Photo lab(?) print

[satnitefever]

Well today I have picked up my first printed G3 photo, I was abit dissatisfied.

Firstly, the photo turns out great (if you look from a distance) but in close-up, you can see obvious pixels which really distracted the photo.

The only thing I adjusted is auto color/contrast etc. and unsharp masks in photoshop.

I am wondering if this was actually caused by .jpg artifacts or because of the sharpening process in photoshop.

Thanks =)

( http://images.deviantart.com/large/screenshot/windows/Poster.jpg ) - I think it's abit too hard to see.

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Which also reminded me, what's the difference between printing in 300 dpi or 180 dpi? Will the photo become smaller, or bigger?

[Switch]

all print media has to be at least 300 DPI

did you print it out at a DPI that is less than that? if so that is why it looks grainy, bad, blurred, distorted etc..

maybe try without the unsharp filter in photoshop?

what resolution did you take the picture at also?

and the last thing i can think of is.. it looks like it is a fairly big poster print out, did you do this? or did you take it to a print/photocopy place?

could of been the machine that did it

it is a beautiful picture though, really,
is it NYC?

[satnitefever]

No it was taken here in Hong Kong.

Thanks for your tips, the photo lab printed it off at 8" X 10" at 180 dpi, I'll ask for 300 dpi next time.

Thanks for the tips Switch =)

[PacAce]

satnitefever wrote:
No it was taken here in Hong Kong.

Thanks for your tips, the photo lab printed it off at 8" X 10" at 180 dpi, I'll ask for 300 dpi next time.

Thanks for the tips Switch =)

With everything else being the same, printing at 300 dpi instead of 180 dpi is just going to make the print smaller. To keep the print size the same (8x10) with the increased dpi, you'll have to make sure that the file itself is increased in size in terms of pixels.

All my prints are at max resolution and my 8x10's have come out very well without any type of artifacts showing.

Another thing you might want to check is the compression level you are using when you save the image after editing. I always save using at least the max setting (10 in photoshop).

[ryuwulf]

Hello,

In the G3 is there any way to set the dpi? when import into photoshop i noticed it says 72 dpi. Can i change that?

thanks

[PFlor]

satnitefever wrote:
Thanks for your tips, the photo lab printed it off at 8" X 10" at 180 dpi, I'll ask for 300 dpi next time.


Given the G3's native resolution you should be able to print at 213dpi on an 8" x 10" - unless you cropped out some parts of the image, which could explain why the photolab printed at 180dpi. To get a 300dpi print at that size you would have to upsample the image which would cause some degradation.

[marcel wouters]

For a photo lab there is no direct relation between photo size and DPI!
They print the requested size from your materials!
To get enough quality and usually they give you a minimum and maximum pixels size for each standard photo size.
The minimum is to garantee a minimum printed quality.
The maximum is to keep your image untouched.
I think that actually there is no photo lab printing at 300dpi, the fuji frontier (one of the best lab printer) print around 250 dpi (you could find some forums about that).
If the image is over the maximum the photo lab software must modify your image (same as in PS modify the resolution keeping the size), you easely understand thats it's better to modify the resolution yourself (except i you don't own a good imaging software).
In the 8"X10" case an uncropped image should be about 210dpi,you could try to oversample to the maximum resolution allowed by your photo lab.
They are jpeg artefacts in the upper part of your image (well defined blocks of same color) but this is only a 72 dpi resolution image?

[BartS]

marcel wouters wrote:
....
I think that actually there is no photo lab printing at 300dpi, the fuji frontier (one of the best lab printer) print around 250 dpi (you could find some forums about that).
.....

I have to disagree with that... The Fuji Frontier's native resolution is 300dpi. (Wether it can truely resolve that is something else).
I resample my final files at 300dpi and have them printed with the "no resize" option. In my experience this gives the sharpest results as there is no up/downsampling done by the Frontier. But it's only a very small difference compared with the usual "fit in" or "fill in" option (assuming the file is near 300dpi resolution).

[marcel wouters]

Barts,
Yes some Fuji prints to 305 dpi, they are a large variety of fuji printer in the shops. I just want to emphasize that generally a definition of 250 is sufficient and match the maximum pixel size accepted by almost all (non pro) shops. I agree with you that the best thing to do is to ask the shop the greater native resolution.
Now out of subject i have some question!
Do you use jpeg or tiff file?
Do you use another profile than sRGB?
Is there a big difference between mate and glossy paper?

[saqib]

hey man that's a really nice shot - any chance of emailing me it so i can print one for myself?

thanks :)

[satnitefever]

saqib wrote:
hey man that's a really nice shot - any chance of emailing me it so i can print one for myself?

thanks :)

Sure ! I'll be glad to, what's your email?