Monday, August 24, 2009

What To Do With Poor Quality Digital Images

Do you have any really low resolution digital photos? Our first digital camera took 200 KB pictures - at their largest - and the whole card only held one MB. At the time, just being free of film was amazing but I had no idea what to do with the images once they made it to my computer.

Fast forward seven years and I take pictures that push up into the 4, 5 and 6 MB range. They blow up beautifully and are fun to play with. But what about all those memories trapped in a blur of grainy pixels? As a scrapbooker, the easy answer is to make collage style LOs that allow you to print the pictures small enough that the poor quality isn't an issue. For this LO, the largest image was 126Kb and the smallest was 53Kb - yikes! But, at 2x2, the photos look fine.

On a Mac, when dealing with small files, Contact Sheet in iPhoto is your best friend. You can print many photos on one sheet and all you have to decide is how many photos across on your page.

Here is my LO, I got to have fun using all my old standbys - sewing, very linear design, machine stitching, distressing tool etc.

Details:



It's really dark here today so the colors look terrible. That's how it is sometimes, what can you do?

Sorry if I offended anyone with my comment about natural childbirth last Thursday. Trust me, I know childbirth is hard. It took 29 hours of labor and three hours of pushing to bring Trenton into the world. He was OP (occipital posterior) so every contraction slammed him into my spine and during pushing, my tailbone snapped. I firmly believe I should have had a C-Section with him and had we been in a hospital I would have had whatever meds they offered. Natural childbirth was my goal because I didn't want to expose the boys to drugs, *BUT* if you've been pregnant since I've known you, you've probably heard me say, "take whatever you have to if you need it."

Also, thanks for the input on spinal injections. The doc described it to me like this, " make a tight fist and then shove a needle through it. That's what it will be like getting to your spine through the bone disease." Which scared the crap out of me. He also said it won't be as bad as a spinal tap - something I've had the unpleasant pleasure of experiencing. That's good. Perhaps he just has a really terrible bedside manner. Hearing your epidural stories made me think it won't be too awful.

Again, thanks for all the support the last four months and especially last week.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

Omigawsh, those are some tiny boys! Makes me want to go look at photo albums of mine :)

I did the epidural with the first and last. First because it had been 24 hours, pitocin drips are mean, and I'd started passing out from the sciatica pain. I was so against it at the time, but the fight had been sucked clean out of me by then. I wasn't a fan of that epidural.

The last was because pitocin drips are mean. The epidural was a piece of cake. Seriously, I've had more painful blood draws. Never lost feeling in my legs. So, I think it's all in the technician.

And congrats on finding some people who have hope, not doom. Made my day :)

CathyR said...

I love the layout. I'm a big fan of the small squares look even though I can never get them to line up properly.

The epidural is pretty easy. In my case, the anesthesiologist kept telling me to curl up more. I kept thinking, you try curling up more at 8 1/2 months pregnant. Men!

Anonymous said...

I didn't know you could make a contact sheet in iphoto! I'm so lame! Your layout ROCKS!!!! I love all the squares!

Claudette said...

fantastic layout....keep feeding me idea's :)

Kathi said...

Wow. I didn't know about contact sheet in iPhoto. That's going to solve major problems with the 300+ photos from graduation. Yay.

I'd be scared of the surgery too. Your doctor really needs to learn a modicum of tact, though you probably appreciate the directness and honesty.