Copyright: Copyright VIMAS Technologies © 1999
Citation: Copyright VIMAS Technologies © 1999


What is Web Image Guru?

Web Image Guru is the ultimate graphics package that brings advanced Internet capabilities to your favorite image editing tool. It has functionality that every Web designer need.

Web Image Guru key features are:

•	superior quality Web oriented image optimization;

•	seamless integration of the images into Web pages;

•	efficient yet attractive user interface;

•	unique set of thumbnail creation controls;

•	powerful batch processing, not restricted by simple file conversion;

•	efficient image adjustment and filtering algorithms.

All these features have unique specialties, unavailable in other products. Due to this fact Web Image Guru can be a good addition even for the users of the popular Web image optimization products like Adobe Image Ready, Image Styler or Macromedia Fireworks.

Together with our free software Image Navigator, Web Image Guru is the ideal tool that easily connects digital camera, scanner, PC, your favorite image editing tool and World Wide Web.

 With Web Image Guru you can quickly make your images web-ready by using our superior JPEG compression and Color reduction algorithms. You can optimize image for specific place in the Web page, and moreover you can compress different image parts of any shape with most suitable algorithm (JPEG, GIF, or PNG). As a result the images will occupy less size and Web pages will load faster and you won't lose visitors to your site because the download time of your pages is too long.

Web Image Guru can be run as Adobe Photoshop Plug-in, as Adobe ImageStyler Preview-in module or as standalone application .

 Web Image Guru compatible with Adobe PhotoShop 3.05 - 5.0 and other products that support Adobe PhotoShop 3.05 type plug-ins. Web Image Guru is available as Export and Filter type plug-ins.

See also: Web Image Guru Overview


Overview

With Web Image Guru you will receive:

1.	High quality Web oriented image optimization.

-	Superior Web oriented JPEG compression that allows to significantly speed up the Web pages while preserving quality of the images. You can compress images in JPEG better than with any other compression system on the market. Compare JPEG compression results at our Web site http://www.vimas.com/ve_compare.htm.

-	Original, compression oriented color reduction algorithms that allows generating GIF and PNG8 files from true color images with smaller size (in some cases several times smaller) and better quality compared to other products (see examples at http://www.vimas.com/ve_imm.htm ).

-	Unique set of tools for manual palette editing gives you unbeatable control of your Web site graphics.

-	Full support of Web Safe Colors .

-	Powerful algorithms for decreasing the size of PNG-24 images.

2.	Seamless integration of the images into Web pages.

-	New Compound images technology that eliminates the necessity of image slicing.  This approach allows saving up to 50-60% of the image size compared with image slicing.

-	Unique ability of merging of the image with specified background on a specified HTML page.

-	Useful set of tools for changing the shape of the image and applying different effects to it.

3.	Efficient yet attractive user interface.

-	Ability to export image in one of the most suitable Web formats (JPEG, GIF and PNG). You can easily preview and compare the results in different formats, tune format specific options and select optimal format for your image.

- Super easy ability to preview the images for different platforms (MAC/PC), color modes (True color/256 colors) and Web browsers.

-	Run as Photoshop Export or Filter Plug-in and as standalone application.

-	As a whole, Web Image Guru provides an efficient interface, which has been highly optimized to Web designers needs.

4.	Unique Smart thumbnail generation features for instant creation of perfect proportional thumbnails.

5.	Powerful batch processing not restricted by simple file conversion.

-	Powerful Triple batch processing mode that allows to quickly process multiple images.

-	As a source for Batch processing you can use TWAIN compatible digital cameras or scanners or custom sources.

-	Web image catalogs can be generated as result of batch processing.

6.	Ultimate set of filters for preprocessing of the images with unique level of control.

7.	Image Navigator application for easy browsing of your image archives. Image Navigator is used to run Web Image Guru in standalone version.

8.	Ability to integrate Web Image Guru with third party applications, such as HTML Editors, E-commerce systems or Database applications. In this case Web Image Guru can serve as powerful image processing and optimization engine for your application.

 The market addressed by the Web Image Guru is Internet users, Web designers and users of digital photography.

The mission of Web Image Guru is fast communication of images and other visual information to large audiences through optimized colors, superior compression, integrated user functions and broad compatibility.

 Web Image Guru allows Web designers to incorporate high quality images in their Web pages at minimum bandwidth requirements. The smaller the bandwidths the faster Web page can be downloaded into the browser thus saving transmission time and cost for the client.


System Requirements

Compatibility

  Web Image Guru is a 32-bit software running on the Windows 95 and NT platforms.

  It can be run as Adobe Photoshop Plug-in or as standalone application. Web Image Guru supports Adobe PhotoShop from version 3.05 and over and other products, compatible with Photoshop style plug-ins. The updated list of the products that are compatible with Web Image Guru you can find at our Web site: http://www.vimas.com/ve_guru.htm

  Web Image Guru can be also run as a standalone application with Image Navigator that is distributed together with Web Image Guru.

Monitor Settings

   A photographic quality image in true colors of 16.7 million colors (24 bits color depth) contains more information than the same image displayed in 256 colors (8 bits color depth).

Using GIF formats images cannot be displayed in more than 256 colors (8 bits color depth).

If a true color JPEG image (24 bits color depth) is displayed on a 256 color monitor, it is converted to 256 colors using the same dithering process that produces GIF.

It results in true color JPEG images not looking any better than the GIF.

  As a matter of fact they may even look worse depending on how good the particular monitor driver is at dithering.

  We recommend the user to set the monitor to display 16.7 million colors or at least 65.536 colors (16 bits color depth)


License agreement

License agreement


How to order Web Image Guru

How to Order Web Image Guru


About

Web Image Guru, version 2.0.

Release Date - 26.07.1999,

Copyright VIMAS Technologies, 1999

VIMAS Technologies is an international software development company that provides software tools for image and audio processing and compression, Internet software, databases and education software. VIMAS Technologies also provides custom developments in C++, Delphi, Oracle.

VIMAS Technologies markets end user applications for Windows 95/98 and Windows NT including:

Web Image GuruTM (http://www.vimas.com/ve_guru.htm) - state of the art Web image optimization tool. The purpose of Web Image Guru is not only effective optimization of images, but also seamless integration of images into your Web pages. It works as Adobe Photoshop style Plug-in and as standalone application.

Web ImagingTM (http://www.vimas.com/ve_vwi.htm) - powerful image processing tool for Web designers. It allows quick processing and efficient compression of multiple images for further applications in Home Pages, printed catalogs, databases or files. This package includes triple batch processingTM technology, smart thumbnailTM generation, compound imagesTM , automatic home page generation, instant preview of image processing and much more.

Image MasterTM(http://www.vimas.com/ve_vim.htm) - versatile image processing software, that includes processing of multiple image formats, powerful JPEG compression, large number of image processing operations, creation of catalogs.

Web JPEGTM Plug-in (http://www.vimas.com/ve_plugin.htm) - Adobe Photoshop 3.05 compatible plug-in for interactive JPEG compression and fast thumbnails generation.

Speech MasterTM (http://www.vimas.com/ve_spm.htm) - the tool for speech and music compression for educational purposes.

Singing TutorTM (http://www.vimas.com/ve_str.htm) - the tool to study singing and tuning the musical instruments.

HTML OrganizerTM (http://www.vimas.com/ve_selector.htm) - useful utility for organizing HTML files and selecting contents of large HTML files (such as images, sound, Java applets) on your computer.

VIMAS Technologies,

POB 48, 252015,

Kiev, Ukraine

Internet: http://www.vimas.com

E-Mail:  vimas@info.kiev.ua


How to install Web Image Guru

 To install Web Image Guru run Setup.exe program from Web Image Guru archive or disk.

 Installing Web Image Guru as standalone application

 Web Image Guru as standalone application installed automatically. After installation you can run Image Navigator application with Start - Web Image Guru - Image Navigator menu item, select the image and run Web Image Guru with Web Export menu item.

 Installing Web Image Guru as Plug-in

Automatic Installation

 Web Image Guru as plug-in will be installed automatically if you have Adobe Photoshop 4.0 or later version installed on your computer. In this case Plug-in modules are stored during the installation in the Plug-ins folder, which was created during Photoshop installation.

Warning: If you have Photoshop 3.05 and Photoshop 4.0 installed together, please check the installation directory. Installation directory should point to Photoshop 4.0 location.

  If you install Web Image Guru for another products you have to specify the installation directory. After the installation you have to add the plug-in to your product (see your product documentation).

During the installation you can choose which types of the plug-ins you want to install: Export, Filter or both.

Manual Installation

  For manual installation of Web Image Guru you have to copy GuruExport.8be (Export type plug-in) and GuruFilter.8bf (Filter type plug-in) files from the directory where you install Web Image Guru into the Plug-Ins folder of your product (see your product documentation).

Installation and running with other host applications

   Web Image Guru installation procedure is specific for each host application. Check documentation for the host application, or its on-line help file for the most accurate information. Typically you have to place the plug-in into the specific location for your host application and set some options in the application.

   Note! Most of the host applications better support Filter type plug-ins. That's why we are recommended to use filter plug-in as a main entry to run Web Image Guru. Please, note that all image layers must be flatten before using of Web Image Guru filter plug-in.

Uninstallation

Uninstallation can be performed automatically if Web Image Guru was automatically installed.

There are two possibilities to uninstall Web Image Guru:

- Go to the Windows 95 Add/Remove Software dialog box (Start/Settings/Control Panel/Add/Remove Software). Select Web Image Guru in the software list and press Add/Remove button.

- Run Setup.exe file and press Uninstall button.

- Restart the computer.

To uninstall manually installed plug-in just remove the previously copied files from the computer.


Supported products

Web Image Guru was tested with the following products:

Adobe Photoshop version 3.05 and over

( How to install?    How to run run? )

Adobe Illustrator

( How to install?    How to run? )

Adobe ImageReady

( How to install?    How to run? )

Corel Draw version 7.0 and over

( How to install?    How to run? )

Corel Photo-Paint version 7.0 and over

( How to install?    How to run? )

Fractal Design Painter version 4.0 and over

( How to install?    How to run? )

Macromedia FreeHand version 7.0 and over

( How to install?    How to run? )

Paint Shop Pro version 4.x

( How to install?    How to run? )

ULEAD PhotoImpact

( How to install?    How to run? )

You can find information about installing and using Web Image Guru with these products in the Installation guide.

To see the updated list of the supported products visit our Web site http://www.vimas.com/ve_guru.htm.


Adobe Illustrator

Installation for Adobe Illustrator 7.0 and over.

- Install the Filter plug-in to the Illustartor \Plug-Ins

subfolder.

- Run Adobe Illustrator.

- Web Image Guru will be available from menu Filter-Web Image Guru.

See also:

How to run?


Adobe ImageReady

Installation for Adobe ImageReady.

- Install the Filter and Export plug-ins to the ImageReady \Plug-Ins subfolder.

- Run Adobe ImageReady.

- Web Image Guru will be available from File-Export-Web Image Guru or Filter-Web Image Guru menu.

See also:

How to run?


Adobe PhotoDeluxe

Installation for Adobe Photo Deluxe 3.0 and over.

- Install the Filter and Export plug-in to the Plug-Ins subfolder.

- Run Adobe Photo Deluxe.

- Web Image Guru will be available from menu File-Export-Web Image Guru or

Effects-Web Image Guru.

See also:

How to run?


Corel Draw

Installation for Corel Draw 7 and over

- Install the Filter type plug-in to the specified folder.

- Run Corel Draw.

- Go to menu Tools - Options and select from the tree-control: Workspace-Plug-ins.

- Push Add button and then select the folder, where Web Image Guru

was installed.

- Restart Corel Draw.

- Web Image Guru will be available from menu Effects-Web Image Guru.

See also:

How to run?


Corel Photo-Paint

Installation for Corel Photo-Paint 7 and over

- Install the Export and Filter type plug-ins to the specified folder.

- Run Corel Photo-Paint.

- Go to menu Tools - Options and select from the tree-control: Workspace - Plug-ins.

- Push Add button and then select the folder, where Web Image Guru was installed.

- Restart Corel Photo-Paint.

- Web Image Guru will be available from File - Export Plug-Ins - Web Image Guru or Effects - Web Image Guru menu.

See also:

How to run?


Fractal Design Painter

Installation for Fractal Design Painter 4 and over

- Install the Filter type plug-in to the specified folder.

- Run Fractal Design Painter.

- Go to menu Edit - Preferences - Plugins and select the folder, where

Web Image Guru was installed.

- Restart Fractal Design Painter.

- Web Image Guru will be available from menu Effects-Web Image Guru.

See also:

How to run?


Macromedia FreeHand

Installation for Macromedia FreeHand 7.0 and 8.0

- Install the Filter type plug-in to the Macromedia FreeHand \English\Xtras subfolder.

- Run Macromedia FreeHand.

- Web Image Guru will be available from menu Xtras-Web Image Guru.

See also:

How to run?


Microsoft Photo Draw 2000

Installation for Microsoft PhotoDraw 2000 and over

- Install the Filter type plug-in to the specified folder.

- Run PhotoDraw 2000.

- Go to menu Tools - Options and select Plug-ins tab.

- Specify the folder, where Web Image Guru was installed.

- Restart PhotoDraw 2000.

- Web Image Guru will be available from menu Format- Effects-Plug-ins. Select Web Image Guru and launch it.

See also:

How to run?


Paint Shop Pro

Installation for Paint Shop Pro 4.x and over

- Install the Export and Filter type plug-ins to the specified folder.

- Run Paint Shop Pro.

- Go to menu File - Preferences - General Program Preferences in the Paint Shop Pro Preferences dialog select Enable plug-in filters check box and then specify the folder, where Web Image Guru was installed.

- Restart Paint Shop Pro.

- Web Image Guru will be available from menu Image-Plug-In Filters - Web Image Guru. For Paint Shop Pro 5.x Web Image Guru will be also available from menu File-Export-Web Image Guru.

See also:

How to run?


ULEAD Photo Impact

Installation for ULEAD Photo Impact 4 and over

- Install the Export and Filter type plug-ins to the specified folder.

- Run ULEAD Photo Impact.

- Go to menu File - Preferences. In the Preferences dialog select Plug-in tab and specify the folder, where Web Image Guru was installed.

- Restart ULEAD Photo Impact.

- Web Image Guru will be available from menu File- Export - Web Image Guru or Effects -Web Image Guru.

See also:

How to run?


Web Image Guru as Standalone application

Web Image Guru is available as standalone application or as Adobe PhotoShop plug-in.

There are several ways how you can run Web Image Guru as standalone application:

-	Web Image Guru includes special application Image Navigator for locating the images that has to be optimized. You can run Image Navigator from Start-Web Image Guru-Image Navigator menu or by clicking on Image Navigator icon on a taskbar. With Image Navigator you can easy find the images and run Web Image Guru to optimize selected images.

-	You can run Web Image Guru from Windows Explorer by clicking right mouse on image file and selecting Optimize Images menu item. If you select several images them Web Image Guru will be run in batch mode for all images.

-	You can start Web Image Guru in Batch processing mode from Start-Web Image Guru-Batch Processing menu. In this case

See also:

Image Navigator


Web Image Guru as plug-in

Web Image Guru is available as Export and Filter types of Adobe PhotoShop plug-ins or it can be run as a standalone application. The only difference is how to run the Web Image Guru.

Export type plug-in

Open an image file from a folder in Adobe PhotoShop under the pull down File menu. Use Export - Web Image Guru menu item from the pull down File menu. For other products it can be run from another menu (see your product documentation).

Filter type plug-in

Open an image file from a folder In Adobe PhotoShop under the pull down File menu. From the pull down Filter menu use Web Image Guru menu item. For other products it can be run from another place (see your product documentation).

In every case after running Web Image Guru dialog box appears.

There are various Web Image Guru options that you can set in the Options dialog.


Adobe Illustrator

- Run Adobe Illustrator.

- Web Image Guru will be available from menu Filter-Web Image Guru.

See also:

How to install?


Adobe ImageReady

- Run Adobe ImageReady.

- Web Image Guru will be available from File-Export-Web Image Guru or Filter-Web Image Guru menu.

See also:

How to install?


Adobe PhotoDeluxe

- Run Adobe Photo Deluxe.

- Web Image Guru will be available from menu File-Export-Web Image Guru or

Effects-Web Image Guru.

See also:

How to install?


Corel Draw

- Run Corel Draw.

- Web Image Guru will be available from menu Effects-Web Image Guru.

See also:

How to install?


Corel Photo-Paint

- Restart Corel Photo-Paint.

- Web Image Guru will be available from File - Export Plug-Ins - Web Image Guru or Effects - Web Image Guru menu.

See also:

How to install?


Fractal Design Painter

- Run Fractal Design Painter.

- Web Image Guru will be available from menu Effects-Web Image Guru.

See also:

How to install?


Macromedia FreeHand

- Run Macromedia FreeHand.

- Web Image Guru will be available from menu Xtras-Web Image Guru.

See also:

How to install?


Microsoft Photo Draw 2000

- Run PhotoDraw 2000.

- Web Image Guru will be available from menu Format- Effects-Plug-ins. Select Web Image Guru and launch it.

See also:

How to run?


Paint Shop Pro run

- Run Paint Shop Pro.

- Web Image Guru will be available from menu Image-Plug-In Filters - Web Image Guru. For Paint Shop Pro 5.x Web Image Guru will be also available from menu File-Export-Web Image Guru.

See also:

How to install?


ULEAD Photo Impact

- Run ULEAD Photo Impact.

- Web Image Guru will be available from menu File- Export - Web Image Guru or Effects -Web Image Guru.

See also:

How to install?


Introduction

   Web Image Guru lets you optimize images, apply different effects and shapes and then save them as one of the three most common web image file formats: GIF, JPEG or PNG. In addition to saving images, Web Image Guru lets you to generate the thumbnails of the images in very smart way. Optimized images can be inserted into existed HTML files in predefined positions or new HTML files with optimized images can be created.

  Main window of Web Image Guru consist of the following parts:

   - Preview window and controls

   - Common tab that defines common image optimization parameters, effects and filters.

   - Format specific controls that depend on the current format tab:

GIF/PNG8

JPEG

PNG24

   - Thumbnail generation parameters can be set at the Thumbnail tab.

   - HTML parameters tab that define HTML generation options.

 There are other Web Image Guru options that you can set in the Options dialog.


Common_settings
Common settings

Common settings tab allows to set the image optimization parameters common for all optimization formats.

Background - current background color or image.

Shape - define the shape parameters.

Common Image processing tabs that allows to Transform the image, Adjust image brightness and gamma settings, Apply different filters and effects


Preview window and Controls

 There are set of controls that define general parameters of Web Image Guru.

Image and thumbnail controls

   Generate control define which images will be optimized:

   Image - only main image will be optimized. No, thumbnails produced.

   Image and thumbnail - both optimized main image and thumbnail will be produced.

   Thumbnail only - only thumbnail image will be produced and optimized.

   If Web Image Guru run from Batch processing routine with selected Destination then the set of the produced images will be defined by current Destination settings.

   Preview control allows switching between Image and Thumbnail preview if Image and thumbnail generation mode is selected.

Preview Window

   Preview window allows previewing and comparing optimized images in different formats before saving them. You can resize main program window using mouse to make preview window bigger. New window size will be saved and restored when you run program next time.

   There are two main Preview window modes: Single window and Double window. To switch between modes [image] button is used.

   In Single window mode current optimization format results are previewed. You can quickly switch between Original and Optimized image with [image] button.

   In Double window mode you can compare current optimization format results with original or with another optimization format result. You can easy select image for preview from drop down listbox with available image formats.

  For every image in Preview window the image information is displayed.

  There are set of the Preview Window controls:

Navigator - Image navigator.

Toolbar - Contains the set of the controls that define the image preview.


PNG optimization

PNG optimization parameters:

Transparency - define the transparency mode of PNG image.

Data order - set interlaced mode of the image.

Reduce number of colors with one of color reduction methods.


GIF optimization

  GIF Optimization parameters:

Format - define image format GIF or PNG8.

Data order - set interlaced mode of the image.

Color reduction - define color reduction parameters.

Palette table with palette editing tool bar allows performing palette editing.

Web safe colors - define the level of the optimized image Web safety.


JPEG optimization

   JPEG Optimization parameters:

Compression parameter defines the compression level of the image. The value of 0 results in the least compression level for the image and better quality. The value of 255 results in the biggest compression level for the image and the lowest quality. Compression parameter defines the compression ration for Luminance component of the image and initial value for Chrominance component compression. The real Chrominance component compression value defined by combination of the Compression and Color parameters.

Color parameter is used to control color component (Chrominance) compression ratio. The value 0 means that Chrominance component compressed with the same level as defined by Compression parameter. Negative values improve color quality resulting bigger file size. Positive values compress color component more resulting smaller file size.

Sharpen parameter reduces compression artifacts on the image small details and edges. Setting this parameter to value 0 usually will result in smallest file size. Bigger values of this parameter will cause the sharpening of the larger areas of an image. Note that this will increase the compressed file size.

Progressive - check it if you want to output a Progressive JPEG. A Progressive JPEG enables a browser on a slow communications link to generate a low-quality image quickly and gradually improve the displayed quality as more data is received.

   If the user opens the already JPEG compressed image in order to compress it further the result will not be as good as it would be if the image had not been saved in compressed format in between.

   You can try to use following filters to get better optimization results:

Smooth

Despeckle


Image and HTML page integration

Web Image Guru has an ability to easy integrate the optimized image with an HTML Page where this image will be placed.

Web Image Guru allows following:

-	Generate HTML pages with the links to the optimized image and thumbnail

-	Preview optimized image in HTML page where it will be placed

-	Create seamless integration of optimized image with HTML page background

-	Create "transparent" JPEG images

-	Create simple compound image that consist of JPEG image as background and transparent GIF (PNG) as foreground

HTML generation tab contains the following HTML options:

Create New Page

Insert image in existing page

See also:

Batch generation of HTML pages with images


Thumbnail creation

Web Image Guru has unique functionality called Smart thumbnail generation that makes the process of the thumbnails creation easy and powerful.

Thumbnails will be created if Image and Thumbnail or Thumbnail only mode is selected.

Thumbnail generation parameters are set in the Thumbnail tab.

Width - thumbnail width in pixels.

Height - thumbnail height in pixels.

Fit to thumbnail size - generate the thumbnail of exactly the required size. Otherwise, thumbnail will be generated with preserved aspect ratio of the cropping area and that's why the one of the dimensions can differ from the set values.

There are two possibilities to create the thumbnail of the required size:

-	Discard aspect ratio option stretches selected cropping area to required dimensions.

-	Smart cut option allows one to generate a thumbnail of the required size by cutting the part of the big image with the same aspect ratio as the required by thumbnail size. Web JPEG Plug-in automatically calculates how the big image should be cut in order to produce the aspect ratio that the thumbnail requires. You may tune the cutting of the big image with the slider and then preview the results.

Name expansion - the character string added to the image file name to create thumbnail file name. This field could not be empty. Expansion string can be added to the main image file name as prefix before file name or as postfix.to the end of the file name.


Image slicing and mapping

  Image slicing is the process of cutting a single image into multiple parts then reconstitute the entire image on an HTML page using tables to link the various pieces. This is usually done with large images to allow users a faster loading preview - whether or not an image actually loads faster sliced as opposed to unsliced is still a matter of debate.

  The total amount of data of sliced image usually is bigger then unsliced. So, download time is bigger. And it is not true that if you see the piece of the image you can imagine what is in the another part.

  VIMAS Technologies propose new approach that can be used to speedup the Web graphics more efficiently then image slicing. We call this technology Compound image. This allows to speed up the image preview but by quick appearing of the more informative objects then just fragments of the total image (like in the case of the image slicing).

  You can find more information and examples of compound images at http://www.vimas.com/ve_compound_gallery.htm

  Web Image Guru has the capability to easy create Simple Compound images. You can find the fully functional Compound image editor in another our product Web Imaging. You can find more information about it and download trial version at http://www.vimas.com/ve_vwi.htm.

  Web Imaging has also all necessary to create image maps.

  Attention!!! All registered users of Web Image Guru can order Web Imaging with very big discount.

  By ordering of these two products you will have an excellent two Web graphics products with unique set of the features and with the price less then any single competitive product on the market.

  Take in mind that by ordering of these two products you will receive also 30% discount on ordering of HTML Organizer (http://www.vimas.com/ve_selector.htm) - just great utility that will help to organize and analyze your Web Pages.


Simple Compound images

 Web Image Guru has the capability to easy create simple two level Compound images.

Two level compound image consists of JPEG image in the background and transparent GIF or PNG image in the foreground.

In such way by splitting image into the photo part and art graphics part you can significantly reduce the result size compare with saving whole composition to GIF or JPEG.

There are two variant of positioning Background and Foreground images in the Compound image:

Table cell with background and HTML 4.0 syntax. You can select the required syntax in HTML tab of Web Image Guru.

Note that Background mode option in HTML tab has to be set to Single.

In the case of Table cell background image dimensions has to be more or equal compare with foreground image.

In the case of HTML 4.0 syntax there are no such restrictions.

To create simple Compound image:

- Run Web Image Guru with foreground image;

- Optimize foreground image in GIF or PNG format and set transparent colors;

- Select JPEG image as Background in the Common tab;

- Set Image/Background image positioning to Table Cell or HTML4.0 in the HTML tab.

- Set Background image to Single in the HTML tab.

- You can tune the position of the foreground image with the Image Offset parameters in the Common tab and preview the results with HTML browser preview.

- Save the composition when satisfied and specify the name and location of the HTML file in the save dialog. This HTML file will contain the piece of HTML code for representing the composition in the Web browser as single image.

Important. You can easy and quickly create simple compound images by using the power of host applications like Adobe Photoshop.


Create Compound images with Photoshop

  The main deal before creating Compound images is to split original image to photo part (that well compressed with JPEG) and art image part (that better compressed with GIF or PNG). It can be done very easy if use the power of host application that run Web Image Guru as Plug-in. Note, that for this operations host application must support filter type plug-in.

Below is the step by step instruction how to do it with Adobe Photoshop.

1. Load or create the original image in Adobe PhotoShop.

2. Make necessary selections of the photo areas of the image, which should be saved as JPEG. You can use Magic Wand Tool [image] of the Photoshop for easy selection of the required area.

3. Export selected area with Web Image Guru filter plug-in, optimize it as JPEG and save it for example as Background.jpg.

                                                                   (JPEG file 1.799 Kb)

Tips: We recommend select progressive JPEG option. As usual with the progressive JPEG you will achieve 15-20% better results.

In the Common tab you can set background color to one of the typical colors of the image. This allows to achieve a smaller file size when compress in JPEG. Do not pay attention to the distortion on the background color area, because this part of the image will be invisible.

4. Make invert selection in Adobe PhotoShop. In such way you will make the selection of another part of the image that has to be saved as GIF. Export it with Web Image Guru filter plug-in and optimize it as GIF.

 (GIF file 1.006 Kb)

5. In the Common tab of Web Image Guru select previously saved Backround.jpg file as background image.

6. Switch to HTML tab of Web Image Guru. Select Create New Page mode.

Set Image/Background Image Positioning to Table Cell or HTML 4.0 and Background image mode to Single.

7. Save GIF image for example as Foreground.gif. In the Save file dialog box you can specify the name of the HTML file that will assemble Compound image in HTML browser (for example Dragon.htm).

8. As result, if you will open Dragon.htm file with HTML browser you will see the following image.

 Compound Image(2.805 Kb)         Single GIF (3.147 Kb)            Single JPEG (3.202 Kb)

We prepare for the comparison the same image optimized with Adobe Image Ready and saved to single GIF and JPEG file. As you can see the quality of the Compound image is much better and the size is about 15% less. This is very small example, for the normal size images with complex compositions you can save 50%-60% of the total size. For more information and examples visit our Web site at http://www.vimas.com/guru_image_comp.htm.

More or less the same way you can use other host applications for fast creation of the Compound images.


Options

To run Options dialog click Options [image] button. You can set the following Web Image Guru options:

Auto Preview delay - the delay in ms between parameters changing and starting the compression. Used if Auto preview mode is turned on.

Modem speed - the speed of the modem used to estimate the image download time.

Remember parameters - define which parameters will be saved and restored with the next start of Web Image Guru.

HTML Browsers - the list of the Web browsers for preview in browser mode. Use Add, Delete, Edit and Refresh buttons to edit HTML browser's list. Refresh button automatically scans your system and try to find installed Web browsers.


Batch Processing

  Batch processing mode is one of the main advantages of Web Image Guru.  Batch processing allows one to apply the predefined set of image processing operations to the selected list of images.  The main idea is to make processing of volume images quick, easy to use, and intelligent.

Batch processing is a powerful alternative to running Web Image Guru for multiply images with Adobe Photoshop actions.

We call Web Image Guru batch processing "triple batch" for two reasons:

1. Many sources + Many operations + Many destinations

The batch processing module consists of three main parts: source, processing and destination. The key feature of Web Image Guru is that users can choose the images from different sources and place them into different destinations after processing.  For example, as a source, users can choose a file system, a TWAIN compatible scanner or a digital camera, some custom sources, etc.  As a destination, users can choose a file system, HTML pages, database, etc.

The user selects the required operations to be performed on images during the batch processing. The parameters of the operations can be easily changed and tuned.  The results of the changes are immediately applied to the current image and displayed in the preview window.

2. Many input formats + Many operations + Many output formats

  Another key feature of the Web Image Guru batch processing is that you can choose several image file formats for input and also several image file formats for output. In the list of the source images, there might be photos that are better compressed with JPEG or art images that are better compressed with GIF or something in between.  During batch processing you can select output format that is most suitable for your application.  Users can compare the results of converting (compressing) source images into selected formats and choose the most suitable format for the actual image.  During batch processing, users can interactively tune parameters (like compression level in JPEG) and see the results in the preview window. Users may easily and quickly compare the results of different types of conversions (compressions) between each other and with the original image and decide which format is more suitable for saving.  Of course, users can always apply the selected list of operations and selected format to all source images for quick processing without any user intervention.

Menu Start-Web Image Guru - Batch processing is used to run the batch processing.  You can also run batch processing from Image Navigator application.

  After running the Batch processing settings dialog appears. It is necessary to select required source for the images and then click Next button to define the parameters for the destination of the images.

Standard installation of Web Image Guru includes:

File Source - for loading images from files.

TWAIN_Source - for loading images from scanners and digital cameras.

and

File Destination - to place optimized images to files.

HTML Generation destination - to place optimized images to files and generate Web Pages with images.

   It is necessary to set required options for each tab and then click the Finish button. The images will be read from the Source, optimized with Web Image Guru and then transferred to the Destination.  The image processing operations can be tuned for every image or automatically applied to all selected images.

   The plug-in concept of the Web Image Guru batch processing allows easy integration with third party applications on the different levels. The main idea is that it is possible to create custom source and destination plug-ins. So, customer can get images from digital camera, optimize them with Web Image Guru and store directly in the format of his application without any intermediate actions.

See also:

File source

TWAIN source

File destination

HTML Generation destination

Integration with third party applications


File source

Batch Source type Image files selects images for Batch processing from files.  You can select files from different folders on your computer or from the network and add it to the lists of files for processing.

You can switch between two variants of image files representations: List and Contact sheet.

In List mode - you have the list of all files in current directory and can preview each file separately. You can also Preview the selected images.

In Contact sheet mode - you have the thumbnails of all images in current directory. You can set the size of the thumbnail in this mode in the Preferences dialog.

To add the current image to the Selected files list, just click the Add button. You can also add all images from the selected folder with Add All button. To remove images from the Selected files you can use Remove and Remove All buttons.


TWAIN_Source
TWAIN Source

Batch Source type - TWAIN device permits the acquisition of images for Batch processing from the TWAIN compliant devices (scanners, digital cameras, etc.).  If several TWAIN compatible devices are installed on the computer, you can select the required one with the Select source button.  To acquire images, you must click the Acquire button.  Then, the TWAIN device dialog will appear.  After the selection of the required image and final scanning (or acquiring), it will appear in the Source dialog in the Selected images list.  It is not necessary to close the TWAIN device dialog to acquire next image.  You can acquire as many images as you need and only then, close the TWAIN device dialog.

All acquired images will appear in the Selected images list.  You can preview the images, if the Image Preview check box is selected.  You can also remove an image from the list with Remove button.

When images are added to the list, they are named as Image1, Image2, etc.  You can edit an image name directly in the Selected images list.  Then, during Batch processing, images names will be used as file names.


File destination

 Batch Destination type Image files stores images after Batch processing in files on local computer or network. You can select the existing destination folder or enter the new one.

 It is possible to generate a thumbnail of the required size for every processed image.

Generate thumbnails option switches this mode On and Off.  Thumbnails will be stored in the same format and directory as big images.  The thumbnail file name will be the same as that of the image plus the thumbnail name expansion.

  Web Image Guru has a sophisticated way of thumbnail generation called Smart Thumbnail generation.


Batch HTML generation

Batch Destination type - HTML pages is designed for automatic generation of the Home Pages with processed images. You can quickly and easily add image collections to your Website. It creates thumbnail images and an attractive HTML presentation, complete with links to the full-sized images. As the result of such page generation, in addition to the processed image files, an HTML files will be created with the links to these images.

There are three types of HTML files that can be automatically generated:

Index page

Thumbnails pages

Zoom pages

We call this set of pages a Web project.  A Web project can include all types of pages or just few of them.  Each Web project has a name.  This name is used as a base for generation of the pages file names.

Index page contains the links to all generated pages and can be used as the contents of Web project.  There is only one Index page for the Web project.  The Index page file has the same name as Web project plus "_c.htm".

Thumbnails pages contain the thumbnails of the processed images.  The number of the Thumbnails pages per Web project depends on the Web project settings and the number of the processed images.  Each thumbnail can contain a link to the Zoom image of the same image.  The first Thumbnail page file has the same name as Web project with an htm extension.  The last Thumbnail page file has the same name as Web project plus "_L.htm".  Intermediate thumbnails page files have the same names as Web project plus the number of the thumbnail page.

Zoom images are the pages with links to big images or just big images.  The number of the Zoom pages is the same as the number of the processed images.  Zoom page file has the same name as Web project plus "_z#.htm", where # is the number of the zoom page.

Web project has a lot of properties for every type of the page.  The concrete configuration of the properties can be saved as HTML generation Profile for reuse. You can easy change current profile by selecting another one from the list.  Profiles are stored in files.  You can easy add a profile from a file with Load profile button.  All loaded profiles are automatically added to the list of active profiles.  To remove the profile from this list, the Remove profile button is used.

  Web Image Guru setup several sample HTML generation profiles that are stored in HTML Profiles folder. During installation, they automatically registered and added to the list of active profiles. At VIMAS Technologies Web site we create HTML generation gallery (http://www.vimas.com/ve_html_galery.htm). There you can find the examples of HTML pages, generated with different profiles and download the profiles for free reuse.

To create new Web project, it is necessary to enter the project name and location and choose an HTML generation Profile.  By default the last used profile will be set.

The Next dialog allows changing the main settings of the Web project pages.  The Next dialog shows the Web project Properties tree and allows editing the detail properties of each type of the generated page.  The Web project Properties tree content depends of the setting made in the previous dialog.

You can easy navigate trough the current Web project settings with Next and Previous buttons.

It is possible to preview the Home Page layout with Preview button if MS Internet Explorer is installed on your computer. Preview options: image and text define which image and text will be used instead of real images and titles in the page preview.


Basics

  The plug-in concept of the Web Image Guru batch processing allows easy integration with third party applications on the different levels.

  Command line options.

  Web Image Guru can be run as standalone application with BatchProcessing.exe module. This module has the list of command line options that allows customizing running of Web Image Guru from third party applications.

  Source and Destination plug-ins.

  The main idea is that it is possible to create custom source and destination plug-ins. So, customer can get images from digital camera, optimize them with Web Image Guru and store directly in the format of his application without any intermediate actions.


Command line options

Web Image Guru batch processing module BatchProcessing.exe can accept following command line parameters:

-f"<path>" - path to the source images, -f may be used several times. This command support wildcards. If -f parameter is omitted then before starting of the Batch Processing Image Sources tab will be displayed to manually select the source for images.

Examples:

-f"c:\source_images\1.jpg" -f"c:\source_images\2.jpg"

-f"c:\source_images\*.*"

-f"c:\source_images\*.bmp"

-f"c:\source_images\1?.bmp"

-q<quality> - quality of optimized images. Parameter range from 0 to 255. 0 corresponds to highest possible quality, 255 to the highest compression and lowest quality. For JPEG optimization quality parameter set Chrominance and Luminance values. For GIF and PNG8 files its corresponds to the number of colors in optimized image (value 0 - 256 colors, value 255 - 2 colors).

Important. If quality parameter is set and path to the destination image is defined (-i option) then Web Image Guru will perform the image optimization without displaying any dialogs.

Example :

-q24

-i"<path>" - path to the destination image. Image file extension is required and define the format of the optimized image. * in the destination file name means the name of the source image. Web Image Guru can save images in JPEG, GIF and PNG formats.

If -i parameter is omitted then Destination tab will be displayed to specify the destination for the images manually.

Examples :

-i"c:\temp\1.gif"

-i"c:\temp\*.gif"

-t<width>,<height>"<path>" - thumbnail parameters. Thumbnail width, height and path to the thumbnail file location. Thumbnail file extension is required and defines the format of the thumbnail image. * In the thumbnail file name means the name of the source image. If -t parameter is omitted then thumbnails won't be created.

Examples:

-T100, 70"c:\temp\*_t.jpg"

-T100, 70"c:\temp\1_t.gif"

-L"<path>"   - log file path. Log file contains the report about optimized images and errors during the Batch processing.

Example:

-l"c:\temp\logfile.txt"


Source and Destination plug-ins

  Web Image Guru has two types of the Batch processing plug-ins: Source and Destination. By developing custom Source and Destination plug-ins  Web Image Guru can be easy and close integrated with custom applications like E-commerce and databases.

  Source plug-ins defines the image source for single or batch image optimization with Web Image Guru. Web Image Guru can get images from different Sources for example, from files or from TWAIN compatible device. The plug-in concept of Web Image Guru allows easy addition of custom Sources that allows to read image data from specific applications.

  Destination plug-ins defines the way images will be saved after optimization. Web Image Guru can store images in different Destinations, for example, to files or HTML Pages.

The plug-in concept of the Web Image Guru allows the easy addition of custom types of Destinations. With such plug-ins images can be saved after optimization in the format of your application with all necessary extra data.

  Web Image Guru Plug-ins Developers Kit contains the information about developing custom Source and Destination plug-ins. You can find more information about it at http://www.vimas.com/ve_guru.htm.


Introduction

  With Web Image Guru you can create thumbnails of the images easy and quickly. Thumbnails can be optimized separately from the main image.

  Web Image Guru thumbnails generation mode has two unique features:

 Smart Cut

 Smart Crop

   These features help to instantly generate proportional thumbnails of the required size. That's why we call thumbnail generation - Smart.


Smart Crop Overview

   Usually thumbnails have small dimensions and that's why it is necessary to make them as more informative as it is possible. Good way to do it is to crop most informative part of the image and then create the thumbnail for this part of the image. In this case the important information becomes more recognizable even on small thumbnails. Web JPEG Plug-in allows doing such cropping during thumbnail generation process. You can easy control the cropping area of the image with cropping area frame. This functionality is called Smart Crop.

   Thumbnail of the cropped area will be generated in accordance with current thumbnail generation mode. In the Smart cut mode the cropping area frame will always be set to the same aspect ratio as defined by current thumbnail dimensions.

The example below demonstrates the efficient of the use of the Smart Crop.

 Thumbnail is generated               Thumbnail is generated

without previous cropping            with cropping of the most

          of the image                   informative part of the image

You can find more examples at our Web site  http://www.vimas.com/ve_smart_crop_examples.htm.

Smart Crop and Smart Cut features of Web JPEG Plug-in makes thumbnail generation as Smart as it is possible.

See also:

Thumbnail generation

Smart Cut


Smart Cut Overview

    A common problem with thumbnail generation is how to generate the thumbnail in exactly the required size. If the aspect ratio of the big image is saved and used for the thumbnail, it may happen that the thumbnail cannot be generated to fit the required width and height.  If the aspect ratio of the big image is discarded, the thumbnail may be stretched to fit the required size, however the results sometimes may distort image proportions.

What can users do to ensure that all thumbnails on the page have the same dimensions? There are two ways:

-	 don't save the aspect ratio. In this case image will be stretched to fit the required size;

-	try to cut the big image in order to change the aspect ratio to the one required by thumbnail size.  This is not an easy task to do manually as it may take many iterations.

  In Web JPEG Plug-in both methods may be used. For the second method Web JPEG Plug-in will automatically calculate how the large image should be cut in order to produce the same aspect ratio, as the thumbnail requires. Users may preview and control the results of cutting part of the big image by moving image cropping area.

  In the Smart cut mode image cropping area is automatically set to the aspect ratio, defined by current thumbnail width and height. You can move and resize cropping area to make thumbnail most informative, but aspect ratio of the thumbnail will be prevented and that's why created thumbnail will have exactly required dimensions.

The example below demonstrates the efficient of Smart Cut.

Both thumbnails have the same size. First was created in Discard aspect ratio mode and the second one in Smart Cut mode.

You can find more examples at our Web site http://www.vimas.com/ve_smart_cut_examples.htm.

Smart Cut and Smart Crop features of Web JPEG Plug-in make thumbnail generation easy and flexible.


Lossless vs Lossy

There are two different approaches to image compression:

1. Lossless Compression

Compressing the image using lossless compression techniques loses no image information.

Every pixel in the compressed/decompressed image is exactly the same as the corresponding pixel in the original image.

Typical compression ratios for lossless compression generators are about 5:1. It means the original image is 5 times larger than the compressed image. Typically lossless compression results in much smaller compression ratio than lossy compression.

Examples of lossless compression techniques:

GIF

PNG

2. Lossy Compression

Lossy compression generators subtly change the image information as they generally eliminate details in the image that are not particularly sensitive to the human eye. Every pixel in the compressed/decompressed image is not exactly the same as the corresponding pixel in the original image. The human eye is more sensitive to small changes in brightness than small changes in hue. Hence lossy compression generators tend to preserve brightness information in an image rather than hue information. Lossy compression results in the loss of image quality during compression. JPEG format is example of lossy compression.

A lossy compression technique generally compresses images significantly more than the lossless compression generators. Typical medium compression ratios for lossy compressions with only slightly visible loss of quality are about 30: 1. Original JPEG compression algorithm that used in Web JPEG Plug-in allows to generate up to 20% higher compression ratios than Standard JPEG for the same image quality.

Compression comparisons page at our Web site http://www.vimas.com/ve_compare.htm contains images to compare different compression algorithms.


Color Reduction

Color reduction procedure allows reducing the numbers of colors in the image.  You can use this function to index an RGB image to 256 colors or less or reduce the current number of colors for a palette image.

See also:

Palette editing

Palette

Dithering


Compound images

 VIMAS Technologies propose new approach that can be effectively used to speedup the Web graphics. We call this technology Compound image. It allows significantly reduce the size of complex images that consists of photos, texts and art images by saving them as separate files and reconstructing in the Web browser as single image. In this case each part of the image can be optimized separately for achieving optimum size. As result the total size of complex graphics can be significantly smaller then correspond JPEG or GIF file. And, as in case of sliced image, the parts of compound image will be downloaded separately. This allows to speed up the image preview but by appearing the more informative objects then just fragments of the total image (like in the case of the image slicing).

  You can find more information and examples of compound images at http://www.vimas.com/ve_compound_gallery.htm .

  Web Image Guru has the capability to easy create simple two level compound images. You can find the fully functional Compound image editor in another our product Web Imaging. You can find more information about it and download trial version at http://www.vimas.com/ve_vwi.htm.


Interlacing

Interlacing is a method of displaying image on the screen in its entirety but at low blocky resolution as soon as image appears on the screen.   As the image data continues to load, image quality improves.  Interlacing is useful option for big images that will be used in WWW. Interlacing only applies to images saved in the GIF and PNG format.


Transparency

Transparency is typically used to "turn off" colors in an image, making that color transparent.  The effect is most often used when creating images for Web pages.  Most Web browsers will read transparent images, allowing the appearance of a free-form image as opposed to a rectangular one. Transparency only applies to images saved in the GIF and PNG format.


Web Safe colors

Web safe colors are the set of 216 colors common to most browsers. Palette, created from such colors, is often called a web-safe or browser-safe palette, because it produces fairly consistent results on different platforms and with different browsers. When an image is displayed in a 256-color screen mode, this set of colors is never dithered.

Web safe colors are useful only for computers, which run in 256-color screen mode.

Stats from http://www.thecounter.com showing bit depth for monitors in global web site statistics:

65K (16bit)    33017401 (51%)

(32bit)    11517324 (17%)

256 (8bit)    9228059 (14%)

16M (24bit)    9117089 (14%)

Unknown    1482039 (2%)

16 (4bit)    22177 (0%)

Web Image Guru provides some ways to support Web safe colors for paletted images. The simplest is just to use Web palette in GIF or PNG-8 images. But as you can see from stats above the obvious trend among the browsing public is toward computers with the capability of displaying thousands or millions of colors, and there is no reason why users with these newer systems should see only these poor colors. So, we recommend use Perceptual or Adaptive color palettes and only examine image with Web Safe Preview. Only colors with unacceptable dithering should be replaced with Web safe ones.


Image maps

  Image maps define clickable areas for images on Web pages. When you click on a clickable area within the graphic, you are automatically linked to the designated page.

  Web Image Guru has no support for image maps, but you can find it in another our product Web Imaging. You can find more information about it and download trial version at http://www.vimas.com/ve_vwi.htm.


TIF

Tagged Image File Format: The most widely used raster format.  It is jointly developed and supported by Aldus and Microsoft.  This file format is used for data storage and interchange, particularly cross platform.  It supports up to 24bits and multiple images per file.  TIFF is a standard file format found in most paint, imaging, and desktop publishing programs.

The default file extension is TIF.


TGA

Truevision Advanced Raster Graphics Adapter: Introduced by AT&T to support their image capture boards and now supported by Truevision. Color depths may be 16, 24 or 32 bits.

The default file extension is TGA.


BMP

Windows Bitmap: The image format created by Microsoft for use with Windows.  This format is also referred to as a DIB.

Bit depths may be 1, 4, 8, or 24-bit.

The default file extension is BMP.


PNG

  PNG stands for Portable Network Graphic. It is a lossless compression generator, which has been developed in June 1994 as a possible successor to GIF. The format created in response to the GIF licensing debacle. Developed for optimized graphics use on the Internet and other on-line services.  PNG supports true color as well as paletted-based graphics.  Color depths may be 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 24, or 48-bit.  PNG uses an advanced lossless compression system and also supports full transparency and interlacing.

The default file extension is PNG.

PNG format advantages for the Web:

- Support for a variety of color models, which allows saving images in full color, in indexed-color mode, or in grayscale.  Unlike GIF and JPEG, PNG supports all basic color models that are used to create on-screen images.

- Support for sophisticated interlacing, which makes the image appear in the Web page layout more quickly.  PNG's new interlacing scheme greatly improves the illusion that images load quickly.

- Support for gamma correction, which corrects the images brightness automatically when the image is displayed on any kind of monitor.

- Support for alpha channels, which allows the creation of transparent images with much smoother edges then with GIF.


GIF

 GIF stands for Graphics Interchange Format.

 The format created by CompuServe as a cross-platform graphic standard and is supported by all graphical Internet browsers. GIF supports up to 8-bit color (256 possible colors) and lets you store custom palettes with your image. GIF offers several advanced graphic options, including transparent backgrounds, image interlacing, and animation.

  GIF files provide lossless compression, which means that when you convert to GIF, all the file information is stored with the image, and the GIF file looks exactly like the graphic you created.

The default file extension is GIF.

  Many of the advantages and innovations that PNG format offers can be found in GIF and it's these features that made GIF popular in the first place.  Nowadays, PNG does GIF one better in most of the areas, but it's good to understand the historical reason for GIF's success.  It's also important that not all browsers currently support PNG.

GIF advantages:

- Small file sizes for art images. PNG compression is a little better than GIF's.

- Transparency. The GIF format allows for simple transparency.

- Animation. GIF, or rather the special species "animated GIF", or GIF 89a, is the easiest and cheapest way to add movement to a Web Page.


Progressive JPEG

A Progressive JPEG is a refinement of the basic JPEG that is broken down into several passes, which are sequentially sent to the Monitor screen. In the first pass highly compressed, low quality data is sent to the screen. Image quality improves as more passes are completed.

The first pass takes little time to execute. In the successive passes increasing levels of quality data are sent to the screen gradually improving the image quality.

Although Progressive JPEG actually takes longer to decode, it appears to be faster to the user.

Progressive JPEG files are popular on the Internet. However, some earlier browser versions do not support it.

Web Image Guru supports Progressive JPEG and the compression script is automatically tuned to achieve smaller compressed image size for selected compression level.


JPEG

   The name JPEG stands for Joint Photographic Experts Group, the name of the committee that developed the specifications. JPEG is a widely accepted standard for compressing photographic images for further use in Web projects, image catalogs, databases and files. JPEG is a compression method but everyone refers to JPEG Interchange File Format (JFIF) as JPEG. A photo realistic color image is represented as a collection of pixels on the video monitor. The color information of each pixel is described by its RGB values and it has one color at the time.

   The JPEG compression generator is based on the fact that the human eye is more sensitive to small changes in brightness (luminance) than small changes in color (chrominance) or large changes in color or brightness.

    As a first step the internal image representation of color is transformed into a system, the YCbCr color space, which identifies the brightness of each pixel. After the conversion is made, the first data reduction step takes place using a process called subsampling. In the subsampling process the color aspect of pixels is changed according to certain criteria by replacing neighboring pixel colors with a single value represented by their average. The brightness is still intact and no significant loss of image quality has occurred.

In the next step working on 8 x 8 pixel blocks using complex mathematical processes called Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT) and Quantization, the changes in color and brightness are identified and rounded off according to certain criteria. The sophistication of the algorithms used in the Quantization process has an essential impact on the quality of the compressed image, in particular at high compression levels. Due to the rounding process many identical values are generated and a further reduction in data size can be implemented using lossless compression techniques, which analyze repetitive data patterns.

    In JPEG compression generators there is a direct relationship between image quality and compression level or compression ratio. Higher compression ratios cause more loss of image quality. To compress the image using JPEG takes considerably more time than to decompress the image. Due to this reason JPEG compression/decompression is asymmetrical.

Two JPEG format options exist: Baseline JPEG (Standard JPEG) and Progressive JPEG


Image Processing and Compression

1. Which image format to use?

   The answer on this question depends on actual image.  If we are talking about photo images, then the better choice is JPEG, for art images, in most cases, PNG or GIF format will be better.  But there are a lot of images for which it is difficult to say, in advance, which format is better. Web Image Guru can help you to quickly make a decision based by comparing image quality and size in different formats.  During image Export or Batch processing , you can select several alternative formats and preview and compare the results with original and between each other.

2. What is the best way to set JPEG compression parameters?

   To compress images with high compression ratio and preserve good quality you should tune JPEG compression parameters individually for every image. The main JPEG compression parameters are Compression and Color. They define compression level of Luminance and Chrominance components of the image. In general the Luminance component provides a grayscale part of the image (such as the image on a monochrome TV), and the Chrominance components provides the extra information that converts the grayscale image to a color image.

   Compression is the main parameter that defines image quality and size. It set compression level of Luminance component and initial compression level of Chrominance component.

Chrominance component compression level can be further tuned with Color parameter. The value 0 means that Chrominance component compressed with the same level as Luminance parameter. Negative values improve color quality resulting bigger file size. Positive values compress color component more resulting smaller file size.

   Therefore, if in JPEG image you see only color distortions, you should reduce Color compression parameter.

   We recommend starting with Compression parameter from 0 to value, where distortions become visible. Then you can tune Color parameter to achieve smallest possible file size with acceptable quality. We should to note that for the different images, optimal values of Color parameter can be positive or negative. But, if you are not JPEG expert and image size is not the main importance for you can leave Color parameter equal 0, that will be good in most cases.

3. What is Sharpen parameter in JPEG compression settings and how to use it?

   Sharpen is the unique parameter of the Web Image Guru JPEG compressor. Average images can be compressed well with Sharpen parameter set to 0. But if image has small sharp details like glisten eyes or shining jewels using Sharpen parameter can increase image quality. When you set Sharpen parameter to the values larger then 1, JPEG compressor tries to find sharp areas and process them in special way. The larger Sharpen values, more areas will be processed. In other word Sharpen parameter works as threshold to divide image on ordinary and sharp areas. Note, that larger Sharpen parameter value lead to larger JPEG file size, so you should set it as small, as possible with acceptable image quality. Often value 2 is good enough. But for some images larger Sharpen parameter may be needed. We recommend you to tune Sharpen parameter from 0 to value, corresponded to the best image quality. If you do not see the differences between images with different Sharpen parameter values, set it to 0.

4. How to improve compression efficiency?

The content of an image significantly affects the efficiency of image compression. Images with large areas of completely flat color compress very well; images that contain unpredictable sequences of color don't compress as efficiently. Noise can creep into an image in many ways and you have many ways of reducing or removing it.

In Web Image Guru you can do it with the set of the filters:

Despeckle - removes single-pixel noise from a flat background, replacing the "specks" with the background color.

Median - averages out groups of pixels in the image. Usually this alters the background color.

Smooth - tones down differences in adjacent pixels, resulting in only a slight loss of detail while smoothing the overall image or selected area.

Such filters as usual can have a drastic effect on the image and should be used with extreme caution. To avoid this problem Web Image Guru filters have unique adaptation capabilities controlled with Threshold parameter.

5. How I can generate thumbnails of the images?

  Web Image Guru has the ability to generate thumbnails of the processed images. Thumbnails will be generated in the same format as big images. You can find more information here.

6. What is thumbnail generation option Smart cut and how to use it?

   A common problem with thumbnail generation is how to create the thumbnail of exactly required size. If the aspect ratio of the big image is saved and used for the thumbnail it may happen that the thumbnail cannot be generated to fit the required width and height. If the aspect ratio of the big image is discarded the thumbnail may be stretched to fit the required size, however the results may sometimes be very peculiar.

  What can users do to ensure that all thumbnails have the same dimensions (width and height)? There are two ways:

- don't save the aspect ratio. In this case image will be stretched to required size;

- try to cut the big image in order to change the aspect ratio to the same as the required by thumbnail size. This is not an easy task to do manually, but if successful the result will be a nicely proportional thumbnail.

In the second variant Web Image Guru will automatically calculate how the big image should be cut in order to produce the same aspect ratio, as the thumbnail requires. You can preview and control the results of cutting part of the big image. We call this mode Smart cut. You can set all thumbnail options on the Thumbnail tab.

6. Can I use Web Image Guru for processing images from digital cameras or scanners?

  Yes, if these devices are TWAIN compatible and correspond drivers are installed. There are two ways how you can read images from scanner or digital camera.

  Web Image Guru has Batch processing source module TWAIN device. With this type of the image source you can acquire several images and they will appear in the list of the selected images. After this all power of Batch processing can be applied to the scanned images. For example, with such approach you can at one step load images from the digital camera, process them (for example cut, rotate and convert to most suitable format) and create the Home Page with the photos.


Compound images

1. When you recommend to use Compound image instead of usual GIF or JPEG image?

The effect of using Compound image can be achieved if original image consist of the areas with different nature. In this case it is possible to use optimal image optimization algorithms for the different areas of the same image.

The main types of the images that can be effectively optimized as Compound images are:

- The image that consist of the photo in the background and art graphics (like logos, texts) over it.

- The Photo over solid background. In this case it is possible to hide the artifacts that appears on the edges between background color and image. So, in this way you can increase the photo compression ratio.


FAQ - HTML Generation

1. How I can generate home pages with images?

  Web Image Guru can generate the homepages with images as the result of Batch processing. As the result of such page generation, in addition to the processed image files, an HTML files will be created with the links to these images. To start generate homepages you need:

- Start Batch processing with Batch Processing utility.

- Select the images you want to store on the Web site in the Source dialog of the Batch processing.

- Click Next to switch to the Destination dialog. Select Destination type: HTML pages. Folow the instructions and set parameters of the generation.

- Click OK to start Batch image processing. You can click Apply to all button to automatically process all selected images.

- When finished you can check the results of the generation if open generated pages with any Web browser.

   HTML generation options can be saved in the HTML generation profiles . At our Web site exists HTML generation gallery (http://www.vimas.com/ve_html_galery.htm). There you can find the examples of HTML pages, generated with different profiles and download the profiles you like.


Send product suggestions

Dear customer, please send your product suggestions, comments and bug reports to vimas@info.kiev.ua.


Current background color or image.

Current background color or image.

You can use menu [image] or color picker [image] to define the background color. With color picker you can click on the required color on the original or optimized image and this color will be set as background. Hexadecimal value of the selected background color is displayed in the same format as in <body bgcolor="#000000"> HTML tag. You can easy copy current background color value and paste it to your Web Page.

You can even type or paste required hexadecimal color value to define background color.

To select background image use menu [image] item Image... and locate the image file. Selected image will be displayed in the background window.

Background is used for the Shape effects and HTML Generation operations. With background color will be filled transparent area when image is optimized with JPEG.


Background Color Picker

Background Color Picker allows easy selection of the background color from the current image.

To select background color from the current image:

-	Click left mouse button on the Background Color Picker;

-	Locate required color in the Image Preview window and click mouse on it;

-	Selected color became background color. It hexadecimal value is displayed in the same format as in <body bgcolor="#000000"> HTML tag. You can easy copy current background color value and paste it to your Web Page.


Background menu

Background menu allows you to define background as a color from the set of the colors or as an image.


Background color

Hexadecimal value of the current background color. It is displayed in the same format as in

<body bgcolor="#000000"> HTML tag. You can easy copy current background color value and paste it to your Web Page.

You can even type or paste required hexadecimal color value to define background color.


Image Offset

Image Offset defines the offset between the optimized image and background image in pixels. By tuning offset values you can achieve perfect seamless layout of the optimized image on your Web page. You can use Preview in Web browser button to immediately see how the image will be integrated in your Web Page.


Filters

  Web Image Guru has the set of the filters that can be applied to image before optimization. In some cases such filters help to achieve better optimization results.

Such filters as usual can have a drastic effect on the image and should be used with extreme caution. To avoid this problem Web Image Guru filters have unique adaptation capabilities controlled with Threshold parameter. To demonstrate the effect that can be achieved using these features we prepare the comparisons with Adobe Photoshop for every filter. You can find it at our Web site.

Median filter - The Median filter removes noise and detail by averaging the colors of adjacent pixels in the image.

Smooth filter - The Smooth filter tones down differences in adjacent pixels, resulting in only a slight loss of detail while smoothing the overall image or selected area.

Sharpen filter - The Sharpen filter accentuates the edges in the image by finding the edges and increasing the contrast between adjacent pixels. The Sharpen filter available only for RGB (True color) images.

Despeckle filter - The Despeckle filter applies a soft, blurred effect to your image. It is especially effective on images with a high amount of contrast.


Adjust

Use Adjust tab to tune image Brightness and Gamma settings.


Feathering

Feathering is the gradual blending of pixels between an image shape and the surrounding background. Feathering produces a softer, more natural-looking edge when applying the shape to the image.

Feather parameter range: 0-100


Shape parameters

Using Shape you can change the shape of the optimized image in accordance with current shape image.

You can apply the shape to the full image or to the part of the image. Shape Preview window is used to define the area to which the shape will be applied.

You can also invert the shape to hide the part of the image or to make it transparent.

The shape can be applied to the image with different Shape effects:

Feather

2D Edge

Web Image Guru installs the set of the shapes to the Resources\Shapes folder. You can also create and use your own shapes.


Invert current shape.

Invert current shape.


Shape Preview

Shape Preview window allows to define the area of the image where the shape will be applied. You can change the size and position of the red rectangle that define the shape area with mouse or with the set of the coordinates that define shape area size and position.


Alpha channel

Intersection of the shape with transparent area defined by current image alpha channel. In this case shape will be applied to nontransparent image area only.


Effects

The shape can be applied to the image with different effects:

Feather


Image navigator

Image navigator used to view areas of the image that fall outside the Preview window. Drag the rectangle around the image to select required image area for preview.


Color Selector

Color selection dialog allows defining custom color.

You can select one of the predefined colors - White, Black, Netscape gray and Gray 50% or choose required color from the palette.  button is used to shift current color to the nearest Web Safe one.


Web safe

Shift current color to the nearest Web Safe one.


Preview button

Initiate preview of the image with current optimization settings.


True color/Web safe

Preview the image in Web Safe colors. So, you can check how your image will look on the monitor in 256 colors mode.


Image Info

 - Original or Compressed image size.

 - The number of bits per/pixel in image.

 - The number of bits per/pixel in image.

 - Compression ratio.

 - Download time is an estimated time of downloading of the image for the set Modem speed. You can change the modem speed in the Options dialog box.


Modem speed

Modem speed - the speed of the modem used to estimate the image download time. You can change the modem speed in the Options dialog box.


Compression Ratio

The Compression Ratio is defined as the ratio: (size in bytes of original image / size in bytes of compressed image).

The larger the Compression Ratio the more has the original image been compressed.

A large value of Compression Ratio implies a high Compression Level and a low Compression Ratio value correspondingly implies a low Compression Level.

Example:

Size of original image = 1.243.632 bytes = 1.214 KB = 1,186 MB

Remember: 1024 bytes = 1 KB and 1.048.576 bytes = 1 MB

Size of compressed image = 10,242 KB

Compression Ratio = 1.214 / 10,242 = 118,5


Auto preview

  Turning On Auto Preview option automatically shows the compression results in the Preview Window after changing the image parameters. The delay between parameters changing and starting the preview defined by Preview delay parameter in the Options dialog.

  If Auto Preview option is Off then Preview button can be used to preview the optimization results.


Image Preview

Set Image Preview mode if both image and thumbnail are generated.


Thumbnail preview

Set Thumbnail Preview mode if both image and thumbnail are generated.


Web Export Dialog tool bar

Toolbar is used to change Web Image Guru modes and includes following buttons:

  Zoom controls allows zoom-in and zoom-out the images in Preview window. You can zoom in and out on an image the following ways:

-	Press either the + or - keys on your keyboard's numeric input pad.

-	Click either the "+" or "-" icons on the toolbar.

-	Select zoom value in % from drop down list box.

 Single/Double window image preview mode. In Double window preview mode you can compare the results of image optimization with the original and between each other. In Single window preview you can easy compare the optimized image with the original using View source image button.

 Mac/PC Gamma. Using this button you can preview how the optimized image will look on the MAC computers.

 - Toggle Transparency Grid. Switch between transparency representation mode:

transparency grid ( [image])or current background color or image .

 True color/Web safe preview. Using this button you can check how the image will look on the monitors with 256 colors mode.

 View source image temporary switches between optimized and original image preview in the optimized image preview window.

 Preview Image in HTML browser. With this button you can preview an image in one or all installed Web browsers. You can add or remove the browser for preview in Options dialog.

 Run Options dialog.

 Run Web Image Guru Help.


Generation mode

Set the Generation mode. Possible values:

Image Only - optimize image and do not generate thumbnail.

Image&Thumbnail - optimize image and create and optimize it's thumbnail.

Thumbnail Only - create and optimize thumbnail of the image and do not optimize image itself.


Thumbnail

Thumbnail is a miniature, low-resolution version of an image for fast image preview. Thumbnail is generated together with the compression of the main image. Thumbnails are often used by Web designers for preview of the large images on the Home Pages.

Thumbnail image file has the same name as the main image file plus Thumbnail name expansion string. Thumbnail name expansion string can be set in the Thumbnail settings tab.

You can also define how the expansion sting will be added to the image file name as suffix or as prefix.


Thumbnail width

Thumbnail width


Thumbnail height

Thumbnail height


Thumbnail name expansion

Thumbnail name expansion - defines how Thumbnail name expansion string will be added to the image file name:

- as prefix before image file name

or

- as postfix to the end of the image file name.


Smart cut and Smart crop control.
Smart cut and Smart crop control

Smart cut and Smart crop control. It allows to define Cropping area of the image for thumbnail generation. In the Smart cut mode Cropping area always has an aspect ratio defined by current thumbnail size. Cropping area of the image can be controlled easily with the mouse or the keyboard.


Smart cut

Smart cut option allows user to generate a thumbnail of the required size by cutting the part of the big image with the same aspect ratio as required by the thumbnail size. Web Image Guru automatically calculates how the big image should be cut in order to produce the aspect ratio that the thumbnail requires. You may control the cutting part of the image by moving cutting area frame.


Discard aspect ratio

Discard aspect ratio option allows generating the thumbnails of the exactly required dimensions with discarding the aspect ratio of the main image. This may result in distortion of the image proportions.


Fit to thumbnail size

Fit to thumbnail size option allows to generate the thumbnail of the exactly required size. Otherwise the thumbnail will be generated with preserving the aspect ratio of the main image.


Thumbnail Name expansion

Thumbnail Name expansion - the character string added to the image file name to create thumbnail file name. This field can't be empty. Expansion string can be added to the main image file name as prefix before file name or as postfix to the end of the file name. This is defined by the  As prefix or As suffix radio button.


Cropping area

Cropping area is the area on the image selected for cropping before generation of the thumbnail. Initially it is equal to image size or maximum allowed cut part in Smart cut mode. The size of the Cropping area can be easily changed with the mouse. In the Smart cut mode Cropping area always has an aspect ratio defined by the current thumbnail size.


Chrominance

Chrominance is the color component of the pixel in an image.


Luminance

Luminance the brightness/gray scale element of a pixel in an image.


Lock sliders checkbox

Lock sliders checkbox allows switching between separate and common adjustment of the Chrominance and Luminance parameters.


JPEG Quality settings

JPEG compression parameters Compression, Color and Sharpen define compressed image quality and size.

Compression parameter defines the compression level of the image. The value of 0 results in the least compression level for the image and better quality. The value of 255 results in the biggest compression level for the image and the lowest quality. Compression parameter defines the compression ratio for Luminance component of the image and initial value for Chrominance component compression. The real Chrominance component compression value defined by combination of the Compression and Color parameters.

Color parameter is used to control color component (Chrominance) compression ratio. The value 0 means that Chrominance component compressed with the same level as defined by Compression parameter. Negative values improve color quality resulting bigger file size. Positive values compress color component more resulting smaller file size.


Sharpen

Sets Sharpen parameter that reduces compression artifacts on the image small details and edges. Setting this parameter to value 0 usually will result in smallest JPEG file size. Bigger values of this parameter will cause the sharpening of the larger areas of an image. Note that this will increase the compressed file size.

We recommend using Sharpen parameter for compressing images with small details.

Warning. Do not mix Web Image Guru Sharpen parameter with the Sharpen filter operation, because these are absolutely different functions.

Sharpen range is 0-100.


Progressive JPEG

Create Progressive JPEG files. Progressive JPEG compression script is automatically tuned to achieve smaller compressed image size for selected compression level.


Wavelength

Wavelength of light is associated with a color name: red, green, blue, etc. Short wavelength corresponds to blue color and long wavelength - to red color. White light is a mixture of different light wavelengths.


LZW

LZW stands for Lempel Ziv Welch, named after creators of compression algorithm. It analyzes recurring data patterns to generate data compressions.


Color Depth

The number of colors in the image is called color bit depth:

 8 bits correspond to 256 colors;

16 bits correspond to 65,536 colors. 16 bits color depth represents high colors;

24 bits correspond to 16,777,216 colors. 24 bits color depth represents true colors;

32 bits corresponds to 16,777,216 colors plus a "special effects" channel. We say 32 bits color   depth represents full colors.

Higher color depth in bits allows storage of more image information and higher image quality.  This correspondingly increases image file size and requires more disk space for image storage.


Export Plug-in

Export type plug-ins are activated through the File - Export menu of Adobe Photoshop. To run Web Image Guru, select Web JPEG from the list of available export plug-ins.


Filter Plug-in

  Filter type plug-ins are activated through the Filter menu of Adobe Photoshop. To run Web Image Guru, select Web Image Guru from the list of available filters.

  Note! Most of the host applications better support Filter type plug-ins. That's why we are recommended to use filter plug-in as a main entry to run Web Image Guru. Please, note that all image layers must be flatten before using of Web Image Guru filter plug-in.

  Only Filter plug-ins support selection and can be used for easy producing simple compound images.


Bandwidth

Bandwidth is a measure of size as measured in bytes


Pixels

Picture elements that are the building blocks for raster images (Images consisting of dots).


RGB

The primary colors Red, Green and Blue.


Lock image and thumbnail sliders

Lock image and thumbnail sliders option allows to set thumbnail compression parameters to the values set for main image. Note, that in this mode changing thumbnail compression parameters will not affect changes of the corresponding for the main image.


Palette editing

  Palette editing allows making modifications to the palette of the palette images, set transparency colors and simple image editing. Web Image Guru provides you with the unique flexibility in manual palette editing.

  Paletted images use a color table, which determines the color usage for the image.  Each pixel in the image is mapped to a particular color in the table, or palette.  Each color in the palette is identified by its index number, or value, which corresponds to its position in the table.

  Palette editing can be performed with selecting of the colors on Palette table or on the Optimized or Original image.


Palette editing colors

Current color and Foreground color selector.

There are the information about current color on the left side of the indicator and the information about Foreground color on the right side.

Index is the index of the color selected in the palette table. Each color in the palette is identified by its index number, or value, which corresponds to its position in the table.

Current color is the color on the image or palette table where mouse is positioned. You can select the variant of digital representation of the color in Decimal or Hexadecimal form. Just select the required representation from the drop down list box.

Foreground color is used with Pen and Replace color tools. Foreground color can be changed with a double click on the right rectangle.  Then color selection dialog will appear and you can select the required color. Another way to select Foreground color is a Pick color tool.  When the Pick color tool is selected, just click left mouse button on the required color on the image or on Palette table and this color will be selected as Foreground color.


Palette editing info

Information about current image palette and current palette color.


Edit Palette tool bar

  Palette editing toolbar includes several tools:

   Pick color tool - used for quick selection of the Foreground color.  To select the color, it is necessary to click left the mouse on the required color on the Preview image or on the Palette table.

   Replace color tool - used for replacing selected color with the foreground color.  The replaced color could be selected with left mouse click on the Preview image or on the Palette table.  To undo the operation just click left mouse again on the same place.

   Pencil tool - used for replace the pixel color of the Preview image with Foreground color.  It is useful for simple editing of the image.

   Replace with Web safe color tool - used for replacing selected color with the nearest Web safe one.

   Lock color tool - used to lock the selected color for preventing it from removing during the color reduction and for the returning removed color to the palette.

You can lock color with mouse click on the required color on the palette table.

Selecting on the original image the color that is absent in current palette forced adding of this color to the palette.

If you remove the necessary color and need to restore it, then you can click on the necessary area on the optimized image and the corresponding color from the original image will be add to the palette.

In such manner you can easy add the necessary colors that were taken out by color reduction.

   Remove color from palette tool - used to remove the selected color from palette. Click left mouse on the color in the palette table or on the optimized image to remove the color from palette. Removed color will marked as deleted in the palette table. To return color to the palette click on the removed color again.

   Set transparent color tool - used to make the selected color transparent.  To select the color, it is necessary to click left mouse on the required color on the Preview image or on the Palette table. To undo the operation just click left mouse again on the same place.

   Set transparent pixel tool - used to make the selected pixel transparent. Select the pixel on the optimized image and click left mouse to make it transparent, it is necessary to click left mouse on the required pixel on the Preview image. To undo the operation just click left mouse again on the same pixel.

On the palette editing toolbar there are two controls that define the information format:

 - select the mode for digital color representing: Decimal or Hexadecimal.

 - select the sorting mode for displaying palette colors in Palette_table .


Palette table

The image palette appears as a table of color bars. Each bar (or square) in the palette represents a color and has its own index value, which ranges from 0 to maximum 255 (256 colors).  The first, top-left, position has an index value of 0, and the last, bottom-right, position has a maximum index value.

Some colors on the palette table can be marked with special symbols:

 - Locked color.

 - Web Safe color.

 - Transparent color.

 - Deleted color.

You can define different sorting modes for displaying palette colors with [image] button.


Palette

Defines a Palette of the result image. You can select the appropriate palette for the result image from the following list:

Adaptive

Creates a custom palette by sampling colors from the spectrum appearing most commonly in the image. For example, an image with only the colors green and blue produces a palette made primarily of greens and blues. Most images concentrate colors in particular areas of the spectrum.

Perceptual

Creates a custom palette by giving priority to colors for which the human eye has greater sensitivity. This palette usually produces images with the greatest color integrity.

Web

Uses the standard 216-color palette common to the Windows and Mac OS 256-color palettes.

Windows

Uses the Windows system's default 8-bit palette, which is based on a uniform sampling of RGB colors.

MAC OS

Uses the Macintosh system's default 8-bit palette, which is based on a uniform sampling of RGB colors.


Interlaced

Save GIF or PNG image with interlacing. Interlacing is a method of displaying image on the screen in its entirety but at low blocky resolution as soon as image appears on the screen.   As the image data continues to load, image quality improves.  Interlacing is useful option for big images that will be used in WWW. Interlacing only applies to images saved in the GIF and PNG format.


PNG Transparency

PNG image transparency. (Hope that this functionality will be supported in the next generation of Web browsers).

Full Alpha channel - save full alpha channel transparency.

Background color - save transparency for current background color only.


Reduce number of colors

Reduce the number of colors in image with one of color reduction methods.


Number of colors in image

Number of colors in image.


Bits per pixel

The number of binary bits that define the color of each pixel in a result image. The number of color values a given bit depth (bits/per pixel) can produce is equal to 2 to the power of the bit depth. The number of bits per pixel could be also changed with Colors value.


Color reduction method

The method of reducing the number of colors in image. Currently available 2 methods:

Filtering - merge colors in the set range. Range value is defined by Level parameter.

Adaptive - works in the same manner as Adaptive palette for GIF/PNG8, but can produce up to 1024 colors.


Dithering

Dithering is used for reducing the number of colors in image.

Dithering is a useful feature when performing color reductions.  This function diffuses adjacent pixels to represent colors, which are not actually in the image, resulting in a closer representation of the original color balance.

Less Dither level cause smaller image file size.  The recommendation is to reduce Dither level to the value where the image quality is acceptable.


GIF/PNG

Define in which format to save paletted image: GIF or PNG.


Lock Web safe colors

Locks all Web Safe colors that are present in the original image.


Required number of colors

Required number of colors in image after optimization.


Web tolerance

Web Tolerance define the level of the colors Web safety. A higher value shifts more colors.

A value of 0 corresponds to optimal color palette.

A value of 25 shifts all optimal colors to the nearest Web safe one.


Support transparency

Enable supporting of the transparency. Switching this check box off you can disable the existed transparency and replace transparent colors with Background color


Create New Page

The new HTML page for image and thumbnail can be created.

If Background color is selected in the Common tab, then HTML page will have such background color.

If Background image is selected in the Common tab, then the syntax of the HTML page will be defined by the following options:

   Positioning method defines the syntax of the HTML code for image and background positioning on the page.

   Background image defines how the background image will be displayed.

See also:

Insert Image in Existing Page


HTML options

Define the syntax of the HTML code for image and background image positioning on the page.

Table Cell - Image will be placed in the table cell and Background image will be set as this cell background. Image Offset parameters defines the offset of the image from the cell borders.

Cell width and height defined by the image sizes and Background image mode.

HTML 4.0 - The piece of the HTML 4.0 code with relative Image and Background image positions will be generated.


Background style

Define the style in which Background image will be displayed:

Single - the background image will be displayed as single image. This mode is useful for making simple Compound images.

If Image/Background image positioning is Table Cell, then cell size will be set to the dimension defined by background or optimized image.

Tiled - the background image will be tiled on the screen.

If Image/Background image positioning is Table Cell, then cell size will be set to the current screen dimension.


Insert Image in Existing Page

This mode is used to insert image into the existed Web page.

You have to select an existed HTML Page with the temporary image you are going to replace and the temporary image itself. After image optimization the link to the temporary image can be replaced with the link to the optimized image.

Using this functionality you can define the image position on the Web Page with any HTML Editor and then optimize it using current background and layout of the page.

You can easy preview how the optimized image will fit into the Page using Preview in HTML Browser mode.

This allows you to perfectly integrate the image into your page especially if you are using Shape and Feather effect and background image.

Use Image offset parameters to tune image and background shifts to achieve seamless integration.

Look at the examples at our Web Site (http://www.vimas.com/ve_webguru.htm)

to see which results you can achieve using this functionality.

If you will run Web Image Guru from Image Navigator using HTML Image Optimizing menu, then the Insert Image in Existing Page mode will be selected automatically and

HTML file and  Image to replace will be set to the corresponding HTML file and Image.

See also:

Create new HTML Page


HTML file

HTML file where the optimized image will be used.


Preview in Web Browser

Preview selected HTML file in Web browser.


Replace image

Image in the HTML file that will be replaced with optimized image.


Save HTML file

Web Image Guru can create HTML files with the links to the optimized image and thumbnail.

To create HTML files select Save HTML file check box.

You can edit the location and the name of the HTML files for the image and thumbnail in the corresponding edit boxes.

The format in which HTML files will be created will depend on the settings in HTML tab of Web Image Guru.


Auto Preview delay

Auto Preview delay - the delay in ms between parameters changing and starting the compression. Used if Auto preview mode is on.


Current modem speed

Current modem speed for estimation of download time.


Options - Remember parameters

Remember parameters - define which parameters will be saved and restored with the next start of Web Image Guru.


Web browsers list

The list of Web browsers for previewing images in Preview in browser mode. Use Add, Delete, Edit and Refresh buttons to edit HTML browser's list. Refresh button automatically scans your system and try to find installed Web browsers.


HTML browser name

Specify HTML browser name and location.


Batch processing Place To

Batch processing Place To contains the list of available Destinations. To change current Destination type you can choose another one from the list.


Path

Select or enter the path where image files will be stored after Batch processing. If the path doesn't exists you will be prompted to create the new one.


Create thumbnails

Create thumbnails of the optimized images.


HTML - Ask file name

Before saving the image you will be asked for file name.


File name

Enter file name of the processed image.


Use image file name

Processed image file name will be the same as original image has.


Find the image

Find the image files on the local computer or network.


Selected files list

Selected files list contains the list of all images selected for Batch processing.


File Preview

File Preview allows previewing the image before or after selection. If the image was saved with Interlaced (GIF, PNG) or Progressive (JPEG) option, only the first scan of the image is displayed.  You can also get information about image resolution and bit depth.


Batch processing Load Images From

Batch processing Load Images From contains the list of available Sources. To change current Source type, just choose another one from the list.


Selected images

Selected images - is the list of acquired images. When added to the list images named as Image1, Image2, etc., it is possible to edit an image name directly in the Selected images list.  To rename the image, select it and click the mouse on it again.  After this you can edit the name.  When finished, click Enter or click the mouse outside the editing area.


Remove

Remove button removes currently selected image from the Selected images list.


Select source

Select source button displays the dialog with the list of installed TWAIN compatible devices. You can select the required device from the list.


Acquire button

Acquire button runs the currently selected TWAIN device dialog. After the selection of the required image and final scanning (or acquiring), it will appear in the Source dialog in the Selected images list. It is not necessary to close TWAIN device dialog to acquire the next image.  You can acquire as many images as you need and only after that, close the TWAIN device dialog or it will be automatically closed when the Batch processing starts.


List/Contact sheet

You can switch between two variants of image files representations: List and Contact sheet.

In List mode - you have the list of all files in current directory and can preview each file separately.

In Contact sheet mode - you have the thumbnails of all images in current directory. You can set the size of the thumbnail in this mode in the Preferences dialog.


Adjustments

With Web Image Guru you can easy make adjustments to the Brightness, Contrast, and Intensity of the image. You can change these values using the mouse to drag the slider control bars to the left or right or you can enter a numeric value into any of the fields.

You can adjust all colors simultaneously or Red/Green/Blue channels separately.

Operation parameters:

Intensity

Brightness

Contrast

Color channel


Adjust brightness level

Adjust brightness level. The Brightness control shifts all pixel values up or down the tonal range.  When you adjust the brightness, you are lightening or darkening all colors or selected color channel only.


Adjust contrast level

Adjust contrast level. The Contrast control adjusts the distance between your lightest and darkest pixels for all colors or for selected color channel only.


Adjust intensity level.
Adjust intensity level

Adjust intensity level. Increasing the intensity brightens the lighter areas without washing out the dark areas. Intensity changing can be applied to all colors or to selected color channel only.


Color channel

Color channel list box used to define the color channel for Brightness/Contrast/Intensity adjustments. Color channels can be selected as Red, Green, Blue, or All colors.


Gamma adjustemnt
Gamma adjustment

Make adjustments to the Gamma of the image. Gamma is a method of tonal correction that takes the human eye's perception of neighboring values into account. Gamma adjustment lets you pick up detail in a low-contrast image without significantly affecting the shadows or highlights. You can change these values using the mouse to drag the slider control bars to the left or right, or you can enter a numeric value into any of the fields.

You can adjust all colors simultaneously or Red/Green/Blue channels separately.

Win to Mac and Mac to Win buttons allows easy gamma conversion of the images created on different platforms.

See also:

Gamma

Color channel


Color channel list box

Color channel list box used to define the color channel for Gamma adjustment. Color channels can be selected as Red, Green, Blue, or All colors.


Adjust Gamma

Adjust Gamma. Gamma adjustment lets you pick up detail in a low-contrast image without significantly affecting the shadows or highlights.  The Gamma adjustment can be applied to all colors or to selected color channel only.


Despeckle filter

The Despeckle filter detects the edges in an image (areas where significant color changes occur) and blurs all image except those edges. This blurring removes noise while preserving detail. Amount parameter allows setting the amount of color change needed in an area before it is considered a speck.

  Despeckle Amount parameter defines the amount of color change needed in an area before it is considered a speck. Less amount value means more of a color change is needed.


Median filter

The Median filter removes noise and detail by averaging the colors of adjacent pixels in the image. The Median filter available only for RGB (True color) images.

  Threshold automatically defines the image areas to which the filter will be applied.


Make image negative

Make image negative.


Sharpen filter

The Sharpen filter accentuates the edges in the image by finding the edges and increasing the contrast between adjacent pixels. The Sharpen filter available only for RGB (True color) images.

 Amount defines the sharpness level. Amount range is 0-100.

 Threshold automatically defines the image areas to which the filter will be applied. To easy understand how it is works, set the Amount to 100 and play with different Threshold values.

Threshold range is 0-100.


Smooth filter

The Smooth filter tones down differences in adjacent pixels, resulting in only a slight loss of detail while smoothing the overall image or selected area.

The Smooth filter available only for RGB (True color) images.

 Amount defines the intensity of the smoothing effect. Amounts range 0 -100.

 Threshold automatically defines the image areas to which the filter will be applied. To easy understand how it is works, set the Amount to 100 and play with different Threshold values.

Threshold range is 0-100.


Do not copy original images

Original images will not be copied to the home page location, only links to them will be added.


Duplicate original image

If selected then zoom images (original images) will not be processed during batch processing and only the thumbnails will be created (if selected). Original images can be copied to the home page location if Duplicate original image option selected.


Copy original images

Original images will be copied to the home page location.


Thumbnail or zoom image title

In this dialog box you can enter the thumbnail or zoom image title.  This title will be placed on the generated page.  Default title is the image file name.  To enter new line in your text use <CTRL><Enter>.


HTML - New Web project

New Web project


HTML - Index page properties

Index page properties define the layout of the page.  The page settings can be defined by Header template file or can be set manually.

In the last case, it is necessary to define:

Page background color if not default.

Visited link color if not default.

Active link color if not default.

Background image if any.

Index page can include a Footer template file if necessary.

It is possible to edit the currently selected Header or Footer template files with system default Web editor. The Edit button runs the Web editor with selected file.


HTML - Index Thumbnails page link properties

Thumbnails page link properties defines the layout of the links to Thumbnails pages from the Index page .

Font size - link font size.

Font style - link font style.

Text color - link text color.


HTML - Number of columns

Number of columns in the Zoom images links table.


HTML - Index Zoom image properties

Zoom image link properties defines the layout of the links to Zoom images from the Index page.  Zoom images links are placed in table.  You can control these table parameters.

Zoom images links table settings:

Columns - number of columns in the table.

Border width - width of the table border.

Cell spacing

Cell padding

Zoom image link text settings:

Font size - link font size.

Font style - link font style.

Text alignment - the alignment type of the link text.

Text color - link text color.

Background color - background color of the link text.


HTML - Properties tree - Thumbnails cell properties

Thumbnails cell properties define the layout of the cells with thumbnails and their titles.

Thumbnail image settings define the thumbnail image size and initial parameters that define how it should be created from the big image.

Thumbnail generation options:

Discard aspect ratio

Fit to thumbnail size

Smart cut

Thumbnail width

Thumbnail height

Thumbnail and title cell settings:

Cell color

Border width

Thumbnail and title cell border color:

Default color

Single color

Double color


HTML - Properties tree

Properties tree contains the properties of all pages generated in current Web project.  Each page's properties are divided into subgroups.  When a subgroup is selected, its properties appear and become available for editing.  The current configuration of all properties can be saved as HTML generation Profile with the Save profile as button.


HTML - Zoom page properties

Zoom page properties define the layout of the page.  The page settings can be defined by Header template fileor can be set manually.

In the last case, it is necessary to define:

Page background color , if not default.

Visited links color , if not default.

Active links color , if not default.

Background image , if any.

Zoom page can include Footer template file if necessary.

It is possible to edit currently selected Header or Footer template files with the system default Web editor.  The Edit button runs the Web editor with selected file.


HTML - Zoom images links table border

The width of the Zoom images links table border in pixels.


HTML - Properties Zoom page image

Zoom image properties define the layout of the big image cell on the Zoom page.

Zoom image processing options:

You can define if zoom image will be processed or not. In the last case original image will be used as zoom image.

You must select Do not process zoom image check box if you don't need any changes in original image. You can copy original images to the home page directory with Duplicate original image option. Alternatively you can select Do not copy image option. In this case only links to the images will be added.

Warning! If you select Do not process zoom image option, please check if original images are in Web compatible formats (JPEG, GIF, PNG). Otherwise your links will not work.

Zoom image title text:

Use image file name as zoom image title

Ask a title for every zoom image

Use the same title as thumbnail of zoom image

Zoom image cell settings:

Border width

Cell spacing

Cell padding

Cell color

Zoom image cell border color:

Default color

Single color

Double color


HTML - Properties Zoom title

Zoom image title properties define the layout of the zoom image title text.

Zoom image title text settings:

Background color - background color of the title cell.

Font size - title font size.

Font style - title font style.

Text alignment - the alignment type of the title text.

Text color - title text color.


HTML - Template file format

HTML Template file is a file with standard HTML syntax.  This file contain several specific keywords that instruct HTML generator to place processed thumbnails, big images and their titles into the specified place on the page.  The page generated on the basis of the template will look the same as the template, but real images and their titles will replace the keywords.  The template file format is the same for Thumbnails pages and Zoom pages .

Image keyword:

"default.jpg" - this keyword in the template will be replaced with real big image or thumbnail file name.

Example:

<IMG BORDER=0 SRC="default.jpg">

Title keyword:

def_text - this keyword will be replaced with real thumbnail or zoom image title.

Example:

<CENTER><B><I><FONT SIZE=6 COLOR="#00ff00" FACE>def_text</FONT></B></I></CENTER>

Zoom image hyperlink keyword:

"zoom_link.htm" - this keyword will be replaced with the zoom image or zoom page name.  Only the thumbnail image can have the link to a Zoom image.  This keyword should be placed inside an HREF tag before the thumbnail image tag.  Zoom image generation must be selected.

Example:

<A HREF="zoom_link.htm"> <IMG BORDER=0 SRC="default.jpg"></A>

Index page hyperlink keyword:

"$Content$" - this keyword will be replaced with Index page name.  This keyword should be placed inside an HREF tag before the text with the link to Index page.  Index page generation must be selected.

Example:

<A HREF="$Content$">Content</A>

The keywords are replaced in the same order that they appear in the template.  In other words, first from the beginning of file keyword "default.jpg", will be replaced with first processed image, second with second, etc.

There are several examples of the template files that are stored in the HTML Templates subdirectory of the Web Image Guru.

At our Web site we create HTML generation gallery (http://www.vimas.com/ve_html_galery.htm). There you can find the examples of HTML pages, generated with different templates and download the template examples.


HTML - Thumbnail and title in the same cell

Place thumbnail image and title in the same table cell.


HTML - Thumbnails page template file name

Thumbnails page Template file name. The Template file is the HTML file that corresponds to HTML generation template file format .


HTML - Background color

Specify a background color by selecting a color from the drop-down list. To specify a custom color, click Define Custom Colors button.


HTML - Border default color

Use browser default border color.


HTML - Border double color

Double color border. You should specify a Dark and Light colors of the border by selecting them from the drop-down lists. To specify a custom color, click Define Custom Colors button.


HTML - Border double dark color

Specify a border Dark color by selecting a color from the drop-down list. To specify a custom color, click Define Custom Colors button.


HTML - Border double light color

Specify a border Light color by selecting a color from the drop-down list. To specify a custom color, click Define Custom Colors button.


HTML - Border single color

Single color border. Specify a color for the border by selecting a color from the drop-down list. To specify a custom color, click Define Custom Colors button.


HTML - Cell color

Specify a thumbnail cell color by selecting a color from the drop-down list. To specify a custom color, click Define Custom Colors button.


HTML - Cell padding

Cell padding is the space in pixels between the link text and inside edges of a table cell.


HTML - Cell spacing

HTML thumbnail table cell spacing.


HTML - Create thumbnail check box

Thumbnails pages check box. If selected then Thumbnails pages will be generated.


HTML - Generation - Index page

Index page contains the links to all generated pages and can be used as contents of the Web project.  There is only one Index page for the Web project.  The Index page file has the same name as Web project plus "_c.htm".

The Index page structure depends on the configuration of Web project (Thumbnails pages and Zoom images combination).

Thumbnail pages - On       Zoom images - Off

Index page contains the links to all generated Thumbnail pages files.

Thumbnail pages - On       Zoom images - On

Index page contains the links to all generated Thumbnail pages files.  For every Thumbnails page generated it contains the table with the links to Zoom images of this page of thumbnails.

Thumbnail pages - Off       Zoom images - On

Index page contains the table with the links to all processed images or their Zoom pages.

Index page layout is defined by properties that set in the Properties tree :

Index page

Thumbnails page link properties

Zoom image link properties


HTML - Generation - Thumbnails page

Thumbnails page contains the thumbnails of the processed images.  The number of Thumbnails pages per Web project depends on the Web project settings and the number of the processed images.

If the Web project will consists of several Thumbnails pages, then each page will contain the links to the First, Previous, Next and Last pages.  If an Index page was created, then each Thumbnails page will also contain the link to Index page.

Each thumbnail can contain the link to the Zoom image , if the Zoom image option was selected for the Web project.  The first Thumbnails page file has the same name as Web project.  The last Thumbnails page file has the same name as Web project plus "_L.htm".  Intermediate thumbnails page files have the same names as Web project plus the number of the thumbnail page.

There are two ways to generate Thumbnails pages: Automatic and Template based .

If the Thumbnail page is generated on the basis of a template, then the number of the thumbnails per page and their layout are defined by Template file .  In this case, only thumbnail generation options should be set in the Properties tree :

Discard aspect ratio

Fit to thumbnail size

Smart cut

Thumbnail width

Thumbnail height

If Automatic creation of the Thumbnails page is selected, then layout of the pages is defined by the set of properties in the Properties tree:

Thumbnails page

Thumbnails table properties

Thumbnail cell properties

Thumbnail title properties


HTML - Generation - Zoom pages

There are two variants of displaying enlarged images: just as an image or as an HTML page that contain the big image (Zoom page).

The number of the Zoom pages is the same as the number of the processed images.  The Zoom page file has the same name as Web project plus "_z#.htm", where # is the number of the zoom page.

There are three possibilities of displaying enlarged images if the Just image variant selected:

Zoom image displayed in the same browser window

Zoom image displayed in a new browser window

Zoom image displayed in the popup window

There are two possibilities to generate Zoom pages with big images if this variant selected: Automatic and Template based .

If Zoom pages are generated on the basis of a template, then layout of the pages is defined by Template file .

If Automatic creation of Zoom pages is selected, then layout of the pages is defined by the set of properties in the Properties tree :

Zoom page

Zoom image properties

Zoom image title properties


HTML - Generation profile

HTML generation profile. HTML generation profile is the set of the HTML generation options that saved in file for reuse. You can save the current HTML generation options in HTML generation profile with Save profile as button. To load profile from file you can use Load profile button. All saved and loaded profiles automatically stored in the Profiles list. To remove the profile from this list select required profile and click Remove profile button.

You can change current profile by selecting another one from the list of available Profiles. All HTML generation options will be automatically set in according with the profile.

At our Web site exists HTML generation gallery http://www.vimas.com/ve_html_galery.htm . There you can find the examples of HTML pages, generated with different profiles and download the profiles for free reuse.


HTML - New Web project location

The directory where generated HTML files and processed images will be stored.


HTML - New Web project name

Web project name can be any valid file name. Web project name will be used as a base for generating the project file names.


HTML - Page active link color

Specify an Active link color for the page by selecting a color from the drop-down list. To specify a custom color, click Define Custom Color button. Active link is a hyperlink that is currently selected in Web browser.


HTML - Page background color

Specify a background color for the page by selecting a color from the drop-down list. To specify a custom color, click Define Custom Colors button.

You can combine a background image with a background color. If the background image has a transparent color, the background color will show through the background image.


HTML - Page background image

Select the Background image to use an image as the page's background. The image will be tiled to form a background for the page.

You can combine a background image with a background color. If the Background image has a transparent color, the background color will show through the background image.


HTML - Page edit

Edit HTML file with system default Web Editor.


HTML - Page footer

Footer template file can be any valid HTML file. When Footer template file is used, it's contents from the tag <body> up to the </body> tag is inserted in the end of every page generated.


HTML - Page header

Header template file can be any valid HTML file. When Header template file is used, it's contents from the beginning of the file up to the </body> tag is inserted in the beginning of every page generated.  Therefore all page settings (background color, font color, etc.) will be the same as the Header template file has.


HTML - Page preview

Preview HTML file with system default Web Browser.


HTML - Page settings

HTML page settings.


HTML - Page template

The HTML page will be generated on the base of template. Template file - is a special HTML file that corresponds to HTML template file format .


HTML - Page visited link color

Specify a Visited link color for the page by selecting a color from the drop-down list. To specify a custom color, click Define Custom Color button. Visited link is a hyperlink on a page that has been activated.


HTML - Preview Image

Preview options - Image. Image that will be used for the preview of the Home Page. If empty def.jpg image will be used.


HTML - Preview Text

Preview options - Text. Text string that will be placed in the Home page preview instead of thumbnail or zoom image title. If empty string "Title" will be used.


HTML - Properties tree - Thumbnail title

Thumbnails title properties define the layout of the thumbnails title text.

Thumbnails title text settings:

Background color - background color of the title cell.

Font size - title font size.

Font style - title font style.

Text alignment - the alignment type of the title text.

Text color - title text color.

Wrap text


HTML - Properties tree - Thumbnails table

Thumbnails table properties defines the layout of the table with thumbnails and the parameters of the thumbnail title (the text that will appear close to thumbnail).

Thumbnail title location:

Thumbnail and title in the same cell

Thumbnail and title in the separate cells

Thumbnail title text:

Use image file name as thumbnail title

Ask a title for each thumbnail

Thumbnails table settings:

Border width

Cell spacing

Cell padding

Columns

Limit rows number - if selected, then the maximum number of rows per page will be Max rows.  If the number of images is more then can be stored on current page then, the next Thumbnails page will be generated.  If Limit rows number is unselected, then all thumbnails will be placed on one page.

Border color settings:

Default color

Single color

Double color


HTML - Properties tree -Thumbnails page

Thumbnails page properties define the layout of the page.  The page settings can be defined by Header template file or can be set manually.

In the last case, it is necessary to define:

Page background color if not default.

Visited links color if not default.

Active links color if not default.

Background image if any.

Thumbnail page can include a Footer template file if necessary.

It is possible to edit the currently selected Header or Footer template files with the system default Web editor.  Edit button runs the Web editor with the selected file.


HTML - Bold

Bold


HTML - Text Center

Center


HTML - Text color

Specify a text color by selecting a color from the drop-down list. To specify a custom color, click Define Custom Colors button.


HTML - Text font size

Font size


HTML - Text Italic

Italic


HTML - Text Justify

Justify


HTML - Text Left

Align left


HTML - Text preview

Preview of the text with current settings. Real Browser view of the text will depend on Browser font settings.


HTML - Text Right

Align right


HTML - Text Strike Out

Strike out


HTML - Text Underline

Underline


HTML - Text Wrap

Wrap text. If selected, text will be wrapped to fit into image cell size.


HTML - Thumbnail name

If selected, then thumbnail page will contain the thumbnails titles.


HTML - Thumbnail name as file name

Thumbnail title will be the same as the thumbnail file name without extension.


HTML - Thumbnail name ask for name

After processing every image Enter thumbnail title dialog box will appear. There you can enter any text that will be used as thumbnail title.


HTML - Thumbnail name in the separate cells

Place thumbnail image and title in the separate table cells. Thumbnail title cell is located under the thumbnail image cell.


HTML - Thumbnail name include

If selected, then thumbnail page will contain the thumbnails titles.


HTML - Thumbnail page automatic

If selected, then Thumbnails pages will be generated automatically in accordance with settings in the Properties tree.


HTML - Thumbnail page image cell border size

Thumbnail and title cell border width.


HTML - Thumbnail page template

If selected, then Thumbnails pages will be generated on the base of template file.  The Template file is the HTML file that corresponds to the HTML template file format.


HTML - Thumbnail table border width

The width of the thumbnails table border in pixels.


HTML - Thumbnail table limit number of rows

Limit the number of rows in the Thumbnails table. If the number of images more then can be placed on one page, next Thumbnails page will be generated.


HTML - Thumbnail table number of columns

HTML thumbnail table number of columns.


HTML - Thumbnail table number of rows

If the Limit number of rows parameters is selected, then Number of rows defines the maximum number of rows in the thumbnails table.


HTML - ZOOM ask for title

After processing every image Enter zoom image title dialog box will appear. There you can enter any text that will be used as zoom image title.


HTML - ZOOM border size

Zoom image border width in pixels.


HTML - ZOOM include title

If selected then Zoom page will contain image title.


HTML - Zoom page checkbox

If selected, then Zoom images will be generated.


HTML - Zoom page HTML Page

If selected, then Zoom images will be generated in the form of Zoom pages - HTML pages with big images.


HTML - Zoom page HTML Page automatic

If selected, then Zoom pages will be generated automatically in accordance with settings in the Properties tree.


HTML - Zoom page HTML Page template

If selected, then Zoom pages will be generated on the base of template file. Template file is the HTML file that corresponds to the HTML template file format .


HTML - Zoom page HTML Page template file name

Zoom pages template file name.


HTML - Zoom page just image

If selected, then Zoom images will be displayed just as images.  This is mean then the links from Thumbnails page or Index page will be connected directly with big image file.


HTML - Zoom properties show in new browser window

Image displayed in a new browser window. In this case the new copy of the browser is started and image is displayed in it.  To return to the Thumbnail page or Content page you can close the copy of the browser with image or just switch to the previous copy of the browser.


HTML - Zoom properties show in popup

Zoom image will be displayed in the modal popup window. To return to the Thumbnail page or Content page you should close the popup window.  This variant is based on HTML 4.0 syntax and currently supported only by Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.


HTML - Zoom properties show in the same window

Image displayed in the same browser window and replaces the current page. To return to the Thumbnail page or Content page, the Back button of the browser should be used.


HTML - ZOOM title as filename

Thumbnail title will be same as image file name without extension.


HTML - ZOOM title as thumbnail title

Use thumbnail title as zoom image title.


Dithering

  Dithering is a useful feature when performing color reductions.  This function diffuses adjacent pixels to represent colors, which are not actually in the image, resulting in a closer representation of the original color balance.

  Less Dithering level cause smaller image file size.  The recommendation is to reduce Dithering level to the value where the image quality is acceptable.

Dithering level range is: 0-10


Transform-Resample

Resampling (resizing) is the process of changing the resolution or size of an image to alter the number of pixels it contains.  Up sampling increases the resolution, increasing the number of pixels; down sampling reduces the resolution, decreasing the number of pixels in an image.

Operation parameters:

Width

Height

Maintain aspect ratio


Transform-Width

Resampled image Width. Can be entered in pixels.  If Maintain aspect ratio option is checked, then the resampled image width will be changed automatically when entering resampled image height or changing image size in percents to original image.


Transform-Height

Resampled image Height. Can be entered in pixels. If Maintain aspect ratio option checked, then resampled image height can be changed automatically during entering resampled image width or changing image size in percents to original image.


Transform-Maintain aspect ratio

Aspect ratio is the ratio of the width of an image to its height.

If Maintain aspect ratio option checked, then the resampled image will have the same aspect ratio as original.  In this mode width and height of the resampled image automatically recalculated to maintain the aspect ratio of the original image.

If Maintain aspect ratio option switched off, then resampled image will be stretched to fit selected width and height.


Transform-Percent

Change image size in percents of original image dimensions. Enabled only if Maintain Aspect Ratio is cheked.


Transform_Flip
Transform-Flip

You can flip an image horizontally (left to right) or vertically (top to bottom).  This function produces a mirror image of the original image in the required direction.


Transform-Rotate

With rotate operation you can rotate a selected image between one and 360 degrees. The precision of the custom rotation is 0.1 degree.

During rotation the area around the modified image is filled using the current background color.

If the Shape - Alpha channel is selected, then it will rotate together with the image.


Common Processing

Common Processing tabs allows performing the image processing operations on original image before optimizing it.

Filters - the set of the filters that can be applied to image before optimization.

Adjust - used to tune image Brightness and Gamma settings.

Transform - used to Resamlpe , Rotate and Flip original image.

Shape Effect - used to define the different shape effects, like Feathering and 2D Edge.


2D Edge

Two Dimensional (2D) Edge effects allows creating different edges of the image to make it really look distinctive.

Effect parameters:

Softness -  smooth the elements of the edge effect.

Noisiness -  make the elements of the edge more or less random.

Dot size -  define the size of the edge element.

Width -  define the width of the edge.

You can select different Patterns to create Edge effect.


2D Soft
2D Softness

Softness parameter smoothes the elements of the edge effect.


2D Noise
2D Noisiness

Noisiness parameter defines how random the order of the elements of the edge.


2D Dot
2D Dot size

Dot size parameter defines the size of the edge element.


2D Width

Width parameter defines the width of the edge.


2D Pattern
2D Edge Pattern

Edge Pattern defines which elements will be used to create 2D edge effect. If Image type is selected, then you have to select the image file, which will define the effect element.

Web Image Guru installs the set of the shapes to the Resources\EdgeMap folder. You can also create and use your own patterns.


Shape - Trim shape

Trim shape checkbox define the mode, when optimized image dimensions will be defined by visible area of the image after applying the shape.


Shape Position

Coordinates that define shape area size and position. Shape area show to which part of the image the shape will be applied.


What's new in version 2.0

There are set of new features in Web Image Guru, version 2.0. Now you can:

•	 Resample (resize), rotate and flip original image before optimizing it.

•	 Apply new 2D edge shape effect to your image.

•	 Adjust program window size to optimize it for your screen resolution.

•	 Select between two different variants of transparency presentation.

•	 Sort colors in palette table with different sorting modes.

•	 Trim image to discard 100% transparent area and to leave only meaningful (opaque and semitransparent) areas in optimized image.

Web Image Guru, version 2.0 has:

•	 More user-friendly JPEG controls that lead to best optimization results.

•	 Improved shape positioning.

•	 Simplified image preview in Web browsers.

•	 Better integration with Adobe Image Styler.


Adobe ImageStyler

Installation for Adobe ImageStyler 1.0

In most cases Web Image Guru setup recognize installed Adobe Image Styler and installs automatically.

If you have a problem with setup, please check Adobe ImageStyler documentation about adding a browser or other application to the Preview In menu.

See also:

How to run?


Adobe ImageStyler run

- Run Adobe Image Styler.

- Web Image Guru will be available from menu File-Preview In-Web Image Guru.

Note, that to use Web Image Guru optimization features you should select in ImageStyler Export settings (menu File-Export Settings) PNG-TrueColor format. It is better to check Transparency and uncheck Make Page options.

If in Export settings selected Entire Composition or Trimmed Composition mode then single image will be optimized with Web Image Guru.

If in Export settings selected AutoSlice or AutoLayout mode then Web Image Guru will be run in batch mode and will optimize every slice in most suitable format. Note, that new HTML file with slicing information must be created. Web Image Guru will ask you about HTML file name and location after compressing first image.

Note, that it is only the way to create sliced image that consists of slices in different image formats.

See also:

How to install?


Marcomedia Fireworks

Installation for Macromedia Fireworks

- Install the Filter type plug-in to the Macromedia Fireworks \Settings\Xtras subfolder.

- Run Macromedia FireWorks.

- Web Image Guru will be available from menu Xtras-Web Image Guru.

Important! Macromedia Fireworks use obsolete version of MFC42.DLL. Web Image Guru can't be run with it. To avoid this problem remove MFC42.DLL from Macromedia Fireworks folder (usually c:\Program Files\Macromedia\Fireworks) or rename it. Macromedia Fireworks will be run normally because it will use updated version of this DLL which Web Image Guru install to the Windows System folder.

See also:

How to run?


Marcomedia Fireworks run

-	Run Macromedia Fireworks.

-	Web Image Guru will be available from menu Xtras-Web Image Guru.

If you will have problems running Web Image Guru, please read How to i nstall? topic.

See also:

How to i nstall?


Web Page Images optimization

With Web Image Guru and Image Navigator you can easy optimize all images linked to your Web Page in batch mode.

1.	Run Image Navigator.

2.	Find your HTML file.

3.	Click right mouse and select HTML Image optimizing menu item or File -HTML Image optimizing item from the main menu.

4.	Web Image Guru will be run in batch mode to optimize images linked to your page. If you will change the format of the image or image name then Web page source will be automatically updated.

5.	You can select which image formats must be optimized in Image Navigator options.


Image Transformation

Web Image Guru can transform original image before optimizing it. Image transformation operations include:

Resampling (resizing)

Rotating

Vertical and Horizontal flip