Is there any decent free software for zooming in on parts of pictures?

Airwolf1

I realise I could google this...but I wanted to know from people who may use the software and have your opinions of it.

Ideally it would be good if I could zoom in on a part of a picture and there wouldn't be an adverse effect on the quality of it.

Thanks

Sput2001

Do you just want to look at the zoomed in area, or do you want to crop it, or edit it in some other way?

If it's the latter then either Photoshop Elements or GIMP if you want a freebie.

The quality of the "zoomed" image will depend much more on the size and quality of the original picture than the software.

Airwolf1

I'd just want to look at the zoomed in area, but without the image getting distorted as happens. Thanks.

lazy_tiger

Just about any free pic viewer will do this.
Irfran view, Picassa.

Just open the program, press F1, search for zooming, read the Manual.

Fortyfoot

A very good free prog is IRFANVIEW, it does lots of things. I have been using it for some time now

Paul_Herring

If you're expecting a CSI-type zoom into a picture where you get no blockiness and can see extra detail that isn't in the original picture, then I'm afraid you will be sadly disappointed.

Conor_3

Airwolf1 wrote: »

I'd just want to look at the zoomed in area, but without the image getting distorted as happens. Thanks.

You can't unless it's a really high resolution image saved in an uncompressed file format. There will always be distortion that'll increase in severity with the level of zoom.

totalsolutions

Paint it's built in..........

jmc160

If you're running Vista, there's a magnifier built in. It's accessible through either the Ease of Access menu or can be configured onto one of your mouse buttons.

EDIT: I've just re-read your post and this probably isn't what you're looking for, but it's handy if you just want a quick zoom on something.

aliEnRIK

Paul_Herring wrote: »

If you're expecting a CSI-type zoom into a picture where you get no blockiness and can see extra detail that isn't in the original picture, then I'm afraid you will be sadly disappointed.

haha

:rotfl:

Sput2001

Photoshop can upscale photos using various resampling techniques (basically taking informed guesses as to what needs to be on the pixels it's adding), but its effectiveness is limited.