Post processing Noobie help - 2 pix

I just got a new DRebel XT with a few extra toys and downloaded the latest version of Digital Photo Professional and I'm trying my hand at post processing. No question my head is swimming!

Any comments on these b4 and after? I increased contrast and hue a little and sharpened a little. Frankly, I don't know what's too much or what's not enough. Original was actually in a Canon SureShot S30 from a couple years ago, not the DRebel XT.

Any pointers to good learning resources? Books? Not sure I want to pop for Adobe yet, I'd rather learn on the freeware I got from Canon.

Thanks all!

John Collins

Edit, Old is on left, modified is on right. I have no idea how you folks post such large images. Sorry.

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Hard to tell too much from the images you posted, as they're very small, but the edited version does appear to be better. Most of the books I have are geared towards Adobe, as I mainly use PS CS2 so I can't really recommend any there. But, I think that the stickies in this forum are probably your best bet to start with. Lots of info there!!

Thanks, I'll go to the stickies.

I can't figure out how you folks post such large pictures and stay under the 100 size limit??? What am I doing wrong? I'm always leaving it small and highest quality. Do you select medium quality and a larger size?

I'm amazed at the size and quality of the photos posted here, but I can't figure it out. Any help would be appreciated.

John

A quick way I have used (one of many) is to use the picture resizer within Microsofts powertoys which can be downloaded from their site. Save your file as a jpeg. Open up the picture you want to resize, right click resize pictures and choose the size that will fit within the parameters you need.

My procedure is to size the image to (800 pixels max.) x (800 pixels max), making sure to enable re-sampling. Then save as JPG, but NOT under the original filename (preserve the original file). During the save, set the compression for whatever it takes to keep the final file just under 100kB. Every program doing JPG has a different way of describing the degree of compression.