Announcements: I Can See Clearly Now

Hi Jeff

I think there may be easier ways to enhance the photos without the manual process.
I use Paintshop Pro which has a batch processor that allows you to manipulate photos and copy them to new or existing files.
There are other batch processing systems https://fixthephoto.com/batch-photo-editors.html

Are you aware that the process you’re using is actually reducing the DPI of the file (from 250 to 96 DPI)?
Here is my automatic enhanced version of this image in the gallery

I’ve also used 20% file compression to reduce the file size from 460Kb to 27Kb but with no loss of resolution so the DPI remains unchanged which is better for larger monitors and hi res screens.

Hope this helps

Paul

Thanks, Paul!

I’m using Pixelmator’s new app because it uses machine learning to smooth over rough edges. This is especially important with our many old, small, low-resolution pictures. For example:

image786×600 124 KB

Here’s your version and our current version of the image you mentioned:

I think the skin tone is more natural in our version, and the definition is much clearer. Compare the eyes, the nose, the ears, the background, the sweatshirt. I find it worth the effort to bring out details like this. See https://oldergay.men/images/edited/ for more examples.

DPI isn’t a meaningful measurement of image quality:

Here’s a better summary of the differences between the original file and our edited version:

Sincerely,
Jeff

Jeff,

You’re right that dpi isn’t in and of itself a measure of resolution, but the number of pixels is. The file size on disk isn’t listed in the comparison data, but the number of pixels and resolution are. From the comparison data, it looks like the images are being blown up (larger display size) and massively increasing the number of pixels, which is a huge waste of space and does not increase the quality of the image. Reducing the dpi will make the image display much larger on the same screen without increasing the quality, which results in an actual reduction in quality. (“Size isn’t everything.”) Increasing the pixels may make the image appear sharper in certain circumstances (displaying the image at the same physical size on the same monitor) when also adding other processing, but it actually causes a loss of information. As a matter of fact, changing anything at all loses data, and even changing the compression ratio without changing anything else, regardless of which way you go, will lose data. Decreasing the compression ratio and increasing the “quality” actually loses information and decreases the actual quality. Even processing a lossless format loses information.

Changing the color, contrast etc. can make the photos look better, but that can and should be done without changing the dpi or the number of pixels.

Frankly, the resolution and quality statistics in the comparison example don’t make much sense. Both sides list the same “resolution” in horizontal and vertical pixels, but the one on the right (the modified version) has massively increased the number of pixels and display size, which is contradictory.

The bottom line though is that changing the images in any way loses data, and while it may make them appear better and more consistent in thumbnails, I would recommend against doing any processing at all, because it always causes a loss of quality. I stopped processing my own images years ago for that very reason. If I need to make a copy and modify that in a particular way for a specific reason I’ll do that, but I always leave the original alone.

I will say that on the screen I’m using as I write this the modified images appear to be reduced in quality. One is brighter but loses detail and in my opinion has less natural colors, the other also loses some detail but has more pleasing colors. The common theme is loss of detail, which to me is more important.

Thanks so much for your feedback, @wolfmane! I admit to some trepidation in making edits since I’m not a photographer. Even among professionals, there will always be differences of taste and opinion. But we have so many photos from twenty years ago that look miserable now and benefit so much from freshening that I think the trade-offs are worthwhile.

My first impulse was not to touch any of the profile images members have uploaded for themselves, but in the end, that’s most of what I’ve ended up doing since I saw how much brighter and cheerier it makes the site. I don’t mean to criticize anyone when I say that a lot of guys could use some help. I don’t see any reasonable argument that this thumbnail:

Won’t draw more interest than its original:

Repeated hundreds of times, this makes the site much more appealing. Without it, as on many sites, page after page looks like a set of ransom photos taken in a basement somewhere.

Yes, it is; scroll down to “Filesize:”.

Again, this is subjective. To me, the new version of Hank sitting in the chair is far more appealing. He looks like himself instead of a sickly version of himself.

Yes, we’re doing the same; we’re not deleting anything. I just added a gallery on the page of each edited image that brings up the original version and any other versions we have of the given photo. A random example:

For the moment, “More information…” on the image still redirects to the new version because that was the easiest way to do it quickly, but we can send it to a page with the full-sized original if people need it.

Thanks again, do hope this is helping everyone enjoy the site more.

Jeff