Use Tiger's ColorSync Utility to Quickly Shrink Images

I discovered this tip by accident. A customer asked how he could quickly reduce the size of digital images for sending via email. The customer didn’t want to use iPhoto or Mail to do this (see Mac Treat #14 for how to resize photos in OS X Mail.) Also, he didn’t want to download the excellent (and free) ImageWell application (linked below.) Basically, he wanted to do what he was used to doing in Windows – right-clicking on an image to resize it.

To do this in Tiger, select an image you wish to resize. Right-click on the image, or, if you use a laptop or a single-click mouse, click on the image while holding down the control key (usually the key located in the lower left corner of the keyboard.) A contextual menu will open up. In this menu, select “Open With” and chose “Color Sync Utility.”

In ColorSync Utility, click on the square resizing icon, which is second from the right. If you don’t see the square resizing box icon, click on the oval tic tac-looking button on the upper right corner of the ColorSync window.

When you click on the square resizing box, a menu will open up, with an option to Resize: scale. You can chose how small you want the image to be by percentages. You won’t see the changed to the image until you save it. IMPORTANT NOTE:the new, smaller image will overwrite the original image unless you choose Save > As and rename the new image. This is why iPhoto is great – non-destructive image editing means you can always revert to the original photo.

However, for quickly resizing an image, ColorSync Utility is fast – it only take four steps, including saving the image.

Download ImageWell to make simple image edits (including scaling them down) here:

http://www.xtralean.com/IWOverview.html