resize picture

I remember sometime ago I had a picture that was few MB in size and I resaved it so the file size was around 40kb. When I was resaving it I recall seeing and using a horizontal slider, that, as I moved it from side to side it showed what the resulting file size would be. I can no longer find where I used that, but found it to be a useful tool. Does anyone know what I am talking about and where it is?

TIA

You may have been using the Preview application on your Mac. Have you tried it again with Preview? (You may have also been using iPhoto.)

I don't use iPhoto for anything so I tried Preview again. When I click save as and choose JPEG as the format, the slider is there, but I don't see the changing file size like I described in orig post. Could my "issue" have anything to do with moving from 10.6 to 10.8? I did that just a few months ago.

dnbreaks said:

Could my "issue" have anything to do with moving from 10.6 to 10.8? I did that just a few months ago.

Click to expand...

Could well be. Its been that long since i have used 10.6, but i can vouch for what you are doing is correct and will significantly reduce the size of the image. Best thing is give it a go and then Get Info on the image to check if the size is what you want, ie ~ If you need it to fit in some Forums ridiculous size rules on their images M-F not included

I think you are misunderstanding the reason for the slider in Preview. It is there to select the JPEG quality (or JPEG compression) not the picture file size. Clearly, if you have a high quality and resave it as a lower quality he result will be s smaller file but if it is already low quality it won't change.

I have checked my answer is correct by taking 260 KB graphic and resaving it as the lowest quality. The resulting file is 57 KB. Resaving the new file as the lowest quality still results in a file of 57 KB. Resaving the small file as the highest quality takes the file up to 319 KB but the picture is now no better than the small file as the computer cannot add detail that was not there.

The only real way to make a picture file smaller that is already at maximum compression is to make the picture itself smaller - which you can also do in preview.