Whether you're trying to fit all your photos on a CD or SD card for slide show viewing or you just want your photos to take up less space on your hard drive, you can resize your batch of photos to less than 1 megabyte (MB) in size. The exact process for this varies according to the quality and size of the original photos, but, in most cases, resizing photos to less than 2,560 pixels by 1,920 pixels at a 300-dots-per-inch resolution in JPEG format keeps them under 1MB.
Step 1
Create a new folder in a convenient location, such as your desktop, and drag-and-drop the batch of photos into this directory. Most resizing software works best during the batch resizing process when all the photos are located in one, root folder.
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Step 2
Open your photo resizing software. There are several photo resizing software programs available, such as Adobe Photoshop Elements and PIXresizer. If you're using Adobe Photoshop Elements, select the "Process Multiple Files" option under the "File" tab. If you're using the free PIXresizer software, navigate to the "Work With Multiple Files" tab. (To obtain PIXresizer, click on the link in the Resource section.)
Step 3
Select the root folder where your photos are located. Select a destination folder, such as a new folder on your desktop, where the resized photos are saved when they're done processing.
Step 4
Select a custom size for your photos. You can choose virtually any selection under 2,560 pixels by 1,920 pixels, as long as you keep it in JPEG format with a resolution of 300 dots per inch. If you're in doubt as to the final size of the file, select 1,024 pixels by 768 pixels in JPEG format to ensure the photos stay under 1MB.
If there's a selection to "constrain proportions" in your software, click on this selection, as this keeps your photos in proper proportion, without stretching or squashing on any side.
Step 5
Click on "OK" or a similar command to begin resizing the photos. Don't do anything else with the software while it processes the photos, as this could harm the process or lock up your computer.
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