Enlarging P30 Files or MF files in General. How much??

[Snook]

Doing some gallery prints and will be printing my P30 files around 40X 30 and some 40x60 inch to canvas prints.
Can any body recommend the best way or program to enlarge the images to be printed.
Also any body know if it is better to Start out with the image the size I want then manipulate it in Photoshop after I have enlarged?
I have Alien SKin Blow up as well as Genuine Fractals 5 which seems to be the best?
I am working on mac OSX 10.5.6 and Photoshop CS4 or CS3.

The images are going to be printed on an HP Z3100 by the way. Could I get away with blowing up by lowering the DPI or is that a general No No?
 



Thanks for any professional advice.

Snook

[rainer_v]

Doing some gallery prints and will be printing my P30 files around 40X 30 and some 40x60 inch to canvas prints.
Can any body recommend the best way or program to enlarge the images to be printed.
Also any body know if it is better to Start out with the image the size I want then manipulate it in Photoshop after I have enlarged?
I have Alien SKin Blow up as well as Genuine Fractals 5 which seems to be the best?
I am working on mac OSX 10.5.6 and Photoshop CS4 or CS3.

The images are going to be printed on an HP Z3100 by the way. Could I get away with blowing up by lowering the DPI or is that a general No No?
 



Thanks for any professional advice.

Snook

although i dont have a p30 the workflow it will not make a difference as i believe.....
i start with unsharpened files at native size. after editing in 16bit i convert to 8bit and add a noise ( e.g. 4% gaussian blur b+w) before upscaling.
now i upscale with photozoom 2.3 to the print size in 180/300 or 360 DPI,  and add again grain ( artificial detail 100% ) in photozoom and put "edge boost" on. i dont sharpen with usm or so.
photozoom does a fantastic job in upscaling, avoiding stairsteps and jaggies. btw. (the downscla algorythm seems to be pretty bad).
you shouldnt have any problem with 60inch.
not so good idea to start with already sharpened files, if i see the things right c1 always sharpens the p30 files with not a little amount, even if sharpening is set to 0. i dont know how to avoid and how to handle this for upscalings.

[Snook]

although i dont have a p30 the workflow it will not make a difference as i believe.....
i start with unsharpened files at native size. after editing in 16bit i convert to 8bit and add a noise ( e.g. 4% gaussian blur b+w) before upscaling.
now i upscale with photozoom 2.3 to the print size in 180/300 or 360 DPI,  and add again grain ( artificial detail 100% ) in photozoom and put "edge boost" on. i dont sharpen with usm or so.
photozoom does a fantastic job in upscaling, avoiding stairsteps and jaggies. btw. (the downscla algorythm seems to be pretty bad).
you shouldnt have any problem with 60inch.
not so good idea to start with already sharpened files, if i see the things right c1 always sharpens the p30 files with not a little amount, even if sharpening is set to 0. i dont know how to avoid and how to handle this for upscalings.

Thanks Rainer..
What artificial detail 100% are you referring to..
also you put 180/300 or 360. What do you print at 180?
Also with the grain and noise, Why do you do it after converting to 8 bit and why do you convert to 8 bit if I may ask?

Also for a printer like the HP is Adobe RGB which I usually always work in or would ProPhoto give better color range.
All new to the Printing.
The Printer said that giving him the files in 16 bit would render a better image.?

I really appreciate the advice.

Also Looking at my image at 100% in Photoshop after upscaling should give me an idea of the Sharpness or how the image should print sharpness wise at that same size as it will be?

Snook
 


Snook

[Anthony R]

View at Print size (View Menu)

For the size you need, Photoshop is fine. Bicubic smoother.

If you are concerned about sharpness, do a crop and print say an 11x14 at @ 100% of an area you may be concerned about and analyze that.

[RobertJ]

Snook, regarding "artifical detail," rainer is talking about the options in PhotoZoom Pro when you're upscaling.

PZ pro has an "Artificial detail" slider, along with strength and sensitivity settings for the S-Spline algorithm that's used in PZ pro to upscale (there's also USM options if you need it).

It's really an awesome program.  Better than Bicubic/Photoshop and Genuine Fractals.

However, I don't use PZ Pro to downscale.  Use Photoshop instead.

[rainer_v]

Thanks Rainer..
What artificial detail 100% are you referring to..
also you put 180/300 or 360. What do you print at 180?
Also with the grain and noise, Why do you do it after converting to 8 bit and why do you convert to 8 bit if I may ask?

Also for a printer like the HP is Adobe RGB which I usually always work in or would ProPhoto give better color range.
All new to the Printing.
The Printer said that giving him the files in 16 bit would render a better image.?

I really appreciate the advice.

Also Looking at my image at 100% in Photoshop after upscaling should give me an idea of the Sharpness or how the image should print sharpness wise at that same size as it will be?

Snook
 

Snook

T already explained the "artificial detail" slider i mean. it adds some fine grain, although very subtle. i often add also at the final stage some dxo grain to the image. goal of all this grain festival is to hide the smearing of the fine details which can appear if you enlarge very big. experiments can bring here very good results, which differ a lot. unfortunately this is very hard or impossible to judge at the monitor, you should make smatter test prints of this detail zones to judge the right amount of edge sharpness and grain. its not a little work.

i go in the final images often to 8bit because 8bits are enough if there is no further color or gradation editing needed.
in general i use for hiend prints on epson pronters 360dpi, but at very big sizes sometimes may appear problems. so is the new epson 11880 with epson printer driver not able to print sizes over app. 190 x 160cm,- he will make in this case a white stripe and go on behind this with the print.
obviously a bug. with 180dpi the visual difference is very very subtle compared to 360dpi, but the 11880 accepts than the double size because the file size is just half as big. and you will notice the differnece with a loupe..... hardly with the eyes ,- and this at sizes over 2 meter is really not a big deal. 300 dpi is afforded for many other printers than epson.
i add sometimes some small amount of noise in ps ( this described 4% gaussian blur ) to the image before upscaling and scale up with this noise in the image. reason is that this noise nearly dissappears in the upscaled image but helps to hide exactly the same fine detail regions which ends to give a smeared  look, the upscaled noise merges itself in some way in the detail ,- this smering i mean you can often see in grass or little stones or other repetitive but random and fine patterns.
only to add noise in the upscaled image may easily look artificial.

no idea about photo pro or adobe rgb. i normally use adobe rgb, or eci rgb.

[csp]

after testing some upscale tools, i use them regulary,  i settled with sizefixer it delivers more natural and better results than GF, photozoom....  the only drawback is it takes a lot of patience but the results are stunning.  i also recommend to go a little bigger in resolution than necessary and add some grain. not just simple noise realgrain does a good job and offers a lot of options to control the effect. i also recommend to do some test prints of portions of the image to see what sharpness and grain settings work best.

[Snook]

You guys are the best Thanks so much...
There is a lot to this printing stuff...:+}
The you have the whole Paper options.... :coffee:

I am working with a lady who is printing my stuff on a HP Z3100.. that is about the best I could find here in South America.
I have been trying some canvas papers. She has some Premiere and HP canvas papers.
So far the High Gram heavy canvas paper from HP themselves seems to give the best look. I thought the premiere would be better but the HP seems to have more depth to the images and not so flat.

Did not want to open another thread but do you guys have any good frame sites that deliver world wide or that are in the US?


THANK you all so much!

any other suggestions are always welcome.
Going to have to try this grain stuff. It makes sense. I use a little on girls skin when I have retouched them to much. It also seems to make the images less "Digital".

My images this time around are pretty tweaked out in Photoshop and look more like surrealistic paintings rather than photographs.

Snook

PS. I accidentally sent the girl a non resized image and she upsized it herself and I find the image looks jagged and over sharpened looking.
That is what brought up this subject.
I am planning on doing 40-50 40X60 inch gallery prints which with stretching and framing can start to get rather Big Budget...:+]

[Snook]

Rainer..
If you do not mind...
Can or should I dial down all the settings and then slowly bump them up.. ?
Also I am assuming I should be in S-Spline XL ? Right?
What kind of numbers should I be looking for more or less for just slight sharpening and "grain" with the artfical control.. I was using edge Boost of around 52.00 and Artificial of around 31.00.
Probably depends on every image being different, But I use some sharpen contrast mask that are more or less the same on every image so I thought some of these settings are similar?

Thank you for you time, I really appreciate it.
I do notice that the upsizing makes things a little smudgy, Is that why the grain will help cover that up making it look like grain from blowing up film in the old days??

Thanks a lot
Snook

[Don Libby]

Hi Snook

I’ve been very successful in making prints up to 30x60 and slightly larger from my P30+ images using CS3 and printing on Canvas using Epson 9800.  One of my more successful prints is “Desert View” in the South Rim Grand Canyon which was a two shot panorama merged then printed on canvas (gallery wrap) for a finished image of 30x60; this same image has been printed on paper at 20x40.  In either case there has been no loss of image whatsoever.  I always size an image to the size I’m printing (e.g., 34x64) to make sure it will take the size; once I’m comfortable with the image size and after I’m done the last of the PP that’s when I’ll apply any unsharpen mask.  (I used to do test prints of the image until I decided that I could trust my monitors which is not to say that’s always the best way to do things.  )

Like anything else you need a sharp image to start with and based on what I’ve seen here of your work you should have no problems with 40x60 or larger.  

BTW - I do my own stretching and 30x60 is a real treat (can take over an hour) I can only image 40x60 and larger.  If you do the stretching on your own I’d be interested in what you thought of it.

don

Edited:  I use Dick Blick  (www.dickblick.com) for my canvas frames; they have a good selection, good shipping, and better yet good wood.

[rainer_v]

snook,
this are the basic settings i start in photozoom:
[attachment=10843:pzoom_setting.jpg]

[ivan muller]

Hi Snook,

I have a z2100 44inch and I have regularly printed to 40x60 and larger on canvas. I must confess that I am not too technical and my med format camera is 22mp only. I use Q-image for fine prints(PC). It does the up sizing automatically, takes a long time though, and you can choose sharpness settings etc etc. I am really pleased with the results. do remember canvas is fairly forgiving. Also remember that you need about 7.5 cm border to stretch the canvas on a 4.5cm frame. My framer uses a frame with rounded edges on the outside. Looks very nice and has the added bonus of reducing the stress (of the canvas) and making it easier to align the edge of the image with the 'bend' My advise would be to do a small test with the various up sizing techniques above and see what works. My personal opinion is that with your size back up sizing wont be much of a headache.(if necessary at all) By the way my framer charges about 40usd equivalent for a square meter!  

Scott Kelby recommends photo shop, image size, at 360 dpi and bicubic sharper. Very easy and works well.

Good luck, Ivan

[Snook]

Hi Snook,

I have a z2100 44inch and I have regularly printed to 40x60 and larger on canvas. I must confess that I am not too technical and my med format camera is 22mp only. I use Q-image for fine prints(PC). It does the up sizing automatically, takes a long time though, and you can choose sharpness settings etc etc. I am really pleased with the results. do remember canvas is fairly forgiving. Also remember that you need about 7.5 cm border to stretch the canvas on a 4.5cm frame. My framer uses a frame with rounded edges on the outside. Looks very nice and has the added bonus of reducing the stress (of the canvas) and making it easier to align the edge of the image with the 'bend' My advise would be to do a small test with the various up sizing techniques above and see what works. My personal opinion is that with your size back up sizing wont be much of a headache.(if necessary at all) By the way my framer charges about 40usd equivalent for a square meter!  

Scott Kelby recommends photo shop, image size, at 360 dpi and bicubic sharper. Very easy and works well.

Good luck, Ivan

I am pretty amazed with just photoshop CS4 actually.
Just tried it last night and it seems actually "better" than anything. There is no smearing AT ALL? Just resizes the image really...?
Could this be? :+}
I just did a crewed test and will have to see what it prints like but on screen it looks better than anything at the moment? The others seem to smear the image slightly. The images I have to print have a lot of text (writing) on them  so you notice right away any smearing. Fortunately for me I am going for a more "painterly" look and the uprezing programs may "help".
But for a portrait I think Photoshop, atleast CS4 may be better??
Thanks all
Snook

[rainer_v]

I am pretty amazed with just photoshop CS4 actually.
Just tried it last night and it seems actually "better" than anything. There is no smearing AT ALL? Just resizes the image really...?
Could this be? :+}
I just did a crewed test and will have to see what it prints like but on screen it looks better than anything at the moment? The others seem to smear the image slightly. The images I have to print have a lot of text (writing) on them  so you notice right away any smearing. Fortunately for me I am going for a more "painterly" look and the uprezing programs may "help".
But for a portrait I think Photoshop, atleast CS4 may be better??
Thanks all
Snook

might be that you will see more difference if you go bigger. e.g diagobnal sharp lines easily become stairsteps if uprezzed in ps. photozoom dont show these at all.
simply unusable for architecture at least ....

[david o]

I gave photozoom a try on a Nikon d60 6MP image that I needed to print up to 20x32 and I am quite impress by the result.

[klane]

I wasnt really impressed by what I saw on the photozoom webpage.

Can someone post examples of photozoom vs bicubic sharper vs bicubic smoother?

I agree with Snook I think cs4 has improved since the previous versions, more noticeable on down scaling.