Participating Frequently

Question

Getting a big photo into a small ad

Forum|Forum|4 years ago
September 28, 2021
5 replies
693 views

Hello everyone!

I have an issue. I'm not sure if there is a good solution out there, but i hope some of you can explain. This might be a stupid question, but at least I might learn something 🙂

Okay, so I have recieved a photo from i client who wants to use it in an display ad. The picture is very big (11648x8736 px) and they want it to be in an ad thats only 300x250 px. That is a big difference, and when I try to resize the picture it gets very pixelated.

I've tried to look at some youtube-videoes on resizing, resolution and pixels, but I still don't quite get it. Can you tell me if it's even possible to downsize such a big image and get an okay result? If not, why? And do you have any tips on resources that can help me understand this better?

Hope some of you can help me understand 🙂

macOS

This topic has been closed for replies.

manal shanableh

Legend

and one more thing, when you say PX that mean its a screen veiwing ad, so the user will se it 100% in res. 72 ppi.

josephlavine

Community Expert

The final ad at 300x250 px is rather small. Once downsized, the image has a limited number of pixels, and when you zoom in, it will look pixelated. That said, sharing a screen capture will help.

warmly/j

jennyh97Author

Participating Frequently

Yes, I think when zoomed at 100% it looks kind of okay. As long as it is not scaled up when posted I think it will do, but of course, the details is quite limited. But I guess that i how it is when working in such small formats. Would post a screenshot, but since it's not my photo I don't think I can. Thank you so much for your answer! 🙂

D Fosse

Community Expert

So it's not very much details, but they naturally wants the model to look sharp. As i answerd the comment above it looks okay when i zoom to 100%, but the format is of course very small.🙂

By @jennyh97

They just have unrealistic expectations. Happens all the time. The plain truth is that a lot of people don't really understand the nature of pixels and raster images. They think they can reduce "size" but keep "resolution" - and I put those in quotation marks to imply that both concepts are basically misunderstood at that level.

On screen, size and resolution are the same thing: the pixel dimensions. And 300 x 250 is small bordering on thumbnail.

Sometimes it pays to educate the client when expectations are unrealistic, unachievable or simply un-practical.

manal shanableh

Legend

if the images is a layer inside a design and you want to resize it i suggest to convert it to smart object befor resize.

and yes as jane said, make sure that after resize that you look at it in 100% zoom.

jennyh97Author

Participating Frequently

Thank you so much! Yes, when looking at it in 100% it looks "okay". But the format is so small it's hard to see any details at all. I guess you have to accept that when working with such small formats 🙂

L

Lumigraphics

Legend

It likely to look bad but it all depends on the content of the photo. Can you post a sample?

jennyh97Author

Participating Frequently

Hi,

Since it's not my photo I don't think I can post it, but it's a closeup of a model and sky/ocean as background. So it's not very much details, but they naturally wants the model to look sharp. As i answerd the comment above it looks okay when i zoom to 100%, but the format is of course very small. It makes it hard to see any details at all 🙂

Thank you for your answer! 🙂

Earth Oliver

Legend

That's never going to happen. You're converting 100,000,000 pixels to 75,000 px, which means that you'll be throwing away 99.999% of the image.

jane-e

Community Expert

Hi

The first question is: what is your Zoom level? Be sure it is 100%.

Jane

jennyh97Author

Participating Frequently

Hi,

At 100% it doesn't look that bad, but I guess it's because the format 300x250 is so small.

As long as it won't be scaled up when posted as an ad I think the quality will work, but when working in such a small format it's hard to see any kind of details. The customer also wanted a logo and a heading, but I think that it will be hard to read 🙂

Thank you so much for your answer!

jane-e

Community Expert

You have to look at it with 100% zoom, as zooming in will always look pixelated.

The second question is: what settings did you use to resize the image? If you can revert or open a fresh copy, can you go to Image > Image Size and show a screenshot with the settings you used? You can paste into a forum window or use the Insert Image button (mountain and sun). We don't need to see the image itself.

Will the ad be online or is it going to be printed?

Also, are you keeping the same aspect ratio or is there a distortion? I used your original numbers, then resized to 300 px for the width and PS gave me 225 px for the height.

~ Jane

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