[Gavin Hamilton]

Being new to digital, I'm having a problem with size! Yes, despite what you hear, it DOES matter! I use a Canon 350D at 8Mp's and I'm told there is a way of reducing the final file size so it can be posted. I have some photo's I would like to post on the site but I'm told their file size is too big. I also have some to post to 'Photolibra' an on-line photo library, they however tell me that most of my postings are too small. Can someone tell me what's going on please?

[Chris]

Sounds like you shot them in RAW Gavin; you'll need a program like Rawshooter or Canon's own converter (name escapes me) which should be on the software disc that came with your camera, to convert the file into a a more managble TIFF or preferably a JPEG to post on the web.

The library needs much bigger files for their customer requirement which means you need to increase the file size by using interpolation software such as Genuine Fractals.

Hope that helps a bit!

[lolyton]

Basically your images have to be sized for their particular usage, you have a camera capable of 8+MP, on the 'Pixalo' site you only need to uplaod images with less than 1MP quality, this is straightforward to do, you just downsize an image to whatever size is suitable for the web (as a rule i choose 500pixels on it's longest side), in your chosen image manipualtion software (as you are trying to supply image libraries i am assuming you are reasonably able with some kind of image software). This is all that is needed because people will then hopefully only ever view them on this site (if they are able to print them out or use them in conjuction with other things your copyright is breached and you should be getting some money for it [however it's unlikely you'd ever find out]).
When supplying image libraries it is necessary for the images to be of a much larger size so as they can be used in a vast variety of ways (i had a quick look at the website you mentioned and they suggest it could be used for a 96 sheet poster....which would be huge), therefore a big file size 25MP+/- would be needed. This is slightly trickier than downsizing, because even though your camera isn't that big it can still produce an image well enough to be extrapolated to that size...Like Chris mentioned previously a good stand alone piece of software (it does also run as a plug-in in photoshop) would be Lizardtech's Genuine Fractals as this produces good quality results, also Extensis have another piece of software capable of this (i can't remember the name of it at present), however my personal favourite is Adobe Camera Raw just because it is intergrated to Adobe Photoshop CS2 and Bridge which i primarily use and this will also give results of good enough quality.

If you let us know your editing software then someone will better advise you as to how to go about doing this.

Also before submitting work to picture libraries it is very important to do your research, (photolibra is vague on image size details only gives set size for Royalty Free images so contact to find if it is the same for Lisenced or not). There are image libraries that may take your work without you having to pay them to do so (paying isn't necessarily a bad thing). Just that it is a good idea to your research.

I wish you the best of luck and hope you sell plenty of pictures....Also welcome to the site!

[Gavin Hamilton]

Thank you for your help. I now have it sorted thanks to your advice. I have managed to reduce the file size of some of my photo's and hopefully should be able to post some onto my gallery soon. I managed to get on last night, I would welcome your comments. Regards to all,
Gavin