. Thanks Alan


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## cwwozniak (Nov 29, 2005)

I use an older version of PS and don't use irfanview but I think I see where your problem is occurring. You shouldn't be re-sampling the image but instead only be changing the DPI from 72 to 243. That will give you an 8.00 x 8.46 inch picture size without cutting down the number of pixels.

Then change the canvas size by adding 374 pixels to the top or bottom of the canvas. You can also add 187 pixels top and bottom to vertically center your 1944 x 2056 pixel photo on the 8x10 inch sheet


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## Noyb (May 25, 2005)

Welcome to the TSG Forum.

Maybe (probably) I missed something ... But I wouldn't mess with the original if I didn't have to.
Can't you do all you want from the Irfanview's print routine 

Something like this ...


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## cwwozniak (Nov 29, 2005)

Noyb said:


> Can't you do all you want from the Irfanview's print routine


I believe that *port80* is trying to get their 8x10's professionally made by Snapfish (see item #6 in original post), an on-line photo processing service, and not trying to print them out on a printer connected to their computer.

I do agree about only editing a copy of the original file while leaving the original file alone


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## Noyb (May 25, 2005)

Thanks .. I missed that.

ALAN ...
Did you try the EDIT > Create Custom Crop Selection ???
Here you can crop to the physical size needed to fit the print you want.
To keep the chosen aspect ratio ... Hold the control key down and move the selection edges.

Looks like some cropping will be needed to fit the final print size you want ... and not distort the picture.

This will prevent any down sizing other than what was cropped.
YES ... always work on a copy of the original.

What does Snapfish want as a minimum resolution ??? Edit .. Never mind, I found the requirements.


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## cwwozniak (Nov 29, 2005)

Noyb said:


> Looks like some cropping will be needed to fit the final print size you want ... and not distort the picture.





port80 said:


> I'd like to do this by having whitespace on one side of the image and physically. trimming the photo. I'd prefer not to crop. The image just doesn't look good cropped.


Noyb, time to get glasses or switch to a stronger prescription if you all ready wear glasses?


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## Noyb (May 25, 2005)

OK ... Try This &#8230;

Open a copy of your original in Irfanview &#8230; And click on image information.
Change the both DPIs to 243 ... and save the File.

This will not change the Image in any way but it will make the default print size 8&#8221; Tall and 8.461 Wide.

I don't think you really need to add white space .. But you can do this in Irfanview by adding 374 pixels on the sides in Canvas size.

Then Tell SnapFish to print it 8&#8221; tall ... this'll add the white space.
A DPI of 243 is pretty good resolution.

Had my eyes tested the Vet said I needed a bigger monitor


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## cwwozniak (Nov 29, 2005)

Noyb said:


> Had my eyes tested the Vet said I needed a bigger monitor


LMAO

Maybe your insurance company will pay for one of these (doctors orders)?

http://www.digitaltigers.com/zenview-powertrio-ultrahd.shtml


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## port80 (Mar 19, 2007)

Thanks for all the response. Late, Late last night I tried changing the DPI to 243. I have definitely been working on a copy since I'm a newbie to image editing (not computers though). Snapfish still wants to crop the photo even at 243 dpi. Just to confirm you can change the dpi and save the file in irfanview? (that is what the dialog box on the image info implies) One conclusion is that snapfish is really, really, really lame. 

I do snapfish through costco so the prints are cheap, and the quality other than the default cropping is in my opinion very good. (guess you get what you pay for). I'm going to go talk to them to see if they can print an entire image on the 8x10 sheet. Which the impression I get from research on other forums is possible, although maybe not through snapfish.


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## cwwozniak (Nov 29, 2005)

port80 said:


> Snapfish still wants to crop the photo even at 243 dpi.


As Noyb and I both mentioned you also need to change your canvas size from 1944x2056 pixels to to exactly 1944x2430 pixels by adding 384 pixels of white space to the 2056 pixel dimension. That will give you a picture size of exactly 8.500 x 10.000 inches @ 243 DPI.

If Snapfish is anything like the software used at the Wal-Mart photo kiosks, then I suspect that if a picture does not fully fill the paper size the software scales the picture equally in both dimensions until it all picture edges touch or go beyond the paper edge and then crops anything beyond the edges. I am not sure if there is any customer selectable option to force it to fit the entire picture on the available paper size and adding its own white space as need be.


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## Noyb (May 25, 2005)

I don't know why SnapFish couldn't print a picture 8&#8221; Tall and 8.461" Wide.
You could do this easily on a home printer ... Without editing your picture in anyway.
Obviously ... The unused print space will be white.

The only thing that changing the DPI does .. Is change the default physical size (in inches) that the picture thinks it is.
Any print routine can override the pictures default physical size (in inches)

Never done a Wal-Mart or Snapfish ... so I asked the local Wal-Mart expert ...
"How would you print a 8"x9" picture 8" tall"

My Wife gave me one of those "You Dummy" looks ... and said ... "Push the 8x10 Button"
Anyone here want to tell her she's wrong ???


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## port80 (Mar 19, 2007)

Chuck,
You were correct when I added the border to make the pixel dimensions 1944x2430, Snapfish then interpretted the photo correctly as 8x10. You seem to be exactly correct in how snapfish behaves based on its "interpretation" of image dimensions. Great reverse engineering! 

Thanks so much folks for all your great helpful posts. I now have the formula for resizing my pictures to do a "shrink to fit" print out, at least at Snapfish. (until they change their algorithm) 

1. Calculate the pixel dimensions for the paper size, 
2. change the dpi of the image so that at least 1 side of the image matches the exact pixel dimension of the paper size. (example 8 inch side) 
3. Add appropriate border (white space) so the other side of the image matches the exact pixel size of the other dimension of the paper size. (example 10 inch side) 

You don't need to resample your picture.

I'm restating this so that 1) you folks can correct me if I'm wrong and 2) so that the next poor sap who wants to do this, (I can't be the only one) who uses google to search for an answer, has a better chance of finding it. I found bits and pieces of the answer in my pretty extensive searching of the web but not all the steps in one place.

Thanks, again. I never would have figured this out on my own.


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## Noyb (May 25, 2005)

As you mentioned ... this would have been a lot easier with Photoshop.
Just change the canvas size to your dimensions .. it does all the calculations ...then send it.
FYI ... The cheaper version ... Photoshop Elements 5.0 has all these Photoshop tools @~ 1/10th the price.


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## port80 (Mar 19, 2007)

One other note. There is a shrink to fit at walmart. But the print quality was terrible. I would have to do more editing to make the coloring and brightness come out correctly at WM. Print quality at costco with snapfish was excellent and 1/4 the price of walmart.


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## port80 (Mar 19, 2007)

Thanks didn't know about PS Elements. With the amount of editing I do there's no way I'm going to pay 500 or 600 bucks for Photoshop. It's a great program but I'd use it 4 or 5 times a year. Not even worth the hard drive space for that. How much is Elements?


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## cwwozniak (Nov 29, 2005)

port80 said:


> 1. Calculate the pixel dimensions for the paper size,
> 2. change the dpi of the image so that at least 1 side of the image matches the exact pixel dimension of the paper size. (example 8 inch side)
> 3. Add appropriate border (white space) so the other side of the image matches the exact pixel size of the other dimension of the paper size. (example 10 inch side)
> 
> You don't need to resample your picture.


Actually Step #1 might not work because you don't really know the target DPI to convert the inches to pixels. Here is a new step#1 and some expansion of your remaining steps.

Step #1 Calculate the DPI in each direction as if the image would scale exactly to fit the given edges. For your 1944x2056 pixel image fitting on 8x10 paper you would calculate ...

1944 / 8.0 = 243 DPI
2056 / 10.0 = 205.6 DPI

Step #2: Pick the highest DPI value in step #1 and set the DPI of the picture to that number in both directions, without rescaling. It would be 243 in this case.

Step #3: Determine the pixel size the other dimension of the picture needs to be to get the same DPI. Multiply the desired DPI by the target inches.

243 x 10.0 = 2430 pixels

Step #4: In the case irfanview, determine how many pixels you need to add to get the desired canvas size.

2430 - 2056 = 374 pixels

Step#5: In the case of irfanview, increase the canvas size by adding the given number of pixels to the correct edge or splitting the addition along two opposite edges. It would be a matter of adding 374 pixels to the 2056 dimension in this case.

I have used this procedure a couple of hundred times fitting family pictures into 4x6 prints. It gets get a tiny bit more complicated when you want to do some cropping first and then fitting the cropped version to the paper.


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## port80 (Mar 19, 2007)

Thanks for the clarification. The impression I get from noyb is that Photoshop elements, will do this pretty much automagicly. So I'm going to look into this. Does anyone know if Picasa will do this type of function?


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## Noyb (May 25, 2005)

Elements does everything Photoshop will do ..
except for the web design features and a few real tricky editing such as special layer effects ... etc.
I've seen it sale for ~$79 .... here's a 30 day trial ... 
http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshopelwin/tryout.html

Don't know about the other freebees... Picassa, Xnview or Fastone.

How many do you have to do ??


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## port80 (Mar 19, 2007)

Cool. I'll try it out. Thanks for the info. Picasa's free and there's a lot of talk online about it. Really, I swear I just need 1. It's funny I'm a computer professional but camera's and graphics just bring out the dummy in me  I really just like to point and shoot and print.


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## Noyb (May 25, 2005)

Tried Picasa once ... It's more of a photo organizer and edits about the same as Irfanview.
I'd rather organize myself ... I don't want to wait for Picasa to find ALL my photos on ALL my drives ... even at dual core speeds.
I already know where my pics are ... and where I'll put them
I'm a point n shooter also ... But there's some really nice tools in PSE5 that can fix about anything.
When you try PSE5 .. It can fix pimples, over/under exposure problems, Color problems, remove distractions in the Photo .. and a whole lot more ... besides resizing.
The bad news is that 30days isn't enough time to learn PSE5.


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