Making images appear smaller while maintaining quality in java

Question

I was just wandering if an image(lets call it plyrSprite) can be made to look smaller with code. I have a 640x480 screen and plyrSprite is 50x140, the sprite dominates the screen but if i make it any smaller it will lose its quality. Any help appreciated.

Thanks

Answer 1

What you want to do is called decimating or downsampling the image. Google it! There are tradeoffs. Some algorithms require fewer CPU cycles. Some produce better results. No matter what, you must lose some quality Just think about what would happen if you downsampled it to a single pixel :-).