# Solved: Photos emailed are received too large



## pjlambo (Sep 10, 2006)

My father's computer is running Vista 64 and he uses Windows Mail but whenever anyone emails photos to him they come in too big that you have to use scroll bars to view the entire picture. When these pics are sent to my computer and laptop they come in normal size and in thumbnail format that I can click on for a larger image. I use Windows 7 and Yahoo mail. Anyone know how to fix this most annoying problem?


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## lordsmurf (Apr 23, 2009)

Send him smaller photos.


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## ChuckE (Aug 30, 2004)

Since the computer, your's and your father's, computer display the exact same emailed picture differently, then the thing that is different is the program used on each of your computers to view the image. You ought to look into what is associated (defined) to be used for images.

Since it is just your father's computer that is exhibiting the problem you could just alter the image file association as to what is used to view images of that file type (my guess would be it is .JPG files). If the email program used on your father's computer web based, and is something other than MS Internet Explorer (which can alternatively switch between 1:1 pixel and "make the image full window size") then you might look into the controls of that browser. If it is some other client (like Thunderbird or Outlook, etc.) then you will have to research how the picture image ability is associated.

Good luck, it should not be that hard.


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## steigerhouse (Jul 30, 2000)

If your dad is viewing the pictures as they open in Windows Mail, it has to do with the size of the picture that is sent. I usually reduce photos to 4 X 6 inches when attaching them to an email to avoid the problem.


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## Peano (Feb 11, 2006)

First, download and install IrfanView. It's an excellent image viewer, and it is free.

Open your image in IrfanView and go to Image > Resize/Resample. That will bring up this dialog box:










Make sure the "units" are set for pixels, and make sure the box is ticked to preserve aspect ratio. In the width and height windows, change the largest dimension to a size that will fit in an email -- perhaps 800 px to 1000 px. Then save the image. (Note in the example above, the long side is 5418 pixels -- much too big to display in email.)

If you have lots of images to resize, you IrfanView can do them as a batch. Go to File > Batch Conversion/Rename.


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## lordsmurf (Apr 23, 2009)

Just don't save over the originals.


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## hewee (Oct 26, 2001)

Always use the *SAVE-AS* to save so your always save your originals


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## calvin-c (May 17, 2006)

Although the OP hasn't replied back, my guess is that he doesn't want to reduce the size of the pictures that are sent, only how they are viewed. That's been my problem-I want to full resolution available for printing but I don't want to have to scroll to see the picture so I can decide what to print. As ChuckE suggested, the solution is to change what program is used to view the pictures. (It sounds like switching to Yahoo email would work, but I don't want to do that so, in my case, I no longer view the pictures in the email-I save them to my hard drive & open them in whatever image editor I'm currently using. I change that from time to time, depending on what I'm doing but all of them have the ability to 'zoom' the picture display without changing the resolution of the actual photo.)


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## ChuckE (Aug 30, 2004)

In that case, I heartedly suggest IrfanView.


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## hewee (Oct 26, 2001)

Most all image viewing programs have "fit to window" so your see the image fill the screen. 
Bigger images get smaller and smaller images will get bigger.

I used ACDsee and use the very old version 2.40 that works great and is fast. 
http://www.oldapps.com/acdsee.php?old_acdsee=6


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## calvin-c (May 17, 2006)

Yes, that's my solution because I never did find a totally satisfactory solution to what I believe is the OP's problem-(s)he wants to be able to 'zoom' photos in the email client. Apparently he can do that in Yahoo mail, but not in other clients. And I can't actually help because I don't know of any clients that do it either-hence my solution of saving the photo & viewing it outside the email client. Not a 'solution' really, but a workaround.


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## ChuckE (Aug 30, 2004)

Correct, Calvin, and that is why I answered the way I did back in post #3. We don't know what the OP is using for an Email client, and (s)he never told us later, either.

Using an outside image viewing program allows for all kinds of options and possibilities. It would have been easy to just say <name the program>, and be done. But I wanted the OP to first check what their current program provided, and/or have them say what they were using for an Email client.


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## bp936 (Oct 13, 2003)

agreeing with you all, that saving pictures is the best way and then using Irfanview or ACDSee or whatever to see them.

Now if we could make the people sending us pictures understand, not to send them so huge, today's cameras have too many Megabytes for the pictures, if I just want to see a pictures and then delete them, a screen size would be ok, but, I know too many people who don't even understand, what I mean by reducing, resizing or what program to use.


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## ChuckE (Aug 30, 2004)

Granted, but that was not the issue from the OP. (S)he wanted to know how to fix (or perhaps explain) the difference between his computer and his father's.

If we knew what he and his father were using for an Email client, or what they were currently doing to see this difference. Knowing that then we would know what to do to resolve it.

You may never get people to understand how to reduce the size of files being sent. With today's generally available high-speed Internet access, and with today's massive drives, the reason for sending reduced files is becoming less critical.


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## hewee (Oct 26, 2001)

If he uses Thunderbird you can get a add-on like *Image Zoom*.
http://imagezoom.yellowgorilla.net/help/?source=options&version=0.4.6
Or
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/addon/139/

They have it also for Firefox and it can be great seeing images on web pages that are small.

I have used it for years.


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## calvin-c (May 17, 2006)

Hey, great addon, Hewee! Thanks.

By the way, it's not that hard for most users to resize photos before sending them. Wish I was on my home PC so I could check & relate the exact requirements, but I know that I have it set up so I can right-click on a photo & select 'Attach to email' and it gives me the option of resizing it. As I recall I didn't even need to set it up, just had to learn to use it-but I won't swear to that since I can't check what I did.


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## wowzer (Dec 28, 2009)

calvin-c said:


> Hey, great addon, Hewee! Thanks.
> 
> By the way, it's not that hard for most users to resize photos before sending them. Wish I was on my home PC so I could check & relate the exact requirements, but I know that I have it set up so I can right-click on a photo & select 'Attach to email' and it gives me the option of resizing it. As I recall I didn't even need to set it up, just had to learn to use it-but I won't swear to that since I can't check what I did.


IE7... right click on photo>send to>mailrecipient...you get a box that gives you three options on size...click attach and its done


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## calvin-c (May 17, 2006)

Yes! That's exactly what I was remembering. It's simple to explain to others when they email you those humongous pictures, if sending smaller ones is what you want them to do. The pictures I generally get are of our grandkids & I want them in high-enough resolution to be printable so I've never told the kids about this-but I've used it a few times myself, as appropriate. (E.g. when sending our pictures to the kids. We display photos of our grandkids but our kids don't display photos of us so why send them printable versions?)


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## hewee (Oct 26, 2001)

calvin-c said:


> Hey, great addon, Hewee! Thanks.
> 
> By the way, it's not that hard for most users to resize photos before sending them. Wish I was on my home PC so I could check & relate the exact requirements, but I know that I have it set up so I can right-click on a photo & select 'Attach to email' and it gives me the option of resizing it. As I recall I didn't even need to set it up, just had to learn to use it-but I won't swear to that since I can't check what I did.


You're welcome.
Also there is Auto Resize Image that you can check out


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## Peano (Feb 11, 2006)

pjlambo said:


> My father's computer is running Vista 64 and he uses Windows Mail but whenever anyone emails photos to him they come in too big that you have to use scroll bars to view the entire picture. When these pics are sent to my computer and laptop they come in normal size and in thumbnail format that I can click on for a larger image. I use Windows 7 and Yahoo mail. Anyone know how to fix this most annoying problem?


This happens when people don't understand the difference between images sized for the web, and images sized for print. I spent an afternoon once shooting pictures of a woman's dog. Later I sent her proofs of the best, about 900 px on the long side (sized for web viewing). A couple of days later she emailed back that she loved the prints! The clueless ditz had printed the proofs, which were about one-fourth the size for print and had not been edited for print.

The way to solve the OP's problem: Embed only web-sized images in email. Send print-size images only as attachments. Letting the email client downsample full-size images isn't a good idea, because it can wreck image quality.


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## pjlambo (Sep 10, 2006)

Thanks for the help everyone, this problem is on my fathers computer so I want the solution to be simple. He uses Windows mail as his email client. He just wants to the pics he recieves to come in normal size, or in thumbnail format like on my PC where I can slightly make them bigger by clicking on them. I realize you need to save them to a location on your computer to view them full size. I just want to find out why the pics come in so big through his email. On other computers, the pics come in normal reduced size. I have messed around the various resolution settings on his PC with no change. I think if he tried a different email program the problem would be fixed but he is reluctant to change from something he is familiar with.


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## Peano (Feb 11, 2006)

pjlambo said:


> I just want to find out why the pics come in so big through his email.


The answer is simple: because you send him huge images, and his email client doesn't resize them.

There are two possible solutions: 1) Change his email client so it downsizes embedded images (which you seem to be bent on doing), or 2) downsize the images before you embed them, so his email client won't have to do it.

I recommend #2 because it allows you to downsize the image so as to preserve image quality.


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## ChuckE (Aug 30, 2004)

pjlambo said:


> ...*uses Windows Mail*
> Thanks for the help everyone, this problem is on my fathers computer so I want the solution to be simple. He uses Windows mail as his email client. He just wants to the pics he recieves to come in normal size, or in thumbnail format like on my PC where I can slightly make them bigger by clicking on them. I realize you need to save them to a location on your computer to view them full size. I just want to find out why the pics come in so big through his email. On other computers, the pics come in normal reduced size. I have messed around the various resolution settings on his PC with no change. I think if he tried a different email program the problem would be fixed but he is reluctant to change from something he is familiar with.


As at least a few of us have already told you, it is his email client, Windows Mail!!
Windows Mail is a 5 year old email client (in came out in 2006) that has been essentially discontinued by Microsoft. I went over to my Vista PC and started up the Windows Mail to try and experience just what you are talking about. And, as you describe, the pictures there do get displayed at full size. If the picture pixel size is larger than what that Windows Mail window is, then it will require scrolling. It really becomes very cumbersome if the received image is larger than the overall monitor size.

With Windows Mail there is no way of scaling down image viewing inside of Windows Mail. The only option seems to be to download, to save, the image off to some location on your computer and then use some image viewer to use the controls of that program. All that seems to not be what you or your father want to do. So here is the solution, with minimal knowledge needed to convert... just go to the Windows Update website and download the optional Windows Live Essentials. It is a suite of tools (Live Mail, Live Messenger, Photo Gallery, Movie Maker and a few other things), You should be given the option to select just the parts you want, and if so, if you only want to have the new Mail client, just select Windows Live Mail.

When Windows Live Mail installs it will import all of the settings and addresses from the already installed (and old) Windows Mail. Once you then start up Windows Live Mail you will see that the images included in email will have a thumbnail view. If you double click an email image it will open in the defined image viewer of that PC. Additionally, you will even have the ability to use the included Windows Live slide viewer of the email program.

All that might make your dad happy. Especially happy since there are all kinds of new controls and features and abilities of the much better Windows Live Mail. Enjoy.


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## ChuckE (Aug 30, 2004)

You'd think that after over a week that the OP would get back and tell us what's up...


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## pjlambo (Sep 10, 2006)

Sorry for not getting back to you guys but whoever suggested my father use Windows Live Mail got it right. My father loves the new program and his over-sized email pics are no more. Thanks again people.


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## ChuckE (Aug 30, 2004)

Now set the status of this thread to * Solved *.


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