Profile Resolution not confirmed

Hi,
I have read every thread I could find on the profile picture resolution topic,
it seems there is no real answer other than guessing.

To find out the exact interface resolution that we get in the end, I captured and cropped the interface while viewing an all-green picture in the profile.

I found the resolution was 178x133 pixels.
I saved an image out at 178x133 pixels (which SL brought in at 128x128 then squashed)
looked terrible, so then..
I then created a 178x133 pixel picture and scaled it in my image program to be 256x256 then uploaded. (which SL brought in at 256x256 then squashed). This looked really fuzzy also.

It seems the profile pics at 512x512 pixels appeared clearer than the smaller ones. But still no where near as clear as it should be after resizing in the image program manually. How are some of you doing it?

- Width (17: Let's use 256 for this dimension, the next larger power of 2.
- Height (133): You could use 256 for the height as well, but I found the less scaling the client needs to do, the sharper it looks. 128 and 133 is almost identical, not much scaling needed, just 5 pixel rows added, while scaling down from 256 to 133 will definitely blur the image. It will also load faster if it's smaller. Let's determine 256 x 128 as optimal size.

So, you need an image with an aspect ratio of 178 x 133, scaled and distorted to 256 x 128. But you need to stay larger than the end result in both directions, to avoid loss of details. You can scale down in Photoshop (and sharpen afterwards), but never scale up.

Here's how I'd do it in Photoshop: .

I made the image at double resolution 356x266, then scaled
to 256x128 and sharpened/uploaded. This method gets better result to what
I was previously trying, thanks.

It is still not a clear image however, I presume because of the 128->133 scaling.
I tried the same technique but squashing 356x266 -> 256/256 before sharpening/uploading but it didn't turn out as good.

I think the profile pic is more accurately 180 x 135, which also happens to be the magical 4:3 aspect ratio.

Don't worry about doing special scaling before you upload. If you upload a profile pic at 180 x 135 (or 360 x 270, or any sort of 4 x 3), it doesn't matter whether Second Life stretches or compresses a dimension to make it OpenGL compatible. If your upload is 4 x 3, and the profile pic box is 4 x 3, then the pic will be stretched to the appropriate dimensions despite how Second Life saves it as a texture.

Edit: If you upload it as a .tga (and not .jpg), you shouldn't get any sort of image quality loss between you uploading it and Second Life storing as a texture.

But I can't upload 4/3 or 360 x 270 because SL images come in at 128x256 or 256x256 or 128x512 at set resolutions. That is the problem I think we are discussing.

In relation to the .jpg/.tga they are both saved at high quality and look the same outside and inside SL.


EDIT: I'm going to try 4/3 as lots of 64 pixels, eg.. 192/256 if it lets me do it.
EDIT: no it brought it in at 256x128 and then scales the height upwards to get 133

heres a thread discussing this same topic
http://forums.secondcitizen.com/showthread.php?t=6982

Try 512x384

I find that 512x350 tends to work well. No exact science to my figures...just some playing around to find what looked good.