What happend here? Please help

[mindchatter]

Long story short. Shooting a wedding on Saturday. Did an E-Shoot to obtain a portrait of the couple to print and mate for guest signatures. This wedding is for friends so no money is being exchanged, any money spent is out of pocket on my end. The picture in question was shot with a 40D in manual mode with highest quality raw and a prime 50mm 1.8 "nifty fifty" lens.
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here's the raw picture info straight from DPP:

File name
IMG_3811.CR2
Camera Model Name
Canon EOS 40D
Firmware
Firmware Version 1.0.8
Shooting Date/Time
8/30/2009 12:41:52
Tv(Shutter Speed)
1/100Sec.
Av(Aperture Value)
F22
Metering Modes
Evaluative metering
Exposure Compensation
0
ISO Speed
800
Lens
EF50mm f/1.8 II
Focal Length
50.0 mm
Image size
3888 x 2592
Image Quality
RAW
Flash
Off
White Balance
Auto
AF mode
One-Shot AF
Picture Style
Standard
Parameters
Tone Curve : Standard
Sharpness level : -
Pattern Sharpness : -
Contrast : 0
Sharpness : 4
Color saturation : 1
Color tone : 0
Highlight tone priority : No
Color matrix
-
Color Space
sRGB
File Size
12242 KB
Dust Delete Data
No
Drive Mode
Low-speed continuous shooting
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Here's my problem ->
The photo was blown up to 20x30 I believe.
The brides hand has "edges" running down it. More pronounced on the print.
My work flow-> DPP raw edit -> converted to Tiff -> Elements 7 for minor adjustments -> Noise ninja for a final touch. Could noise ninja have been the problem?
I just wanna know for future reference where I messed up? Thanks guys!

[krb]

It most likely happened during the "photo was blown up to 20x30" step. How was this done, specifically what was done to preserve the aspect ratio?

[mindchatter]

Well I left to Ritz Photo, a camera chain store around here. But I've used them in the past and never ran into this issue. I believe the ratio was not manipulated due to the end picture not actually being 20x30. We had to trim off excess borders?

[krb]

The reason I asked about the aspect ratio is because a poorly done change can sometimes cause that type of jagged edge.

Another possibility is that there was a mechanical problem with the printer itself. Maybe a misaligned print head or something?

I'm assuming that you don't see this defect when viewing the file on your monitor.

[joedlh]

I can see that the guy holding the print is intensely angry about your failing with the bride's hands. I would be surprised if anybody at the wedding walks up holding a magnifying glass and demands to know how you could show your face after producing such a shoddy piece of work.

It looks like a nice portrait to me. Honestly, I think you're being super-critical.

Technically, is the closeup taken from the print or your TIFF? I wonder why you shot it at ISO 800 and F/22. Even after Noise Ninja, you've got a fair amount of noise. Look at the bride's thumbnail.

You should also entertain the possibility that it's not the image processing but the print job. Was it done professionally or on a home printer?

[mindchatter]

It is visible on the tiff with extreme magnification. At about 1 1/2ft from the print it is visible...to me anyway... maybe because my eye's fixated with it? from about 3ft on, it looks great. The high iso was due to my own errors and not having my lighting prearranged. Unfortunately time was a big issue when we did the shoot. The bride is also 8 months preg and had an MD appointment right after the session. So I did what I could in camera to move things along. It was printed on a professional grade printer with no manipulation prior to sending the image to print "at least to my knowledge". P.S. that guy is me..lol.. I was just displaying the size of the image. My doctor tells me I'm not angry anymore = )

[badgerdid]

I have had this problem by over sharpening somewhere in the pp

[OdiN1701]

Problem is likely that you sharpened, and then had it enlarged. Sharpening should be the very last thing done before printing. Also noise ninja I have seen produce some artifacting, which again would be worsened by enlarging after noise ninja.

[H20boy]

noise ninja also has a sharpening affect built-in, that you can turn off (reduce to 0). Best to NN w/o any sharpening applied, then un-sharp mask after cleaned up. I bet that is what happened.

[mindchatter]

Umm, This is all great info