Digital images of fired glazes may be obtained in one of two ways: scanning a photograph of the fired glaze photographing the fired glaze with a digital camera. Matrix will only accept images with a '.jpg' file extensions.

JPG files

If you have taken a picture of a glaze with a digital camera then the file will most likely be save in the JPG format.

If you are scanning your glaze from a photograph then you should choose the JPG file format option for saving the digital image.

Photographing a Glaze

When photographing a glaze for the purpose of eventually linking it to a Matrix recipe file you should remember that what is needed is an image which will convey as much information about the glaze as possible.

In order that glaze picture files do not take up too much disc space they must be reasonably small. When displayed on screen they may not be any larger than a matchbox. A photograph of a pot will therefore not give very much information about the glaze.

When taking a photograph of a glaze get as close as possible to the surface and try to arrange the lighting so that the surface texture is clearly visible.

Manipulating the Quality of Digital Image

Whichever method is used it is sometimes necessary to adjust the digital image to obtain the best match for the original glaze.

This is best done by loading the image into software such as Photoshop where you may alter the colour balances and contrast and can sharpen the image. If you have taken a well lit image this may not be necessary.

Adjusting the Digital Image Size

If you have unlimited disc space you could use images with high resolutions thus giving your glaze pictures great clarity and detail even when they are enlarged in Matrix's glaze picture window. Unfortunately most of us have computer systems that do not have the disc space for storing hundreds of large picture files.

Digital cameras usually create JPG files of around 50 kilobytes. When these are loaded into software such as Photoshop they are expanded to a full 900 kilobytes. The pixels dimensions of these images is around 640 wide by 480 high.

To reduce the size of your digital glaze image (and thus the storage space needed on disk) :

• load the image into software such as Photoshop and
• adjust the displayed image size down to around 50 kilobytes. The pixel dimensions of a JPG image of this size is around 150 wide by 113 high.
• save your image anywhere in your system making sure that you choose the .JPG file extension. When saved to disk as a JPG file it's size will be around 7 - 10 kilobytes. This sized image gives good detail when displayed in Matrix.
• You do not need to save the initial glaze picture in your Matrix folder. When Matrix attaches an image to a recipe it will place a copy of that image in the same folder as the recipe file.

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