scanning old black and whites

[mrelmo]

very old BW photos that are 3x3, i scan at 600 because i want to stretch them on to 4x6 paper. the issue i am having is when i go to crop the image (elements or photoshop) it only wants to crop as a square. and when i go to print onto 4x6 paper i am losing the feet of the subjects or the top, i do not have an issue with losing the sides of the photo when cropping but i can only crop as a square, the other issue if not cropped is the old white border and scalloped edge of the photo paper gets scanned and needs to be removed. any ideas thanks

 

[santer]

In elements, when you click image then resize, is constrain proportions ticked?

Another option is to use irfanview to resize it then use your usual programme to print it, although you can also print it from irfanview, which has a stretch to page option.

The irfanview plug ins are useful.

http://www.irfanview.com/

 

[The Hat]

very old BW photos that are 3x3, i scan at 600 because i want to stretch them on to 4x6 paper. the issue i am having is when i go to crop the image (elements or photoshop) it only wants to crop as a square. and when i go to print onto 4x6 paper i am losing the feet of the subjects or the top, i do not have an issue with losing the sides of the photo when cropping but i can only crop as a square, the other issue if not cropped is the old white border and scalloped edge of the photo paper gets scanned and needs to be removed. any ideas thanks

In Photoshop first make Duplicate layer of your Photo then using the Rectangular Marquee Tool draw it over your photo
to the size and shape that you require click copy and then paste it as new.

It you make a bags of it with your first attempt then just click on your photo again
and your current selection will disappear, you can keep doing it till you get the hang of it ok.

 

[mrelmo]

oh yeah duplicate layer, sometimes i can't see the forest through the trees and i will check the constrain button

 

[fotofreek]

in photoshop elements, when you select the cropping tool you can then go above the area where you edit the photo and select "preset options". If you select 4x6 you can then reverse it to 6x4 or back by clicking on the arrows beween the width and hight. You can also select any width and hight you want directly in the number windows that show the dimensions of the print you want to crop to. I scan photos (b/w and color) from photoshop elements with the "import" selection under "file". No intermediate steps are necessary, and you can reverse the process to re-crop if you wish. If you have scanned to the correct dpi in the first place you don't need to use the "resize" function. Also, using the rectangular marquee instead of the cropping function is a bit more cumbersome if you want a specific size print.

 

[mrelmo]

thanks for the elements tips it sounds like fewer steps

 

[stratman]

I received some early 1900's photos of family that I used Photoshop to clean up and then QImage for final processing and printing.

I highly recommend trying QImage, especially for the cropping and image resizing as it does a terrific job, maybe better than Photoshop. You can download a two week trial and use it without other limitations, at least that was the deal when I used it this past summer. (http://www.ddisoftware.com/qimage/)

 

[mrelmo]

i did the croping via fotofreeks advice in elements worked great thank you