In order to present images for digital display, particularly for Club and External competitions it is very important to select to correct resolution. This ensures that your image will be correctly displayed on the display device being used.
In the case of our internal club competitions, our club projector has a native resolution of 1920 x 1200 - For external Salon's and Exhibitions this is very often different - For example Cheltenham Salon is 1600x1200, whereas Neath Salon is 1400x1200 and if you were submitting digital images for assessment to the RPS then the resolution would be 4096x2400 So first of all, be sure of the size of image you need.
Given our club's projector is 1920x1200, this means that the maximum width of your image can be 1920 pixels and the maximum height can be 1200 pixels.
The method of achieving this is different in various pieces of Editing Software. In this series we are going to look at three common ones, as well as a tool written by a club member, Mark Kemp.
Here is Mike’s post about Resizing in PhotoShop
Here is DaveH’s post about Resizing in Afinity
and Here is Mark’s post about Resizing with his GCCDPIPrep program.
In this post though, I’m going to begin with Adobe Lightroom Classic
Of course there are many ways to achieve the same thing, and if you use a different method, or setting, please do share your preferences in the comments sections below, but for this article, I'm just going to demonstrate one that generally works well for me. Here I'll begin with a landscape format image, then I'll repeat it with a portrait format.
Once your image is edited and complete, right click and select the Export option
The Export One File dialog box opens
- Ensure the Hard Drive option is selected in the Export To: field for base settings.
Expand the Export Location section, choose a Specific Folder as the Export To location and click the Choose button to browse to your desired location.
- Personally I store all my images in a OneDrive folder that's Synchronised to the cloud for backup. I have a folder for GCC_CompetitionEntries, and a Sub-Folder for each season. This is the location I choose, then I use the "Put in Subfolder field to create a new sub-folder for each round (say Round6 or GloucesterCup for example)
Expand the File Nameing - Here I have a saved preset called Camera Club so it always exports using our club format of Your Name%Photo Title but the new PhotoEntry system doesn't require this format and file naming is not important.
You don't need the Video options
Expand File Settings and ensure the Image Format is JPEG, Quality is 100% and the Colour Space is sRGB
- This is the default colour space that our projector uses. You may need to select a different option for other reasons like some Salons for example, or if you are sending the image to be printed at an external lab
Expand the Image Sizing section and since this is Landscape format where the width is greater than the height*, choose Long Edge and set to 1920 pixels. For Portrait format images where the height is greater than the width then you would choose Short Edge and set to 1200.
Also set the Resolution to be 96 Pixels per inch as this is the recommended resolution for on screen display. You may need other resolutions for other reasons (such as 300 PPI for Printed Images)
* This is a broad generalisation... Depending on the Aspect Ratio of the image, you may find that you still have to export Landscape format images using Short Edge = 1200 so it's always important to doublecheck your final exported images.
Personally I select Output Sharpening and select Sharpen For: Screen with the Amount: Standard
Other options are entirely optional, I leave defaults
You can then click Export button to save the image to the location that you specified and your work is complete.