Aspect ratio of jpgs

I have a ton of pics that I use for my screen saver. They are basically square and I would like to convert them to a wide screen laptop format. I think it is a 16:9 aspect ratio.
I am having zero luck finding a software that will do it. :cry I have thousands of pictures I'd like to change and convert for a nicer looking desktop pic or in my screensaver images.
I'd hate to lose them. Anyone have any ideas?
Floyd

 

AFAIK, the images can't really be "converted". If a nearly square image is stretched to fully fit a 16:9 screen, the image would be distorted.

The only thing I can think of is to crop the images, cutting off a certain percentage of the top and/or bottom so that the
result is the desired ratio.

Maybe someone knows of a way to do that to a collection of images in a batch process while retaining the originals.

 

You could use a tool like Paint.NET and set the canvas size to your screen size, set the background to black or another color and then add the pictures on top and centered over the background.

As mjnc mentioned, I can't think of a possible way to change the aspect ratio of a picture without distorting the pic. mjnc's idea would be great if the pictures are a nice high resolution...

 

Thanks for the suggestions guys. I guess in my gut I didn't think it was possible, but you guys have surprised me before.
Thanks anyway for taking the time to respond.
Floyd

 

It can be done, but you will lose part of the top and bottom of each image. Simply enlarge it until it is as wide as your screen. Anything that "overflows" at the top and bottom will simply not be seen. You could also crop the image so that its height matches the screen height.