Resizing Large Images with XnView for the Web

Resizing Large Images with XnView for the Web

1. [Downloading/Installing XnView] XnView can be found at http://www.xnview.com/ Download the standard XnView and follow the setup wizard to install the program on your computer. Run XnView.

2. [Loading an Image] XnView will start with a file-browser type menu, use the left menu to navigate to the image(s) you wish to resize.

   

   Here we have an image in the "pictures" folder on the desktop titled food.jpg. From the top pane in XnView's main window, we can double-click the food.jpg thumbnail to make it the active image.

3. [Bringing Up the Resize Menu] Now that we have selected food.jpg as our active image, we can go to the [Image] dropdown menu and select the [Resize...] option.

   

4. [Selecting Resize Settings] With the Resize menu up, we are presented with a few different text fields. The import fields are the "Keep Ratio" checkbox, the "Width" field for Screen Size, and the "Units" field in Print Size.

   Here we are resizing the image to 600 pixels wide. We first make sure that the "Keep Ratio" box is checked, or when we enter 600 pixels in width, we'll only change the image width, and make a tall-but-scrunched looking image. With "Keep Ratio" checked, XnView will scale the height according to the new width (600) that we've entered.

   Finally, when resizing images for the web, it's important that the "Units" field read 72 pixels/inch. This is the standard resolution for on-screen images.

   

5. [Saving the Image] Notice now that in the food.jpg tab in XnView, there is an asterisk (*) in front of the name of the image. This means that we've modified the image and it's not yet saved.

   

   To save the image you can hit either ctrl+s or go to the [File] menu and select [Save]. Since the image is trying to save over the older version, XnView will ask you if you'd like to overwrite it, if you select yes, this will overwrite the original, large, image.

   To create a newly named copy of the resized image, as well as saving the original, go to the [File] menu and select [Save as...], now you can specify a new file name.