People upload photos to social media pages, to their websites, open topics on forums, send them to friends and family via email, etc. Photos taken with modern cameras take up a lot of space on various storage media.
The question often arises before users: “ how to compress a photo?", Because the" large weight "of the image causes the following inconveniences:
- The problem of traffic - there are countries and cities in the world where you can use only wireless Internet, respectively, it is charged according to the number of downloaded bytes, so photos must be compressed so that a person can download them if necessary, and not spend all the traffic on one image;
- Speed of loading web pages - even those users who are connected to high-speed Internet will have problems loading "heavy" photos, that is, the entire page will be loaded, and the picture will be reloaded for some time. You also need to remember about loading the page on devices using mobile Internet, the speed of which is low, and too heavy photos slow down this process even more;
- Size restrictions - social networks and various sites put restrictions on the size of uploaded photos - this is necessary for their normal functioning;
- Original size - photos that take up a lot of space on storage media are actually several times larger than the size in which they are displayed on the screen, which causes various incidents with downloading to / from the Internet.
To avoid such problems, you need to compress photos for the Internet. For personal use, that is, viewing on your PC or laptop, this is optional.
Compress photos online
Compressing a photo online is the easiest and fastest way to solve the problem that the image is too heavy. To do this, you need to go to an online service that focuses on compressing photos: basically, this is reducing the size of images by decreasing the expansion.
Below are some free online services of this kind:
- Image Optimizer - this service provides the ability to compress, optimize and resize images. The service interface is easy to use: to get started, you need to upload a snapshot from your device, select the size and optimization option. You can also install this optimizer on your computer:
- Web Resizer - using this online service, you can edit a photo: compress, crop, add borders, change brightness, contrast, saturation and some other parameters:
- PunyPNG is also a free program that works with various image formats and is effective in reducing the weight of your images:
Photo compression software
« How do I compress the size of a photo?"- such a question often appears before novice photographers, and not only before them.
The biggest mistake is trying to reduce a photo without changing the image size, but sacrificing image quality. The result of such actions is a blurry image that does not fit on the screen. To get a good picture with a small weight, you can use the simplest graphics editor called Paint:
Reducing the size of an image in paint is easy if you follow these steps:
- Open an image with Paint;
- Click on the "Resize" button, after which a window will open:
- In the "change" field, activate "percent", set a check mark " keep proportions", We prescribe a number that determines how many percent will be in the reduced image from the original. In our case, this is 80%. After clicking on "Ok" you can see the result:
- Save the result by clicking on "File", "Save As". Next, you need to select the extension and enter the name. Carrying out this procedure gave a reduction in size by half of the original.
You can also reduce the weight of the photo in a professional graphics editor Photoshop:
To reduce weight you need:
- Open a photo in Photoshop;
- Activate the function " Save for web and devices» ( Save for Web & Devices) found in the File menu:
- In the window that opens, set the settings: format and quality. Reduce quality ( quality) more than 50% is not recommended. At the bottom of the window there are width and height settings, with which you can also reduce the size:
- All that remains is to save the resulting image. Below is the result of the performed manipulations:
How to compress photos for sending by email or just for posting on the Internet? As mentioned above, it is necessary to reduce the weight of the images before submitting. When performing compression, it is advisable to adhere to the following rules:
- The weight of the image should not exceed 100 KB, and the size should be 800 by 600 pixels - this is due to the fact that there are still monitors that do not get along well with giant pictures;
- As you reduce the weight of a photo, traces may appear on it, which indicate that it has been compressed. To hide this, you need to blur the photo a little, using the Blur tool in Photoshop, setting a value of 0.1 - this will be enough;
- Best of all is to save images in JPEG format.
Compressing a lot
How to compress multiple photos at once? It is often necessary to send a large number of photos to someone or simply post them on a website. Naturally, first the weight of the photo must be optimized. This can be done both online and using programs installed on a PC or laptop.
How to compress many photos at once online? To solve this problem, there are specialized services such as Kraken.io. At a time, this service allows you to process a large number of photos, but their total weight cannot exceed 10 megabytes.
For better photo processing, it is better to use applications that are installed on your computer. An example of such a program is Picture Combine - this graphic editor allows you to carry out batch optimization of photos. The program is easy to use, so everyone can master it:
How to compress multiple photos in Photoshop
Photoshop also has the ability to compress multiple photos at the same time. To do this, you need to create an action - an algorithm of actions for batch processing of photos.
The steps to create such an algorithm are described below:
- Create two folders. First, save the images that need to be reduced. In the second, already processed photos will be saved;
- Then you can start recording the algorithm for processing photos. In the Window menu ( Window) you need to click on the item " Creating a new operation» ( Create new action), enter a name for the new action and click on "OK";
- Recording of actions will begin after clicking on the "Start recording" button ( Degin recording);
- To reduce the photo, you need to open the file from the folder in which the images for processing are stored (File -> Open) (File -> open). In the Image menu ( Image) select " Image size» ( image size) - the window for expanding and size settings will open. After making changes, you must click on "OK". You can now save the thumbnail image to an empty folder using the Save As command ( Save as);
- Next, you need to stop recording the algorithm by clicking on " Stop recording» ( Stop recording);
- For automated processing of the rest of the photos in the File menu, select "Automation" ( Automate). Within this menu, use the function " Batch processing» ( Batch);
- To process the entire folder at once, it is necessary in the "Source" menu ( Source) select "Folder" ( Folder), then click on "Select" ( choose) and specify the folder with photos. You also need to determine where the processed photos should be sent, for this in the "Location" ( Destination) select "Folder" ( Folder) and using "Select" ( choose) specify the created empty folder. To fully automate the process, you must activate the item " Overwrite, Save command as» ( Override action “Save As” commands), otherwise it will be necessary to approve the save path for each individual photo. To start processing, click "OK".
Compressing the whole folder
How to compress a folder with photos? This question usually arises when it is necessary to save photographs on a medium with a small capacity, for example, on a flash drive. Or when you need to send a large number of photos by email.
A frequently asked question prompted me to write this article - "How to properly compress a photo and not lose image quality?" I'll try to answer it fairly simply.
I want to get better right away, another reason for writing was the decision to increase the maximum allowable size of published photos to 1024 pixels on the wide side, while maintaining the maximum allowable file size of 100 KB.
So, let's begin. The described method, the simplest and most accessible, is therefore sure that you can master it and remember the procedure the first time.
Step 1. Opening the file.
Launching Photoshop, in Program menu choose File-Open in the newly opened Dialog box find the required file and open it in Photoshop.
Step 2. Cropping
It is strongly recommended to remove all unnecessary, unnecessary information from the photo (banks, ashtrays, packs of cigarettes, relatives and pets. The exception is Oleg Yakushenko's cat), that is, to simply crop the image.
To do this, you need to use the tool Rectangular area(highlighted in red in the second photo) and highlight the desired area. It must be remembered that to maintain the aspect ratio of the photo, the aspect ratio must be 4 to 3 (resolutions 600: 450, 800: 600, 1024: 768, and so on). 
After selecting the area in Program menu choose Image-Crop, the extra area will be discarded and the object of interest will remain.
Step 3. Resize the image
In this case, the original photo had the following parameters
Resolution 2592: 1944 pixels, file size 2MB. After cropping
the resolution has become 2208: 1563 pixels, which will become visible if in Program menu select Image-Image Size
in the window Image size in the graph Width set the required resolution, in our case 1024, click Yes and see how our picture has decreased 
We have resized the image, now it remains to compress the file itself to the desired size.
Step 4. Compressing the file
Without closing the windows, select File-Save As in the window that opens, select the folder to save, you can also change the file name.
Attention Be sure to check something in the column File type was JPEG, otherwise you most likely will not be able to upload the file to the site. 
After the command Save a Window will open JPEG options
Down in the graph The size the current file size is visible ~ 143.93 Kb, we need to reduce it to at least 100 Kb
To do this, in the graph Image options smoothly move the slider to the left. It is not recommended to compress a file with a quality lower than 5, it is better to reduce the image size even further
The second photo shows that the file size has decreased to ~ 86.32 KB, which is what we needed.
Vitoge from a large photo with a size of 2592: 1944 pixels and a "weight" of 2 MB, we got a cropped image with a resolution of 1024: 725 pixels and a "weight" of ~ 86 KB. 
Before submitting photos, it's a good idea to work with Image correction: white balance, brightness, contrast, etc., but I will try to talk about this in the next article.
Each photo or picture has its own size, which depends on the quality of the image. The more the picture weighs, the better its quality. However, when uploading a photo to a website or transferring it via e-mail, users often encounter file size restrictions. Some crop the photo, others edit it in Photoshop. However, an easier way to solve this problem is to compress the photo.
Compress photos programmatically
You can compress a picture or photo without losing quality using various programs. Let's take a look at some of them.
The simplest program that is preinstalled on any PC and is suitable for compressing images is Paint. You can compress a picture using it as follows:
- Select the photo and right-click on it. Choose "Open with ..." and choose "Paint".
- The photo will open in the editor. Here we click "Resize".
- A small window will open. It can be resized in pixels and percentages. If you do not want the quality of the photo to suffer, then you should check the "Percentage" mark and reduce the size of the photo by about 50%. Also here you need to check the box "Maintain proportions".
- Now we need to save the photo. Click "File", "Save As ..." and select the photo format.
- The photo is compressed.
Another program for compressing photos without losing quality is FastStone Image Viewer. To compress a photo using this software, follow these steps:
- Open the program and select the folder with photos in the left menu. Select the desired photo. Then click "Edit", "Resize".
- We set a mark next to the "Percentage" item so that the image does not lose quality. We indicate the width and height. It is worth choosing equal proportions so that the picture does not shrink in the corners.
- Then we save the photo.
Also, using FastStone Image Viewer, you can compress photos in another way.
- Select the file and click "Send by e-mail".
- Next, set the size of the photo. Uncheck the items "Add frame" and "Save EXIF / IRTC data". We put the mark "Rename". The "Template" section appears. In it, the name can be left unchanged. We put the mark “Pack the image into archive”. Having set all the parameters, click "Copy to ...".
- We indicate the folder where you want to copy the file.
- Go to the specified folder and look at the compressed photo.
To compress a picture without losing quality, you can use the GIMP program.
- We open the program. Choose "File", "Open".
- Specify the path to the file and click "Open".
- The photo will open. Go to the "Image" tab and select "Image Size".
- In order to compress the photo without losing quality, you need to set the width and height, which would be divisible by 8. Then click "Change".
- Save the edited image.
How to compress a picture online without losing quality?
Users often wonder how to compress an image so that it does not lose quality. There are many services on the Internet that are suitable for this purpose. Let's take a look at some of them.
- Website http://optimizilla.com/ru/. To compress the photo, click "Upload".
- Next, the photo will be uploaded. 2 pictures will be presented: original and compressed copy. Use the slider on the side to set the quality and click "Save".
- The site http://resizepiconline.com/ also provides its users with the ability to resize images. To do this, you need to upload a photo to the site.
- Next, we set the width and quality. You can change the format. Click "Resize".
- Click "Download" and save the compressed photo.
- Website http://www.imageoptimizer.net/Pages/Home.aspx. Select the file. Set the photo size and click "Optimize Now".
- Then we press "Download to computer".
With the help of not only these sites, you can compress a picture or photo without loss of quality and absolutely free. The choice of the method is yours.
With the help of Photoshop, it is easy to reduce or increase the size of an image. Moreover, this can be done in different ways, depending on what result you are striving for.
Before proceeding with the consideration of methods, first a little theory.
First, what is an image downsizing or upscaling? First of all, this concept should be understood as a decrease / increase in the resolution of a picture, that is, its length and width and, accordingly, the number of pixels that make up any raster image. ...
Second, what happens to the quality of a picture after resizing it?
- In the process of decreasing, there is a loss of pixels, but the quality in general does not suffer, it remains quite clear.
- In the process of increasing, Photoshop stretches the pixels and draws them in accordance with its algorithm. Therefore, the picture quality always suffers when enlarging. The higher the magnification, the more clearly the irreversible loss of quality is seen.
A similar question was covered in the tutorial related to layer resizing,
An illustrative example of how the image quality changes:
In this article, we will look at 4 ways to change the size of a picture in Photoshop and analyze the cases when and in what way it is best to use.
Method 1 - Image Size Dialog Box
This is the classic and most versatile way. It is suitable in most cases, especially when you already know to what size you should reduce and increase the size of the picture.
Open the image in Photoshop.
Open a dialog box Image - Image size(or the key combination - Alt + Ctrl + I). A window like this will appear:
Pay attention to the fields right away Width and Height... The values that will be indicated there are the current dimensions of the image. By default, they are measured in pixels.
If you initially know to what size you need to change the image, then enter these values in the above fields.
Proportions
If there is no check mark in the window settings Maintain proportions, you can enter any values in the length and width fields. But you run the risk that the picture will turn out to be stretched vertically or horizontally. It is very easy to make a mistake and choose the wrong proportions.
Example without preserving aspect ratio
Aspect Ratio Example
Method 2 - Resize with Transform
Image transformation is a cool way to add to your Photoshop knowledge base. This method is good in two cases:
- reduce or increase the size of the entire image;
- reduce or enlarge the inserted picture in Photoshop.
The size is more detailed each case.
How to reduce or increase the size of the entire image
Step 1
Open the picture. Select a team Editing - Free Transform or press the key combination Ctrl + T.
Note
If this command is not active (grayed out), then your background layer is locked to change. This is signaled by the lock icon directly on the layer.
To unlock the background layer, double click on it. A window will appear New layer, Press OK.
Step 2
A frame appears around the image. There are markers in the corners and on each side that you need to drag to zoom out or vice versa to enlarge the image.
After resizing, click on the checkmark at the top of the options bar. There is a bug in Photoshop CS6, and this checkbox is not visible. If you also do not see it, then press the Enter button to accept the changes or Esc to cancel.
Step 3.1 Magnification case
If you enlarged the picture in this way, then, as you can see, part of it has become hidden, it does not seem to fit into the size in which it was opened. On the one hand, this is not bad either, and in some cases it can also be used.
But if you insist that the image be shown in full, select the command Image - Show All.
Step 3.2 Reducing case
When you zoom out, you will see a checkerboard background. This is emptiness, transparency. When you save the image, it will disappear. But it will be correct to cut off the void in order to ultimately see what the final size of the picture is.
To cut off the void, choose Image - Trimming.
In order not to disturb the proportions of the image in this method, when you drag on the frame handles, simultaneously hold down the key Shift.
How to reduce or enlarge an inserted picture in Photoshop
In any case, take the case described above into service. Namely, the ability to use the command Free transformation(Ctrl + T). This technique is needed to carry out such a frequently occurring operation, as a decrease or increase in an inserted picture, object, object(call it what you want).
So a familiar situation: you inserted another picture to your main image in Photoshop, but it did not fit in size.
Select this picture and use the transform command. Now, as described above, pull the markers in the desired direction.
Method 3 - Canvas size
Not the most popular way, but nevertheless, we will also consider it - the command.
A feature of this method is that we change the size of the image resolution, while the picture itself does not change in any way. Photoshop simply cuts off part of the image (if we are talking about a reduction), or adds a background color (if it is an increase).
That is, let's say your picture is 700x700 pixels. Across Image - Canvas Size you set the size to 500x500. As a result, Photoshop cuts off the extra 200 pixels in height and width. In the settings, you can specify where it cuts from: it is either evenly from all sides, or you can select a specific side.
How to reduce image size without losing quality
We've covered 4 ways to reduce the size of an image. Of these, two methods: Canvas Size and Cropping are not related to loss of quality. In fact (width and height) the images become smaller, but the content itself remains at the same scale. To achieve this, you need to sacrifice part of the picture, in other words, just crop it to the desired size. For more details on how to do this, see the text above.
How to reduce a cropped image in Photoshop
In order to reduce the size of the cut object in Photoshop, you need to be able to: cut out objects, manipulate the cut area (including its reduction).
Read about how to cut objects in other articles. Let's dwell on reduction in more detail.
In this situation, knowledge of how to use the command will also come in handy. Free transformation.
When the object is cut, you need to form around it. After that, apply a transformation and, according to the instructions above, drag the markers towards the reduction of this object.
In any case, when reducing the cut out fragment in the vacant space, Photoshop will automatically add a background color. Therefore, if you have a simple case, then take care first and choose the same background color that surrounds the object to be reduced. To do this, get a color swatch using and.
If you spot an error in the text, select it and press Ctrl + Enter. Thanks!
In this article, I want to teach you, in the Photoshop program, as well as how to reduce the weight of the picture, while the quality of the picture itself has not changed much. I will tell and show these actions clearly in the screenshots (in pictures), what and how to do so that your picture changes in size and weight. You just have to complete all the actions that I will show and tell.
Currently, it has become fashionable on all sites, in addition to the most important thing - text, to use banners, videos, animation, and to complement the above - to apply images. Images can be of different nature - these are photos and screenshots, etc. Moreover, they have one function - to show some process or action in addition to the text, in a visual form. I won't tell you something new if I say that images convey information better to the visitor than plain text. But, of course, video is higher in priority. Basically, pictures are used on sites in order to dilute large text so that visitors do not get tired of reading them and in order to clearly show what is written about in this article.
In general, there are many advantages of using images for a website, blog and for other purposes on the Internet. But, there are also disadvantages of this method. It consists in the fact that if you use a lot of images in your site or blog in good quality and with a lot of weight each picture, then this will not have a very good effect on the loading of the page of the site where these images are located. And a visitor who does not have a high Internet speed or he pays for traffic in megabytes, he simply does not wait for this page of the site to load and leaves it. Therefore, in this article, I also want to show you a process that will allow you to reduce not only the size of the image, but also the weight without significant loss of quality. In some cases, the weight of a picture can be changed by a factor of 10. Therefore, you should not neglect this opportunity to make the loading speed of your website pages faster. Plus, search engines pay close attention to site loading.
So what do you need to do to resize the image and still reduce the weight of the image. For these purposes I will need you any version of Photoshop. In fact, there are a lot of ways to resize an image, and each one uses his own method to his liking, but in this article I will show this process in Photoshop, since I myself use this program for my images, which I then insert into my site. And in this article, all the pictures were compressed and reduced in size in this program.
So what do you need to do first. You need the Photoshop program itself. You can get it on the Internet in the public domain. Moreover, you can download the program of any version - this is not important, since the Photoshop program has undergone changes, only in design, and the functions and tools remained the same and in the same places. The only thing is that with each new version of Photoshop, some new feature is added. But in this case, this does not affect what I want to show you in this article, namely how to resize an image in photoshop.
I hope you have already downloaded and installed this program. Then launch it. You should have approximately the same working area of the Photoshop program, which is shown in the screenshot.
Everything is simple here: the main menu is at the top of the program; on the left are the main tools; on the right is an additional menu with tools. In order to change the image, you need to open it in this program. There are 2 ways to do this.
Method 1: move the mouse over the main gray area and double-click the left mouse button, after which you will see a window on your computer, where you must select the image that you want to resize.
Method 2: at the very top of the program there is a horizontal menu and there is the word "File". Click on it.
After that, you will have a drop-down menu where you must find the word "Open" and go through it. After that, you will see the already familiar window with folders on hard drives on your computer and find the desired image there. After that, the image that you opened in the Photoshop program will appear in the main gray window.
Now, in order to proceed to the next step, which will consist in resizing the image, you need to go to the "Image" menu in the top menu.
After that you will have a drop-down menu where you should find such a line "Image size". Navigate to this menu item.
Then you will have a window in which you will change the size of the image. Here, if you change the size, for example, the width, then the height will automatically change and vice versa. This is done so that the aspect ratio of the image does not change. You will not set the size of the image separately here. You can do this further when you save this image. Therefore, here you need to set the size of one value, either width or height.
After you set the values and clicked OK, you need to save this image in the next step, and in the same place you can change the proportions of the image of height and width the way you want to see this image and at the same time reduce the weight (compress) the image. To do this, open the File menu at the top of the program and go to the Save For Web & Devices menu.
After that, a window will appear in which you can additionally change the size and quality of the image. If you want to resize the image individually, you need to click on the icon shown by the arrow at the bottom of the screenshot. After that, the chain will break, and you can change the aspect ratio of the image to your liking. After you change the image at the top of this window, you can select the format and quality of this image. After that, in the main window, you should observe all the changes you have made, and at the bottom there will be the size of this picture. After you are satisfied with everything, click "Save" and select on your computer the place where you want to save this image.
That's all, after that you take this picture and insert it into your site.
This concludes this article and now I think you will not have a question, how to resize an image in photoshop.
If you liked the article, then, if possible, leave your comment so that I can evaluate the quality of my work.
