Image Preparation Guide
Introduction
In order to ensure that pages on the FivePoundAhouse web site download in a
timely fashion, it is necessary that the images associated with your advert are
of the correct size and format. There are two ways of ensuring that your images
are in the correct format before you upload them with your advert. You can
either do it yourself manually, using your own image manipulation software
(Adobe Photoshop, Ulead Photoimpact, etc.), or you can do it automatically
using the FivePounds image-formatting utility described below. If you want to
format your images manually, then the format is described here.
Using the FivePounds utility to automatically format your photographs
Requirements
The FivePounds utility will run on any version of Microsoft Windows from Windows 95 onwards.
Download FivePoundsSelfExtract.EXE (432KB).
Step by step guide
- Save the images of your property on your computer from your scanner,
camera, or CD. Make sure that they are saved in one of these formats: JPEG
(JPG), GIF, BMP, TIFF (TIF), or PNG. If you have the option, then we recommend
saving in the either PNG or BMP format.
- Download FivePoundsSelfExtract.exe by clicking the link above. Your browser
will pop up a small window like the one below:
- Click the "Open" button. This will run FivePoundsSelfExtract.exe which will
produce a window as shown below:
- Click the "Unzip" button; a folder "C:\FivePounds" will be created, and the
program will automatically be extracted into it. You will then see a tiny
window as below:
- Click the "OK" button to close the window, and then close the WinZip
Self-Extractor window by clicking the "Close" button.
- Copy (don't move) your image files to the C:\FivePounds folder. Please
ensure that these are not your original files, as the program will modify them.
You must also ensure that there are no more than 5 image files in this folder,
as you can upload a maximum of 5 images to your advert, and the FivePounds.exe
program will only handle 5 images. In Windows Explorer you should have
something like this:
Please note that if your system is configured differently, your files may be
listed without an extension. For example FivePounds.exe may appear as just
FivePounds.
- Double click on FivePounds ICON
to
run the program. You should see something similar to this:
Note: If any of your images are marked as read-only (for example if you’ve
copied them from a CD-ROM) then you will first see a message box warning of
this fact. If you carry on, then the program will remove the read-only
attribute so that the images can be updated.
- Each image is displayed along with its width, height, file size, format and
rotation. If any of these parameters needs to be changed for the image to be
FivePoundAHouse compliant, then it is displayed in red. The rotation parameter
initially starts at zero for each image. If any of your images is in the wrong
orientation, then click one of the two arrow keys at its top corners to rotate
it clockwise or anti-clockwise. The displayed rotation parameter will update to
reflect this change.
- Press the “Go!” button to automatically reformat your images. This should
only take a few seconds. Once complete, the screen is refreshed to show the new
parameters. These should all now be black, and you can now exit the program by
clicking the “Exit” button. Your images are now ready to be uploaded to
FivePoundAHouse’s web site for display in your advert. Please note that if your
images are already in the correct format, the “Go!” button will be labelled
“Exit”, and you just need to click it in order to exit the program.
Getting pictures of your house on to your computer
There are a number of ways of getting images of your house on to your computer ready for adding to your advert.
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Using a digital camera. This is the simplest method of getting pictures of
your house on to your computer. If you haven’t got your own digital camera,
then maybe a friend has?
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Using prints from a standard film camera and then scanning them with a flat
bed scanner. Another relatively easy way of getting photographs of your house
on to your computer.
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Using negatives from a standard film camera and then scanning them with a film
scanner. Generally produces higher quality images than scanning prints with a
flat bed scanner, though this probably won’t be noticeable for the size of
image on FivePoundAHouse.
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Using a mobile phone camera. Similar to using a digital camera, although
pictures will generally be of a poorer quality.
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Using a camcorder that has a still image capability, or by using video editing
software to capture a frame from moving footage taken by the camcorder.
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Using a film camera and the "photos on CD" service provided by some
developers. This is another very easy way of getting pictures of your house on
to your computer. Adds about two pounds to the cost of developing your
photographs.
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You may also be able to use commercial services to scan images from prints or
negatives and to put them on to CD or floppy disk.
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If you’re planning to use a flat bed or film scanner to generate image files
for your advert, then this site www.scantips.com
contains some excellent advice on improving the quality of your scans.
FivePoundAHouse image format
Landscape orientation
Portrait orientation
Photographs must have a maximum size of 380 pixels wide by 285 pixels high for
landscape orientation, or 285 pixels wide by 380 pixels high for portrait
orientation. Each photograph should be saved in JPEG format with medium
compression. If this is followed correctly, then the resulting file size of
each image should be less than 50K. Images received by Five Pound a House not
matching these criteria will automatically be scaled down and saved in JPEG
format. This will result in some image degradation, so it is better if it does
not need to be done.
Useful links
Tips on using flatbed or negative scanner www.scantips.com.
For getting your photographs from a film camera developed and put on CD
www.bonusprint.co.uk.