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Digital Image Processing
This session will begin with basic information about how to prepare the “raw” digital image, once it is on a personal computer, for use in placement on a web site or CD-ROM. Included is a discussion about how to archive the image in the highest quality for use in future projects.
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Starting with the original raw digital image, several computer graphics programs provide “image manipulation tools” to help fine tune or adjust the exposure, contrast brightness, hue, and saturation of an image. Sometimes just increasing the contrast in an image can really improve how it looks on a computer screen. In addition, these programs usually let you crop and size the image for your intended use. A “web sized” image, for example, usually is sized down and compressed with JPEG compression to make it download faster on a web page.
On the other hand, images that may be printed would be kept in the highest quality possible. If the image may have multiple uses it is a good idea to archive or store it in the highest possible original quality and save it under different names, and/or in a different places, for other uses. Archiving raw image files as well as additional versions that have had some changes made to them can be done on CD ROM or DVD ROMs.
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Low, medium and higher cost image processing programs are readily available that allow an amazing array of ways to manipulate the digital image to get the best result possible. Examples of professional applications such as Adobe Photoshop and Image Ready for the web, are often used to change the features of various images as described above. A short listing of other programs which are available will be noted below.
Adobe provides very good resource information, on-line tutorials about their products. One of Adobe’s programs that is getting very good review is titled Elements. It is a low cost, but very powerful program, which has incorporated many useful Photoshop functions. We also noted that many other sources of information about this topic are available on the Internet.
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