Crop & Resize action

[Valentina5CD5]

Hello,

I am trying to create an action that allows me to batch resize images at 640x459 pixels. In the past I used Fastone Photo Resizer for this and it allowed to resize images while maintaining images aspect ratio and using smart cropping to allow images not to be strecthed or squished.

In Photoshop however I am not able to replicate this. When I record and then run a resize action the image gets resized but often its proportions are altered to fit 640x459. I often then need to crop each image to 640x459 and then run the resize action. 

I have tried recording two separate actions, one for cropping and one for resizing, but when I crop images with different resolutions Photoshop often runs a filling process that then alters the photo completely.

Any suggestions? Thanks!

[Conrad_C]

Does the resize action use Image > Image Size? If so, that might be where the problem is.

Instead, try including File > Automate > Fit Image.

[Valentina5CD5]

Thank you SO much Conrad! I managed to record a new action using Fit image and that did the trick.

Wish you a good day

[Valentina5CD5]

Actually no sorry, I just noticed that when I run that images are not exactly resized at 640x459. Is there anything else that should be done with that?

[D Fosse]

Fit Image creates a box for the image's long side to fit into. The short side will just fall wherever it falls according to the original's aspect ratio. 

It doesn't have a function to resize the short side at the same time, and that will work for both portrait and landscape formats. That will involve squeezing or stretching, and only Image Size can do that.

In that case you need to record conditional actions. This is in the fly-out menu in the Actions panel:

[Valentina5CD5]

Hi, I am not sure this is related to my issue. I often only use landscape images but they are all coming in a varitey of resolutions. So when I try to batch crop and resize this is the outcome (see attached).

My workaround so far is just to open each image, crop it at 640x459 and then run the resize action (either with automate>fit image or image size)

[Conrad_C]

I am trying to create an action that allows me to batch resize images at 640x459 pixels. In the past I used Fastone Photo Resizer for this and it allowed to resize images while maintaining images aspect ratio and using smart cropping to allow images not to be strecthed or squished.

By @Valentina5CD5

Can you describe what Smart Cropping does? Like is it “smart” because it analyzes the image and figures out what content should be centered before it crops to an aspect ratio? If that’s what it does, I don’t think there is a comparable feature in Photoshop.

Would it be acceptable to just auto-crop from the center of each image, regardless of the content? If it is, there might be a way to achieve that in Photoshop.

[Valentina5CD5]

I can share a screenshot of how I used to setup Faststone for this kind of resizing, even though it's a completely different software than PS it might show what kind of preferences and settings I chose there. In Fastone, smart cropping is described as "resulting in exact same width and height". 

When I crop images in PS at 640x459 I usually keep it at the center of the image so yeah I'm open to any suggestions you might have to incorporate that in the action, but so far whenever I recorded a cropping action PS then uses filling, which in Fastone is instead unticked (not sure if the two processes are similar though)