This tutorial will show you how to resize and save your photos in Photoshop so they are sharp, crisp, and perfectly sized for your blog.
If you’ve ever posted photos on your blog or Facebook, you may have noticed they are not as crisp and clear as the original image.
This is especially frustrating if you’ve spent time editing the photo, only to have it not show up as well in the image you are sharing with everyone!
In my last photoshop tutorial, I showed you how I edit my photos. I almost always do these two steps:
1. Sharpen
2. Run an action (usually Fresh & Colorful from the Pioneer Woman actions)
But if I’m going to be sharing these images here on the blog (or Facebook or email) there’s one more thing I do to get them ready.
1. Determine How Big Your Photos Should Be.
Left: Internet Explorer. Right: Firefox.
Most blogs are between 400 and 600 px wide. This blog is 600 px. To determine the width of your blog, right-click on a photo that’s already on your blog. From the menu that pops up, click on Properties (if using Internet Explorer) or View Image Info (if using Firefox).
Left: Internet Explorer. Right: Firefox.
Look at the Dimensions. The number on the left is how wide the image is. This image of my Cookies ‘N Cream Oreo Fudge Brownies is 600 px wide. That means we’ll want to resize our images for this blog to 600 px wide.
2. Resize.
Open the image in Photoshop and edit to your liking. For this image, I did a sharpen, Fresh & Colorful, then ran the Topaz Adjust Color Blast filter. Love that filter for fall pics! :)
When you’re done editing, click on Image > Image Size…
Change the width to 600 (or whatever your size is) and click OK.
Great! Now it’s the right size, but it’s not quite as sharp as the original image…
3. Sharpen.
First click CTRL-J to create a duplicate layer.
Then click on Filter > Smart Sharpen…
Change to these settings:
Amount: 60%
Radius: 0.4
And click OK.
Perfect! If it looks too sharp, you can always adjust the opacity until it looks right. (Another reason to always make a duplicate layer.)
4. Save.
Now we’re ready to save. Click on File > Save for Web & Devices…
From the screen that pops up, make sure you are saving as a JPEG and that the quality is around 60. That’s a high enough quality for the picture to still look good, but not so huge that it will take forever to load on your page! :)
Here’s the before….
And then after we sharpened:
Or roll your mouse over the image below to see the before and after!
It’s subtle. Look at the eyes…
Note: You’ll need to be here on the blog for this to work, not reading from the email or RSS feed.
That’s all there is to it! :)
BTW, If you haven’t seen these already, be sure to check out:
How I Take Pictures
How I Edit Pictures
Have a great day! :)
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63 Comments
thank you Amanda…i love your easy to follow tutorials! btw, i got your button on my page, thanks again!
I love your tutorials, they are so easy to follow and understand. I took an 8 week college course on Photoshop and still don’t feel comfortable using it. Thanks!
Thanks for another great tutorial. I’m saving these until I get my camera.
Oh, and I can’t get the picture to change and I’m on the blog??
Thanks for a great tutorial, Amanda!
I have limited knowledge about PS and I really appreciate you taking the time to make this post.
I hope PSE 4 has these same options for me. I read your post and thought- I can totally do this too!!
Love this tutorial!! You always have easy instructions, thank you ;)
wow! thanks so much!! i thought making my pics smaller and lower resolution was doing the job…but your tips and expertise are greatly appreiciated and i realize now i was doing it all wrong! thanks so much!! i am new to your blog…but am so happy i found you!!
I could read your photo tutorials every day! Love them.
this is wonderful Amanda! Now, I just need a decent camera to use to take those pics!! :-) Love your blog!
Wow, thanks so much Amanda! I really enjoy your blog for the fun of peeking into your life through some great photography! These how to tips have been wonderful. I now have hope for doing the same on my upcoming blog.
Live well!
- Nicole
Love your blog! those “babies” are precious! I want two that look just like yours! Great Tutorial today! Thanks Amanda!
Lovely tutorial! Actually, just a lovely blog altogether! And I have been to POSH in Blue Ridge! My Daughter is a nurse and she goes into Blue Ridge all the time! Those shops are addictive!
I just love your blog, and your tutorials have inspired me to do more photography and blogging!! Thank you so much! And keep the tutorials coming! I definitely need them!
Amanda I absolutely love when you do a tutorial!! I have a question though – I have a Nikon D60 and my night pictures are much to be desired! What settings should I use? Thank you again for all of your great tutorials they are so helpful and easy to understand!!
Hi Amanda! I’m a newer reader to your blog and I just love it! Especially these tutorials. You have helped me a great deal! My blog and I thank you :)
This was so helpful. Thank you. ~Ann
Again, thank you so much for taking the time to publish these tutorials.
Thanks for the awesome tutorial! I find photography & PS tutorials to be super helpful. Have a great Wednesday!
Thanks for the sharpening tips. Seriously, it’s so helpful. I love your little nuggets of information. It’s not overwhelming and they are “do-able”. Thanks again. :) {have a great day}
Thank you for your tutorials! They are always so helpful & easy to understand, you’re awesome! :)
I just recently came across your blog! I have learned so much! Your step by step tutorials are awesome!! Thank you for taking the time to pass your knowledge to us!
Take care,
Frances
This is great Amanda! I love your tutorials. Thanks so much for sharing your knowledge with all of us.
Amanda, this has been driving me nuts about my own blog for years. THANK YOU. THANK YOU TO INFINITY!!!
THANK YOU! I swear I have learned more from your blog in a week than I have in the last 2 years on my own! Your tutorials are super simple to follow. Thanks for sharing your knowledge! I appreciate it more than you will know.
Casey
Just thought I’d let you know… I get your email and the picture does change in my email. Great tutorial!
Do you read my mind Amanda or my blog?I have been toying with this very problem this week.I did a trial blog with resized pictures.I couldn’t work out from the PSE class,I have just taken how to find the size of the pictures for my blog.So thankyou for explaining that.I’ve now noticed the edge has been cut of all my horizontal pictures for ages.LOL
Again, thanks for such awesome photo tips. Your pics are always stunning.
My eyes were instantly drawn to the eyes in that last photo! Yes, the sharpen definitely makes a difference! Only question, I don’t have Photoshop, do you know if I can do these tricks in Picasa?
Thanks so much for these awesome tutorials! I am new to posting on your blog but I just love reading it! One of my favorites! Your tutorials are so easy and so informative! Thanks so much!!
thanks so much!
Now you need to do another tutorial to show us how you made the picture change when the mouse went over it!!??? That is AWESOME!!
Also, I’ve been blog stalking you for quite a while now, just thought you should know. :)
Thank you Amanda! Your tutorials are wonderful!
Hey Amanda
this may seem like a very “basic” question, but how do you actually ‘get’ the photos on the Blog? I am now attempting to design my blog and nothing is ‘sticking’. cant get any of the free backgrounds to stay and I cant figure out how to get my pics from Photobucket, where i have them loaded, to the blog. FOR pics on the web, i read you need the url for the pic. where do you get that???
kelly
thanks for this tutorial!!
I love your tutorials! You make me feel so much smarter after I read them! And you make it so simple to understand too! I’ll search a tutorial on another site and for the most part I’ll figure out what they are talking about and if not, I’m one of those who’s darned determined to do all I can to find out what they are saying before giving up, but I know that there are some people who can get totally lost and frustrated that the steps aren’t better set for them to understand.
But holy moly I LOVE the picture you took of your dog! The colors! The motion! The rustic look of the fence and trees! The color of the ball! I love it!
Everything you take a picture of, I want to frame it and hang it on my wall (yes, even that Oreo brownie thankyouverymuch). :P
Great! Next tutorial: how to do the sweet roll-over!
And I’ll echo all the previous comments: your tutorials are so user friendly! Thanks!
What version of Photoshop are you using? I’m curious… :)
I too have been wondering WHY my photos didn’t look as good on my blog! Thank you for the tutorial!
And Wow – when you roll over the pic you can really tell by his eyes – what a difference!
So helpful…I figured out some of the resizing on my own but the sharpening and other info was great! Wish I would have found this a few months ago…I might still have hair! Haha
Thank you so much for this tutorial! I just do PW’s sharpen and define and than the bright and colorful but always wondered why my photos weren’t coming out as clear as yours. This is so helpful. I was starting to feel bad again about not being in the Canon or Nikon club (but the Olympus Club), but this boosts my self esteem back up ; )
Jennie Pie
“Capturing Sweet in the East”
P.S. Amanda, you should really check out my latest blog post about the Seoul fabric market…you would love the accessories! Let me know if you need me to send you something :)
Thank you so much for the tutorial…Seriously, have you ever thought about writing a book? Even if you did it on your own and sold it here on the website? I know I’d purchase one in a minute. I’ve wondered how to get my pictures to look better on my blog and now I know. THANK YOU!!!
Awesome tutorial, thank you! I am finally at the point where I am ready to invest in a DSLR, and new photoshop tips are always great :o)
Thanks, Amanda! Your tutorials ALWAYS rock!! I loves these kind of posts too:)
Awesome job on the tutorial!
~Kelly
Thanks so much for this tutorial :) I had a play with it and posted my results here: http://www.twobecomefour.com/2010/09/just-look-at-those-eyes-now.html
Amanda, Thanks so much for this info! I have a question related to this…I want to use a photo I edited in PS using your tutorial :) for a wrapped canvas from Canvas People dot com. I’d like to get an 11×14 size canvas. How can I use this to make sure my picture is sized right before I upload and order from a vendor?
When going through the steps in this tutorial, I saw the option for “canvas” in a drop down choice and it reminded me of this.
Thanks,
w
http://shechosethebetterpart.blogspot.com/2010/09/teaching-old-dog-new-tricks.html
I used the edit tutorial and the resizing tutorial.
thanks so much!
Can you next tutorial be on how you do the mouse roll-over trick?
Dang, I love that picture of the dog running with the ball in its mouth! Just had to say that none of the photo editing stuff makes much sense to me, but I sure did enjoy seeing that dog bolting through the yard on retrieve! Thanks.
Thank you for the GREAT tutorial. I’ve been teaching myself photoshop and I can’t wait to try this!
Thanks for the great info! Do you take these steps for each photo? Or did you make an action for this process?
Thanks alot Amanda!! You’re so great at telling tutorials!! :D
Wow! So informative, yet simple and easy to understand. You rock!
i love this post. i love all your graphics and tips. it was great having lunch with you today!! have a safe flight back!
Thanks, to easy and useful
O M G…I have loved looking at everything!!! I REALLY want to upload my handwriting and then be able to download it again! How do I do that?
Hi Amanda,
I wasn’t sure where to post this question :/
I recently ordered a collection of graphics online and they all came in gif format. These collections were made several years ago and so she’s not really that active any more and is not very good…actually, downright lousy….at answering my emails.
I don’t have a problem with the embellishments and such (at least so far) but it’s the background paper! Like one says that the dimensions are 4026 x 3600, but when I go to try to resize, it looks really blurred. What do I have to do in order to make it work for digital scrapbooking?
I appreciate any help or tips that you can give me. BTW, your tutorials have been very helpful…I so, SO appreciate them! I’m learning the one about the scrapbook background and am using gimp software. :)
Thanks,
Velma
Does anyone know how to do this on a Mac (I use Safari for my browser and blogspot)?
very helpful. thank you!
VERY VER HELPFUL!!!! Answered my question THANKS!
If somebody does not have photoshop let me recommend the tool I am using. It is free and super-easy to work with. Also availible for most of the operating systems. Hope will help:)
http://rawimaging.org/projects/image-resizer