Sometimes there is a need or desire to crop an image to improve the composition or adjust
the size for printing. This is easy to do in both Photoshop and Paint Shop Pro. When I am cropping I
normally turn 'grid' on. This puts a series of evenly spaces horizontal and vertical lines on the image.
I think that it just makes cropping easier. To turn 'grid' on in Photoshop select 'View' , 'Show' and 'Grid' as shown below.
With grid turned on, you end up with a display like this:
Now lets suppose that I want to crop and resize my photo to print on 6x4 photo paper. Select the cropping tool that I've marked in red
on this next picture and enter your desired width and height in the boxes I've highlighted in green.
Now click on the grid box that is to be the top left corner of your final picture and drag the cropping zone down to the box that will
form the bottom right hand corner of the final image. Don't worry if these are not quite right, they can be adjusted after the crop area
box is created by selecting the corners and moving them in or out. You'll end up with something like the view shown below. Note: If you are using an older version of Photoshop or a product that
allows cropping but does not allow you to specify height and width, keep the number of grid boxes in the height and width proportional to your desired
final dimensions. For example, 240 grid boxes wide and 160 grid boxes high is in the ratio 6:4. This can be resized later to 6in x 4in for
printing.
OK, now do the crop by clicking on the 'tick' marked green on the next picture.
Having completed the crop and removed the grid by selecting 'View' , 'Show' and 'Grid' again, you're left with the following final picture.
Save this and print on 6x4 photo paper.
If you want to resize an image without cropping this is easy too. Just select 'image' and then 'Resize' as shown below:
In the 'Document Size' section, change the width to 6 and the units to 'Inches'. Make sure that the 'Constrain Proportions' box is ticked. If you kept
the side proportions in the ratio 6:4 we should see the height automatically change to 4 inches. Click OK to complete the resize.
