Another great feature of digital photography is that you can send family and friends your photos! One of the easiest ways is to attach the photo to an email (i.e. an Attachment). Here are some steps you could use to make it easier for you and the person you are sending copies of your photos:
Resize your photos in both dimension (height and width) and resolution. 4”x6” or 5”x7” seems to be a good overall dimension. It is large enough to see detail but still fit on most monitor screens. Then you want to make sure the photo has a resolution of 72 PPI (Pixels Per Inch). Most monitors only can produce 72 PPI resolution, so anything more is a waste when viewing. If you are sending the photos to be printed out you should set the resolution for 220-300 PPI (printers can use 300+ PPI). The higher resolution setting for printing will give you a much better print.
Save your resized photos as Jpegs (medium setting). This will greatly reduce the file size and make uploads and downloads much faster. Another advantage to sending a Jpeg file is almost everyone can open a Jpeg file (the whole reason behind Jpeg format).
If you have many photos to share with a person it might be easier to burn a CD and send the photos by mail. A CD can hold hundreds of photos and does not tie up the Internet in uploads and downloads. Especially, if you or the person you are sending the photos have a slow connection (non-Broadband/non-DSL) with one large photo taking 5 or more minutes to be downloaded. So, remember to prepare your photos before they are sent over the Internet!
To recap: Resize photo dimensions, reduce resolution to 72 PPI, save as a medium Jpeg and attach the photos to your email. With a little practice you will be sending everyone your latest photos.
