best way to crop head and shoulders mug shots

SF
Posted By
Stephen_Field
May 16, 2004
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1836
Replies
14
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Closed
I have several hundred head and shoulder mug shots that I need to crop. I want to know what is the best method to crop the photos so they are all the same size as far as pixel width and heighth and also I want all of the faces to be approximately the same size and distance from the camera.

All the photos are 4.8 inches wide and 7.2 inches high to start out with – but all of the faces are varying distances from the camera and thus, drastically different sizes.

I want them to end up 600 pixels wide by 830 inches high with all the faces the same size and distance from the camera.

What is the easiest and most efficient method to achieve this result. I hope I am explaining this clearly enough.
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MM
Mac_McDougald
May 16, 2004
I want them to end up 600 pixels wide by 830 inches high

Assume you mean both dimensions in pixels?

Easiest is use crop tool, simply set dialoge boxes to "600px" and "830px".

Then size the crop.

Only thing is, your "4.8 x 7.2 inch" images. Depending on their ppi, you might be UPsampling to get your final images, not a good thing. In the case of a severe crop, you’ll be upsampling a LOT, a worse thing.

Mac
SF
Stephen_Field
May 16, 2004
The images are all 300 dpi to start with. I guess I am unsure about what upsampling means. Will using the crop tool make it easy to get the result similar head size – even though they are all varying sizes to begin with
MM
Mac_McDougald
May 16, 2004
Upsampling means adding pixels you didn’t have to begin with. If your final image has more pixels than you started with, you’ve upsampled, interpolated, "made up" pixels.

Your 4.8 x 7.2" images @ 300ppi = 2158 x 1442

This gives you some pretty good leeway to crop out your 600×830 pixels and still be using actual original non recycled electron pixels 🙂 Note that a severe crop could still be upsampling though. This is weakness of the crop tool, that it doesn’t tell you when you are doing it (upsampling).

Reason I asked was, if your orginal was at 72ppi, you didn’t even have as many pixels to start with as you wanted to finish with.

But your editied ones are obviously for onscreen use, so as long as they look nice onscreen, then no worries, eh?

Mac
SF
Stephen_Field
May 17, 2004
Actually, my edited ones are for printed use but will also be used online after I save for web.

My question is that when I just use the crop tool set to 600 x 830 – I just get a very small area of the face. So should I first reduce the size of the photo in Image Size – leaving the final two boxes checked and then use the crop tool.

What is the desired method?
BR
Becky_R._Ryan
May 17, 2004
I do alot of graduation composites, where the head sizes of all the people need to be the same size and all the images are the same resolution. I enter the size in the cropping tool (width, height, resolution). To get all the head sizes close to being the same, I drap a guide to the top of the persons head then back up about a quarter of a inch above the top. Then I start the crop box from the top left and drag to the bottom right. I make sure that the center point of the crop box is on the person’s mouth. If the image is for a larger print size, I may center the box on the persons chin. You have to take into account that some people have very round faces and some have very oval faces, but this keeps everyone in the same general size vicinity.
L
LenHewitt
May 17, 2004
Stephen,

I just get a very small area of the face. <<

Are you sure you are not using the rectangular marquee on fixed size rather than the crop tool? With the crop tool you ‘drag-out’ the area you wish to include
MM
Mac_McDougald
May 17, 2004
Actually, my edited ones are for printed use

You are going to print 600×830 pixel images?
Probably not, unless at very small size, very low rez otherwise.

My question is that when I just use the crop tool set to 600 x 830 – I just get a very small area of the face.

The crop is adjustable. You ARE using crop tool and not rectangular marquee?

However, you are going to have to make two renditions of your files, one for print at a higher rez and one for the 600×830 pixel web images.

I’m math impaired, but one way to easily do this is forget the crop tool. Use retangular marquee set to Fixed Aspect Ratio.
What is ratio of 600 x 830, someone?
Use this crop for your printing.
Then use resize dialogue with Resample:On, set long side to 830, and you’ll have your web images.

Mac
SF
Stephen_Field
May 17, 2004
Thank you. I was using the rectangular marquee tool

Mac – We do want the images at that small of a size (600 x 830) for PRINT because we will be doing photo rosters where will will put about 25 images on each page. Each image must be high resolution (300 dpi).

How can I be sure that NOT too much upsampling will occur when using the crop tool. Or should I not be concerned when I am starting with such a large orginal (1442 x 2158).

Thanks for your help
MM
Mac_McDougald
May 17, 2004
A 600×830 pixel image @ 300 ppi is 2 x 2.7 inches, so if that print size or smaller will do, then fine.

Yes, more than likely, you won’t be resampling since you have large image to start with. There’s no way to absolutely know, though, using the crop tool, short of advanced math 🙂

In other words, no matter how how rez your original is, a very small crop out of it specified as 600×830 pixels could be exceeding the actual original pixel content OF that area.

I’d still do the ratio thing I mentioned with the marquee tool. That way you have used all original pixels for your crop. Gives you more leeway for print options, then assuming larger than your 600×830,just need to resize in Image Size, and you downsample to your web needs.

Just need someone to tell us that ratio 🙂

Mac
SF
Stephen_Field
May 17, 2004
Thanks Mac.
I do think the Marquee tool is the safest way.

And yes. How do I figure out what the ratio would be for 600 x 830 for the fixed aspect ratio?

I, too, am math impaired.

Anyone?
MM
Mac_McDougald
May 17, 2004
Yeah, you’d think that it would be 1:1.38 (860 divided by 600).

Setting that in rectangular marquee, cropping image.
Then Image/Image Size with Resample on, change long side to 860 pixels. Makes the other side 616 pixels.
Close, but not an exact cigar.

Going another decimal to 1:1.383 gives 860 x 622, so that doesn’t help either.

What’s the math folks?

Mac
MM
Mac_McDougald
May 17, 2004
Just a quick experimentation:
1: 1.43 gives 601 x 860 pixels in Resize.

That close enough?

I think that since ratio is unresolvable decimal within confines of Photoshop, this might be close as can be gotten, as would involve "splitting a pixel" which can’t really be done.

Mac
SF
Stephen_Field
May 17, 2004
That is close enough for me. I thought there was some special formula since I wasn’t getting it to be exact either. But this works for me. Thank you
LM
Lynch_Mike
May 18, 2004
I want them to end up 600 pixels wide by 830 inches high with all the faces the same size and distance from the camera.

Try making a template file sized to 600 x 830 and 300dpi.

Now use marquis t0 select & copy the head and shoulders for each picture (leave a little extra for fitting)
Now paste your selection into the template.

Next use Edit>Transform>Scale (scale using the shift key to keep your porportions) and fit the selection into the template.
(you may want to hit "Ctrl-" a few times to shrink the view so you can find the boundaries of your larger file, which will be outside the boundaries of your template.

Once you have your head sized to your satisfaction, save with a new filename. (I’d add an extension like -s to the file you copied from and use that for the new file name. If your old filename was complex, just go back to that file and click "save-as" and copy the already highlighted filename from the filename box.)

To repeat this you can use your same now-filled template. Just flatten the image(so you don’t have a lot of layers) and repeat with your next person copying on top of the old person into the same template.

Save with a different name each time.

I bet you could batch-file this with a pause at the resize- but I haven’t figured it out exactly.

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