Resize to 1600x1200 Lightroom 2

Hello, new to the forum. Just bought a 60D and got my hands on Lightroom 2. Trying to resize to 1600x1200 but it always resizes to 1600x1067? Am I missing something in the Export Dialog Box? Thanks, Ralph

The 60D image has a 2:3 ratio aspect. 1200x1600 is a ratio of 3:4. Crop your image to 3:4 and it will fit.

I wish understood what you just said, I'm a struggling amateur. By cropping to 3:4 will I end up with 1600x1200? Thanks so much for the help. I appreciate it. Ralph

rporzio wrote in post #11703597
I wish understood what you just said, I'm a struggling amateur. By cropping to 3:4 will I end up with 1600x1200? Thanks so much for the help. I appreciate it. Ralph

Think about it in terms of pictures. a 4 x 6 has a different aspect ratio than a 8 x 10. One is much more square than the other. Your camera has a 2 x 3 ratio which is the same as a 4 x 6 ratio. Lightroom is maintaining this aspect when scaling your image. If you wanted to have the image end up as a 1600 x 1200 it would have to crop it down to a 3:4 aspect ratio which is more square than 2 x 3 and you would lose part of the image on the left and/or right side.

If you crop the image to a 3 x 4 ratio and then export from lightroom to 1600 x 1200 it will work as you are expecting.

You crop to 3:4 first, then when you export you set the long edge to 1600 in the dimensions box and you should get your 1600x1200 image.

Every image has a ratio aspect. That's the ratio between the height and the width. All Canon DSLR's have a 2:3 ratio. That means that without cropping the image can be any size that has that ratio, like 1200x1800 (1200/1800 = 2/3). But before you can resize to 1200x1600, which has a ratio of 3:4, you have to crop the image to that shape.

ok thanks tzalman, dave_bass and sdiver. I'll do some experimenting. I'm really excited about this board and its responsiveness...! Do you think an upgrade to LR 3 will make my resizing easier or will it be the same; crop first then resize?

No problem, its got a bit of a learning curve but well worth the effort.
I dont think it would be worth upgrading to LR3 just for this, its no different in LR3, but IMO its well worth upgrading anyway for the better features and the better NR and sharpening routines.

There are editing programs that will let you apply different amounts of resizing to the two sides of the image, so you could, for instance start with a 2400x3600 pixels image (2:3) and make it 1200x1600 pixels (3x4) by doing 2400/2.0 and 3600/2.25, but that would distort the image. (Sometimes the distortion is intentional - that's the way you get models with loooong legs, like the young lady below - but mostly it's undesirable.) Fortunately, LR doesn't let you do that, because cropping first is the only way to avoid distortion.

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in thinking about what everyone one is telling me, where is the cropping accomplished, in PS? Individually? I'm wondering if it will be incredibly tedious if I want to resize 100 photos say of a car show for one of my web sites...!

You ask where is cropping accomplished in PS -- I assume you are still asking about Lightroom, or are you considering using Photoshop as well?

Cropping is a common tool in all image editors, and you have to take it into consideration whenever you need a specific image size/format, which it sounds like you require.

One approach you can take in Lightroom: go to the Develop module, then pick an image and select the crop tool -- it's up at the top right of the interface. For specifics go to your Lightroom Help and search for Crop.

Once you select your crop tool you will see a section for Aspect Ratio -- from the dropdown list you will select 4:3.

Then, you will see a rectangle on the image -- if it's going in the right "direction" you can just adjust it to fit the composition. When you get a good "fit", select the rest of the images in the series and, with the first image being the "active" one, click the Sync button. In the dialog that pops up, click Select None and then click Crop to select that and click OK. The cropping will be applied to all the images.

Then, with the crop tool selected, click on each image and review it, making any adjustments necessary.

Once that's done, then you will get your resizing done by Exporting the images, specifying the pixel dimension restraints.

You do want to spend some time reading up on Lightroom! There is Lightroom Help which is the User Guide -- get reading. There are three good books on Lightroom by Victoria Bampton, Martin Evening and Scott Kelby -- pick up one, two or all three from Amazon.com and get reading! Then, there are Web resources with Lightroom tutorials -- you can start with some by POTN member Jason here:

https://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthre​ad.php?t=929170

In either LR2 or LR3, you can crop one image to 4:3, then you can "sync" the cropping of this image to the 99 other images you have. Bear in mind, that the exact same cropping will be apply to all the images, which may not be the cropping you like, but this is a very fast way of apply the crop to all the images.

Thanks everyone, your help is appreciated. One of the reasons I was looking for the exact size of 1600x1200 is for displaying desktops the full size of a monitor on max resolution for instance. I didn't even know that LR has a cropping tool like PS so that will help as well. I have a lot to learn and am extremely patient with my learning curve, my hope is that all of you will be too...! Ralph

My favourite short cut in LR3 is the X key. Pressing this while in the crop tool will rotate the crop area (not the image) from Landscape to Portrait, or the other way around. Very handy IMO.
Im not sure it it works in LR2 though.

Tony, just tried your procedure and it worked beautifully. You're right I have some reading and experimenting to do...!