The rules say that a thumb must be 100 x 100 to 200 x 200 and be no larger than 15kb.  I was trying to save a thumb at 72 pix per inch yesterday for the gallery at 200 x 200 and the lowest resolution on JPEG and wasn't getting close to that.    I downsized it to 100 x 100 and managed to get it to 19 kb and finally had to resort to using just a small patch of the sky in order to get it to 15kb so I could post.

I see so many thumbnails that look quite nice and so was wondering what the best way is to do this so that it can fall under the 15kb, yet still look good.   I wasn't trying to shrink the whole image down or anything, just take a tiny square out.    I've never had to worry about such a stringent thumbnail policy before, so any any pointers?

its best to save them as : SAVE FOR WEB AND DEVICES ..at least thats what its called in Photoshop..
That way you can get it down to 15K easy peasy
just check your program on how to save like that and your done ..

Chris

This is, of course, if you are using Photoshop.  BAR-CODE's description is correct, however there is a feature which will automatically adjust the quality of your thumbnail based on transmission rate.  I am not at my own computer to illustrate the proper procedure.

Thats why its always BEST to give as much info when you have a question ..
Then we know what tools are used etc etc lol ....
I knew all the tricks on how to do it ..but lost them in my long long long use of photoshop ...

Quote - This is, of course, if you are using Photoshop.  BAR-CODE's description is correct, however there is a feature which will automatically adjust the quality of your thumbnail based on transmission rate.  I am not at my own computer to illustrate the proper procedure.

 Yes, I have photoshop, so I'll look for that option.  I was wondering how everyone else got theirs to look so nice, and I had.. clouds   :)

Simple!

Most people make the mistake of trying to resize images so much that they lose image quality due to compression.

First:

1. Create a new blank image of  200 x 200 pixels. 

2. Copy the whole, large rendered image into the new blank  200 x 200 image

3.  Move it around and position it where you are happy.

4. Save according to the instructions given in the links below (depending on your program choice... PSP or Photoshop).

See this thread where I show you how to create thumbnails in Paint Shop Pro easily without losing image quality:

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?message_id=2956071

And here is one for Photoshop. I don't know how to use Photoshop, so I ThrommArcadia was kind enough to take my instructions and do a tutorial for  Photoshop users.

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/tutorial/index.php?tutorial_id=1570&page=1

When you begin in Photoshop, select your cropping tool on the pallet.  Go to the taskbar above and input you size dimensions in pixels (i.s., 200 x 200).  Select an area of your image you would like to crop; don;t worry about constraining you selection.  Afterwards, navigate to Files>Save for Web & Devices; a new window will appear for preparing your final thumbnail image.

 Oh, very cool.  Now I need to make something new to try it.  :)

I just crop out part of the interesting stuff, and crop to suit in the Gimp (the poor man's Photoshop).
Just a way to get people to want to see....the rest of the story...;)