You can set up your rulers for pixels instead of inches. You should be able to eyeball crop it to within 10 pixels or so and then I would use the image resizing tool and auto crop the small edges around whatever I am trying to capture.

@ bodyhead – thanks that sounds like a good approach.

it would be nice if they let you adjust the crop tool with numerical values.

The trick is ensuring that the selected area you want meets the minimum size requirement you gave. That is, you’re not selecting a 50×80 area in the first place. If you do, then you’ll have to enlarge the result… and that just looks crappy.

So, for sanity’s sake, let’s assume your selected area is bigger than 100×130 pixels.

1. Make sure the Info palette is visible
2. Select the area you want ensuring the “W:” and “H:” attributes are >= the desired size. (If it’s already 100×130, well that’s a bonus!) Allow some space to exist around your perfect selection… might need it later.
3. Click the Image menu, and select Crop.

Now you need to shrink it down.

4. Click the Image menu, select Image Size…
5. Enter the value size you want in pixels. Ensure the “Constrain Proportions” checkbox is enabled.

And here’s where it gets a little tricky. You want to constrain the proportions so that the final image isn’t squished. But it’s likely that your selection isn’t proportional to the desired size.

So, plug in either Width or Height and, depending on which you tried, keep the value that allows your proportions to fit in. Like, if you plug in 100 for Width, then Height is auto-filled with another value, like 150, then that’s what you want to keep (150 > 130).

Here’s where the extra space from #2 comes into play.

6. You’ll want to recrop the image again. This time to get the perfect size, cropping off the extra Height (from my example in #4). Watch the Info palette to ensure you get the right dimensions.

—

That’s a really simple and rough example. In reality, you’ll need to experiment a little bit on guessing at the proportions. So you might try it a couple of different ways, playing with selected area.

I’m also stuck in an older Photoshop… so if anyone can explain a new fangled approach, that’d probably be good for us all.

@ robmandu – thanks for your help to. I had not thought of using the selection tool in that capacity as well. I appreciate your time!

Sorry for the unrelated post, but don’t you think the guy in the ad to the right looks a little like our fellow flutherer lefteh?

Ok, I figured this out. If I have my rulers set to pixels and select my crop tool. (this is in PS CS3) I can make a crop box then move the sides and read the pixels in the info pallet. Then, once it is set, I can move the box around in the right proportion.

Thanks for your help all. We came up with 3 great solutions!

When I do web work I always keep my rules set to pixels. It just makes things easier.

Edit > Preferences > Units and Rulers > Units > (Change to pixels) > OK.

Select the Crop tool. At the top of the screen, the crop tool menu will appear. Type in “130 px” in the Width entry box. Type in “100 px” in the Height entry box. Type “72” in the Resolution entry box, at pixels/inch.

Crop to size.

Voila.

actually, changing the units does nothing but allow you to check your work. I like to check my work.

That’s better then any of us. Got to give you props for doing it right Knotmyday.

Aw shucks…

Hey knotmyday. I did what you said but at what point should the cropping area appear to allow me to postition it?

Once you have the select tool open, you should be able to slide it (move it) around and manipulating the size in the top bar should make the selection size what you want it to be.

If you can’t for whatever reason, you may need to get on the hand ‘move’ tool to move the selection area. I think that depending on how you have it set, it might actually move part of your image unless you’re on an empty layer.

so it is the select tool or the crop tool should use? Sorry about being thick on this.

What you would do is use the select tool first and then there should be a ‘crop to selection’ option. I can’t remember exactly where it is because I’m at work but that should get you moving.

I think it’s in a menu (maybe image). Maybe there’s a selection menu. I can’t remember.

@Bri_L… Click on the border of the Tools palette to make it “active”... then hit the letter C. That should select the Crop tool for you.

When you do that, you should see the Width and Height parameter fields that knotmyday mentioned appear just below the File, Edit, Image, etc. menus.

I think you’re asking how to open the Crop bounding box on the image? Position the Crop cursor over the part of the image that you want to crop, left-click (if you’re on PC, on Mac I think you just click) hold, and drag. The bounding box can then be re-sized by clicking and dragging the corners. All parameters will adjust automatically.

Hope that’s what you were asking, sorry, I don’t Fluther nights or weekends.

No worries. You both just answered my question. Thanks for your patients guys. As usual I was my own worst enemy. I was making this way more complicated on myself than it needed to be.

Jeepers, how do I get my pant on in the morning.. . . . . . wait. . I’ll be right back.

You could set the canvas size to what you want then jus the move tool to position the image to how you want it.

@ justin – wow, I thought it would crop the image? Thanks much!

with Crop tool, you can also rotate the cropping area at the same time. Just click right outside of one of the corner points to activate the rotation handle.