In iPhoto, resize an image when you export it to be used in another application
Resize a photo using the export option
Emailing a photo or posting an image to a website (such as the ones in this post) don’t need to be large files. In fact, a lower resolution is preferable so you don’t crash your friend’s email program or create a webpage that takes a lifetime to load. Resizing an image will reduce its resolution and hence its file size.
There are two options to resize a photo using iPhoto.
Option 1: A simple but effective way to resize and email a photo
Select your image and choose the Email button at the bottom right corner of the iPhoto window. This pop-up box will appear:
The one option you have is to select a file size: Small, Medium, Large and Actual Size. You don’t have the option to select a width or height, but the pop-up will display the file size for each option you select. The smaller the file size the quicker the photo will download to the recipient’s computer.
Select Compose and the Apple Mail program will open for you to write and send your message. This is the most basic option and will only be useful if you use Apple Mail.
Option 2: For more control over resizing your image in iPhoto follow these 3 steps
Step 1 - Choose your image
Select your image and choose File -> Export. A pop-up window with three tabs will appear.
Step 2 - Select a file format
On the File Export tab there are several options you can change - you want the Kind and Size options. The Kind option has five file formats to choose from. Three of these allow you to resize the image: JPEG; PNG; or TIFF. If you select JPEG (a common format to email) you also have the option to select an image quality, ranging from low to maximum, and this will affect the final file size of the image.
Step 3 - Select a size
On the Size option you can simply select Small, Medium or Large, but if you want a specific size select Custom. This is my preferred option.
If you choose Custom select a specific height or width. Click Export and save the image to a location on your computer. And that’s it!
Example of the various file sizes
If you are concerned about the file size of your exported image here’s an example of the different options on one of my photos.
The original dimensions of this image below are 1928 x 1427 pixels with a file size of 1.4 mb. That’s too large a file size to email or add to this post and you would need to scroll across the page to see the entire image. My preferred image size for this website is 400px.
Custom resize
Resizing the original image to a 400px JPEG breaks down to the following dimensions:
- maximum quality = 184kb
- high quality = 44kb
- medium quality = 28kb (this is the one I’m using above)
- low quality = 16kb
Small, medium and large sizes
If I simply want a small, medium or large image (without using the custom option) the original image would become:
- full size = 436kb with the same dimensions
- large = 192kb at 1280 x 947 pixels
- medium = 56kb at 640 x 474 pixels
- small = 20kb at 320 x 237 pixels
Remember…resize on export
I have to admit this resize option in iPhoto hid under the radar for me for a while but it’s actually a very simple process. Having the resize option available when exporting it from iPhoto makes sense. And most importantly, resizing an image on export leaves the original version intact.
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