I discovered the digital camera makes a nice scope camera. I'm trying to
convert the pictures I have taken to black and white files with much lower
information content so that I can place a number of them in a Word

document

and send without loading down the recipient's computer. The .JPG picture
files I have currently stored on my computer run typically 160K in size

but

when I try to modify them to black and white they end up being larger,
typically double, but - as high as 30M in one case! I'm currently using
IrfanVeiw but without much luck. Anyone have some advice?
Thanks,
Bill A

Try using Adobe PhotoShop which is available in a cut down version
(PhotoShop LE) as a give-away with a number of products. This allows you to
define the resolution of the final picture. The full version is downloadable
from www.adobe.com, and a free try-out is available.

The best program I have used for making files smaller, especially for the
web, is FireWorks which is usually used in conjunction with the web
authoring tool Dreameaver.

Was your 30M file a JPG? I suspect it was a TIF which is uncompressed. Mono
images are often best saved in a GIF format if it is not essential to use
JPG.

Try altering the image size. Often the image is much bigger than necessary
and the file size diminishes by (roughly) square law as the image is made
smaller.

Good luck.

Mike, G3XDV
http://www.lf.thersgb.net
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