Re: Scaling bitmaps

[David Mitchell <mitchell -at- SOLAR -dot- SKY -dot- NET>]

> I'm currently using Word and RoboHelp to create the Windows Help files,
> including the Screen Capture utility which comes with RoboHelp for capturing
> the windows.  That utility is a lot slicker than Alt-PrintScreen plus
> Paintbrush, but it captures bitmaps at the same coarse resolution...as does
> every other Windows-compatible screen capture tool I've been able to find.

When you reduce the resolution of the image, it is bound to get more
coarse.  If you don't notice the it in your printed documents, it is
because the printer has a much higher resolution than your screen. In
other words, the printout became more coarse, you just can't tell as
easily.

There is a trick (of coarse! <g>) that gets around this with a
a 24-bit paint program, such  as PaintShop Pro, Photoshop, PhotoPaint,
Photostyler, etc.  I mention PaintShop Pro first because it is shareware
and I've tried this with PSP.

In the editor, do the following:  Open the image.  Convert to a 24-bit image
 (approx 16 million
colors).  Scale the image (I think the command is Resample). Convert
back to 16 colors for Help.  (You might also try 256 colors.  There
are lots of tricks to using them in Help files).

Why does this work?  24-bit editors can use intermediate colors to
smooth out the jaggies associated with scaling a bitmap down.  It's
called anti-aliasing.  After the scale is complete, switching back to
16 colors requires the 24-bit editor to perform another trick called
dithering.

You still lose some detail, but this might work better.  It's
impossible to keep the detail and reduce the size.

There is even a program that is designed for Help that does this for
you, but I don't know its name.  Good luck.






--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 -------
David Mitchell (mitchell -at- sky -dot- net)                      David's Web Spot
GTW s+:- v+++ W++$>++++ po--- b++ e++ u-
 www.sky.net/~mitchell/index.html