Posted by Mike McNeill on January 16, 2008 at 8:23 PM
Got lucky ysterday when I got this at the Mass Audubon in Ipswich. Even a broken clock is right twice a day!
Posted by Bill Whitney on January 17, 2008 at 9:11 AM
Mike nice capture...love the wings.
Bill
Posted by Jim Salge on January 17, 2008 at 5:54 PM
Wow, what a moment! Snow simplifies the background to a near clean pallate for a perfect pose. I'm not sure if it is a bit soft, or more than likely compression is killing the small JPG...but with a shot like this it hardly matters! Sweet!
Posted by Mark Wilson on January 18, 2008 at 1:57 PM
Cool image! I really like the moving snow. Looks like compression is causing some issues as presented though.
Posted by Mike McNeill on January 19, 2008 at 10:59 AM
Thanks guys. You are correct about the compression. This isnt as sharp as it appears on my screen in PS. Is there a way to correct this? Or is it something we have to live with on this site?
Posted by Mark Wilson on January 19, 2008 at 11:23 AM
Mike, how are you saving the JPEG in PS? If you use 'save for web' you can adjust the quality setting until the image size is around 100-150 kb. Normally I start at 75 and adjust up or down from there. Alternatively you can use 'save as' jpeg and adjust the quality in the same way.
Also, do you sharpen after resizing to 720px?
Posted by Mike McNeill on January 19, 2008 at 12:27 PM
Mark
Ok here comes my ignorance. U start at 75 what?
I shoot in raw which I realize is a very large file. I make my adjustments in PS and save as a PSD file which is still large. If I want to "save for web " I change the resolution to 72 and/or if the image is still too large I'll change the width to 1024 or the height to 768.
Here's a whitebreasted nuthatch done just that way.
Posted by Mark Wilson on January 19, 2008 at 5:10 PM
OK Mike, for posting on NPN you need to set the longest side of the image to 720 pixels, so for your Nuthatch above, that would be the height. Using that image as an example, I would...
Using Image->Image size
Make sure the Constrain Proportions and Resample Image boxes are ticked.
Set the resample drop down to Bicubic sharper (works well on down-sizing).
Type 720 in the Height box for the Pixel dimensions (the top set of boxes).
Note that the Resolution box where you set 72 only applies to printing, not for viewing on screen.
Then use File->Save for Web
In the top-right of the dialog, change the file type to JPEG and then set the quality to 75. The estimated file size is shown in the bottom left of the dialog, under the image. Changing the quality setting up or down will change the file size. Aim to get it between 100 and 150 kb.
Hope that makes more sense for you Mike?
Posted by Bill Whitney on January 20, 2008 at 8:37 AM
Mike...here is a link to a sharpening technique for web display that works pretty well for most of images.
http://pacificnw.naturephotographers.net/tips/photoshop.htm
Posted by Mike McNeill on January 20, 2008 at 8:58 AM
Ahhhhh my quality was set at 10%!! Maybe that was the problem.
Mark, thanks for the help! Here's another chickadee resized per your instructions.
Discussion
9 repliesBill
Also, do you sharpen after resizing to 720px?
Ok here comes my ignorance. U start at 75 what?
I shoot in raw which I realize is a very large file. I make my adjustments in PS and save as a PSD file which is still large. If I want to "save for web " I change the resolution to 72 and/or if the image is still too large I'll change the width to 1024 or the height to 768.
Here's a whitebreasted nuthatch done just that way.
Using Image->Image size
Make sure the Constrain Proportions and Resample Image boxes are ticked.
Set the resample drop down to Bicubic sharper (works well on down-sizing).
Type 720 in the Height box for the Pixel dimensions (the top set of boxes).
Note that the Resolution box where you set 72 only applies to printing, not for viewing on screen.
Then use File->Save for Web
In the top-right of the dialog, change the file type to JPEG and then set the quality to 75. The estimated file size is shown in the bottom left of the dialog, under the image. Changing the quality setting up or down will change the file size. Aim to get it between 100 and 150 kb.
Hope that makes more sense for you Mike?
http://pacificnw.naturephotographers.net/tips/photoshop.htm
Mark, thanks for the help! Here's another chickadee resized per your instructions.