File sizes and posting challenge

[mjd525]

Photo Friends; looking for guidance......
I take photo's for a couple of different organizations, and recently have upgraded my gear. With that comes ability for larger picture sizes (memory). In the past with older equipment, it was not an issue. I just took the pics in .jpg and uploaded to sites and there was now files size (meg) issues.
HOWEVER... now with newer equipment and larger file sizes this is becoming an issue to deal with. On one hand I want to take good quality images, but don't want (and sometimes can't) upload those large files on to sites for people to view and obtain.
So.... What must I do? Assume to convert (without losing the origianal) to a smaller files size representation of the file, and post those. If so..... what would be the best process / procedure to do this? Suppose i then will be keeping TWO versions of the same photo on file.
Thanks for your valued input, suggestions and recomondations.

 

[Big Mike]

What are the intended end use of the images?

If you just want to display images on the web, you probably don't need more than 1000 pixels wide.
If the image is to be downloaded for printing, you should consider the size of the intended prints. For example, 1800x1200 is plenty for a 4x6 print.

Also, what format are you using? JPEG is pretty much the common standard and when you save-as a jpeg, you have the option to increase compression (lower quality and lower file size). You can actually use a fair amount of compression (greatly reducing the file size) before the quality loss is great enough to be noticed by anyone.

 

[mjd525]

Big Mike,
Thank you for responding....
Intended uses are multiple. Posting on a picture website for people to view and or aquire. Also may be used for video slide show. And some, if they come out really nice, to crop/adust, etc. and print. I'm now shooting with a Nikon D7000 and as you may know, has many options for image quality and image settings. Really just trying to get the best of all needs without having to duplicate the images depending on final use.

 

[Big Mike]

If you haven't already, you should probably develop a solid workflow.

For example;
Shoot in raw.
Process the raw files and then output/save a Jpeg copy for uploading. You can decide what size (pixels), compression level and file size will suit your needs. It's pretty common that a photographers will save copies of their photos for specific uses. So you may end up with several copies of the images. This will mean that you need a good system for organizing your files.

The DAM Book: Digital Asset Management for Photographers