Basic Questions about Digital Photography

[MikeC]

Okay, I just got a new digital camera - a Sony Cybershot. It takes pictures at 8.1 megapixels. The file size of the pictures I've taken so far are about 2.1 MB. Is there a direct relationship between the # of megapixels and the file size?

Also, can anyone recommend good software for editing pictures? Vista has Windows Photo Gallery which seems to be good (I just learned about tags) but would also like the ability to save pictures in other than JPEG and in different sizes (I don't want to e-mail 2 MB pictures). If photo gallery does those things I haven't figured it out yet.

Thanks,
Mike

[porchdog]

The higher the megapixel the larger the file size and the larger you can print a picture. This site: http://www.irfanview.com/ has a free program that will resize your pic as well as change the format if you want. I think someone on this site mentioned this site for the resizing tool just recently.

[CurlieQCarrie]

If you want to make the file size smaller while you're taking photos, you can do it right from your camera. I have a Cybershot 6.0 and I keep mine shooting at 3M. To change it (on my model anyway), I just hit the view/trash button while the camera is in shooting mode and the image size menu pops up right away.

[mike]

I also have a Sony Cybershot. I keep my setting at VGA which is fine for posting on the internet of emailing pictures. I isn't good for printing pictures, but I don't print pictures much anymore. Just keep a virtual photo album. Sometimes I find that if I take pictures at a higher number of megapixels, I can reduce the size of the image with my software and get a sharper image.

I use MGI software which I have found to be good for my purposes.
http://www.mgisoft.com/

[MikeC]

Thanks for the input - now I know what the VGA setting is for. In exploring I noticed that my camera (DSC T100) also has a format for shooting in HDTV format (it's called 16:9 on the menu).

My plan was to shoot at the highest megapixel and then resize based on what I wanted to do with the picture. I'm going to download the irfanview software - however it may be simpler to just shoot at a lower resolution.

Mike - do you use Easy Media Creator 10 (that's what shows on the link when I click on it) or do you use photosuite - also on the Roxio site?

Thanks again. Mike

[mike]

I use photosuite, a pretty old version of it. I don't have very high tech needs for photo editing, just adjusting sharpness, contrast, and brightness. I also put photos on Ebay which requires combining pictures together. For this limited requirement this software works fine for me.

[doingtimeonmyass]

Mike,

I agree with porchdog, IrfanView is an excellent program. I use it as a default picture viewer and like the slideshow features. Have you seen Picasa2 by Google? It's also free, easy to use, and packed with features.
http://picasa.google.com/download/
I like the way you can view, edit, and organize your pictures quickly and easily. I like having the pictures shot at the highest resolution and best quality possible. That is so I can crop a small portion of the picture and print it if necessary. If I have several pictures in one folder I would like to e-mail somebody, I just select the ones I want by holding down the control key, then export those pictures to another folder using Picasa. During the export process you can resize and rename the photos at the same time.

[mike]

Mike,

I agree with porchdog, IrfanView is an excellent program. I use it as a default picture viewer and like the slideshow features. Have you seen Picasa2 by Google? It's also free, easy to use, and packed with features.
http://picasa.google.com/download/
I like the way you can view, edit, and organize your pictures quickly and easily. I like having the pictures shot at the highest resolution and best quality possible. That is so I can crop a small portion of the picture and print it if necessary. If I have several pictures in one folder I would like to e-mail somebody, I just select the ones I want by holding down the control key, then export those pictures to another folder using Picasa. During the export process you can resize and rename the photos at the same time.

I downloaded and tried the Picasa2 program and found it to be excellent. Better then the program that I had been using and simple to work with. Thanks for the input.

Mike

[MikeC]

Thanks Rob, now that you mention it; I have heard of Picassa. Sounds like it will let me resize easy.I'll download it and give it a try. Mike

[doingtimeonmyass]

Thanks Rob, now that you mention it; I have heard of Picassa. Sounds like it will let me resize easy.I'll download it and give it a try. Mike
That's what were all here for. How is it going?