MICROSOFT PHOTO EDITOR INSTRUCTIONS

Note: Although this program is not the best graphics program around, it can be used to make pictures smaller before uploading them to a website or e-mailing them to someone.

TO OPEN A PICTURE:

1) Click on File, then on Open.

2) Click on the Down Arrow next to Look in:, then scroll up to the My Documents folder.

3) Double-click on the My Documents folder.

4) Double-click on the My Pictures folder.

5) Click on the picture file you want to open.

6) Click on the Open button.

TO CROP THE PICTURE:

1) Click on the Selection Rectangle button near the middle of the Button Bar at the top of the screen. 

2) Click & drag a selection rectangle over the area of the picture that you want to keep.

3) Click on Image, then on Crop.

4) Click on OK.

TO ZOOM IN ON A SMALL SECTION OF THE PICTURE:

1) Click on the button that has a picture of a Magnifying Glass on it.

2) Click on the area of the picture that you want to zoom in on. (You can click multiple times to keep zooming in on that section of the picture.)

TO ZOOM OUT:

1) Click on the button that has a picture of a Magnifying Glass on it.

2) While holding down the Shift key on the keyboard, click on the area of the picture that you want to zoom out from. (You can also click multiple times here.)

TO RESIZE THE IMAGE:

Note: It is best to change the image size to around 3” X 4” before e-mailing the picture.

1) Click on Image, then on Resize.

2) Type in 4 (inches) in the Width box. The Height will automatically change to around 3 inches or whatever.

3) Click on OK.

TO CHANGE THE BRIGHTNESS OR CONTRAST OF THE IMAGE:

1) Click on Image, then on Balance.

2) Under Brightness, click & drag the sliders to the left to make the Brightness less, or to the right to make the Brightness greater.

3) Do the same for the Contrast.

4) Do the same for the Gamma (i.e., the middle values between the very dark shadow areas and the very bright highlight areas in the picture).

5) Click on OK.

TO SAVE THE PICTURE:

1) Click on File, then on Save As.

2) Click on the Down Arrow next to Save as type:, then click on JPEG File Interchange Format.

3) Type in a file name, such as “Phil.jpg”  (without the quote marks).

4) Click on the Down Arrow next to Save in:, then scroll up and click on the My Documents/My Pictures folder, the “desktop,” or wherever you want to save the pictures.

5) Click on the Save button.

6) Change the compression ratio from High to Medium or lower to make the file size smaller.

7) Click on OK.

8) Go to the folder where you are saving the picture and check the size of the picture. (Move your pointer onto the icon for the picture to see how big it is.)

9) If the picture is larger than about 100 Kilobyte, it may not be acceptable for uploading to a website.

10) Repeat steps 1 through 9 to make the picture's file size smaller.