When I try to add a picture to my post, I get a message saying the file is too big. It's just an average picture. Should I be doing something to make it a smaller file?
Here is one way to resize the picture: 1. Download and install IrfanView http://www.irfanview.com/main_download_engl.htm 2. Open the picture in IrfanView 3. From the Image pulldown menu in IrfanView, select Resize / Resample. 4. Change the width or height of the image. The Preserve aspect ratio is selected by default, so changing one dimension will automatically scale the other dimension to match. 5. Click on the OK button. 6. From the File pulldown menu, select Save As. 7. Save your resized image under a new file name. If you are using Windows, you can right-click on the image file and select Properties to see the file size. You can also upload the image to http://postimage.org/ and resize the file there. Then just insert a link into your post with the Postimage URL for the image.
If you are using Microsoft Windows (from XP to 8) there is a simple tool available to you called "Paint". (it's native in most installations) If you have it, right click on the file you need to resize and choose "open with Paint". When paint opens you will see your picture full size. Click on the Resize button, and this opens. If you want to reduce the size of your original picture by 50%, enter "50" in the box labeled "Horizontal". Paint will automatically enter 50 into the Vertical box for you so the aspect of the picture is maintained. (you can change this if you want, I usually don't) Click the "OK" button when you are done and your picture will be resized to 50% of its original size. Now comes the most important part. If you want to keep your original just as it was when you started, (I usually do) then you need to "save as" to create a new, second image. The saves the resized image, and leaves the original just as it was when you opened it. To save the new image, click on the dark blue tab in the upper left corner (see below) and from the drop down menu choose "Save as". You will have to name the new smaller file with a different name than the original. I usually just append the original name with a number to show it's percentage of size compared to the original. The photo above was reduced to 50% of it's original size so I named it Merkur25C_50pct. Paint is capable of basic photo editing, drawing, and a few other things. It's a bit crude, and is definitely limited, but for the price, it does well with re-sizing photos. I hope this helps.
Another program that I use occasionally is fotosizer. It is free and works reasonably well. http://www.fotosizer.com/
