Copusmaximus wrote:
> Could someone please tell me the best way to resize from 4048X3040
> to 800X600...in cs2..should i step it & if so how many and what
> settings bicubic/bicubic sharper or other..is there any benefit in
> stepping it gradually..

With CS and CS2 stairstepping is not advised by most adobe people:

Katrin on Bicubic in CS:

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1006&message=9027692
Chris Cox adobe engineer
http://www.adobeforums.com/cgi-bin/webx?7@86.GhAVcbF5fiF.0@.2cce6a14/1
Thomas Knoll on resizing
http://www.adobeforums.com/cgi-bin/webx?14@621.yJcOeBgBhaK.1272867@.3bba34a3/3
Chris Cox
http://www.adobeforums.com/cgi-bin/webx?14@621.YR1uenv4m80.32@.3bba7e3b/5

On using bicubic or bicubic sharper for downsizing, views vary. Some like bicubic sharper - but see recent thread - read the followup posts:

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1006&message=14720437

Tim Grey who publishes a free email list and now an MS employee, suggests using Bicubic Smoother for very large upsizing and uses bicubic over bicubic sharper for downsizing, preferring to do his own sharpening after the downsize and says bicubic sharper can be too agressive on the sharp side.
And does all resizing in a single step whether he's using bicubic or bicubic smoother/sharper.

The adobe people, it seems, go with the newer smoother/sharper algorythms.

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Kent

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