How many DPI do I need?

[Pic One]

Hi,

Why stop at 200 PPI? All it takes is to change the upsampling scale. Doesn't cost money, and gives better quality (assuming proper resampling and output sharpening).

I'm not myself familiar with printing on Canon printers, but I think he was referring to using the Canon plugin for printing out of eg. PS/LR, not only using the driver.. from a Northlight images review (and unlike the print driver for eg. my Epson 3880), the canon print plugin indeed seems to offer resampling method choices and sharpening.  Mind you, I couldn't comment on how well Canon's plugin works vs. eg. LR/PS etc..


from:  http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/reviews/printer/canon_ipf6450-pt1.html


Strange, I have also done such testing (as several others in this thead have also done), and usually the quality improved by using proper tools and technique. Sure, paying attention to achieve the best output quality is not always necessary for large volume printing operations, but why deliberately reduce quality? That would not be an operation who I would use/recommend for taking care of my output.

Again, why reduce the taste of the pudding, instead of even improving it?

Aim for low quality, and low quality is what you'll get. Comparing poor technique with other poor technique doesn't make sense. The thread is about good or even best practice.

Output sharpening after upsampling can make a significant visible difference to the quality of the output. To get the most of it, it helps to use proper technique all the way from capture to print. It won't save images of mediocre artistic quality, but it won't hurt them either.

Cheers,
Bart

[simplify]

It actually does cost money to uprez more than 200ppi.  It creates larger files that we then have to spool to the printer, and then have to store, we don't see a difference in upsampling more than this - and I do remember Michael Reichman also mentioned something about this in one of his videos.  I think he said if it was under 360 ppi he will uprez to 360 but that he didn't see a difference when uprezing to 720ppi (this is just from memory, I may be wrong)

When printing a high quality file I will always print at 300ppi or 600ppi.  However when you own a print shop, people send you 1mb jpegs that they want 30x40's from.  I guarantee that you will not see a difference if you uprez from 80ppi>200ppi compared to 80ppi>600ppi when you start with a crappy file.

My final point and my first point is to do testing and different ppi's/ different upsampling/ different sharpening amounts etc. if you are really concerned about pixel peeping. 

This is all my opinion, and based on my experience running the most successful print shop in my very large city.

Thanks,

[Pic One]

It actually does cost money to uprez more than 200ppi.  It creates larger files that we then have to spool to the printer, and then have to store, we don't see a difference in upsampling more than this - and I do remember Michael Reichman also mentioned something about this in one of his videos.  I think he said if it was under 360 ppi he will uprez to 360 but that he didn't see a difference when uprezing to 720ppi (this is just from memory, I may be wrong)

Realize though that there are a number of software options that people use (eg. LR or Qimage) that uprez before spooling to the print driver.. that you don't have to store.   Sounds like the IPF plugin does the same unless there's an option to "print to file" and save the resampled image.

When printing a high quality file I will always print at 300ppi or 600ppi.  However when you own a print shop, people send you 1mb jpegs that they want 30x40's from.  I guarantee that you will not see a difference if you uprez from 80ppi>200ppi compared to 80ppi>600ppi when you start with a crappy file.

My final point and my first point is to do testing and different ppi's/ different upsampling/ different sharpening amounts etc. if you are really concerned about pixel peeping. 

This is all my opinion, and based on my experience running the most successful print shop in my very large city.

Thanks,

[Tony Jay]

It actually does cost money to uprez more than 200ppi.  It creates larger files that we then have to spool to the printer, and then have to store, we don't see a difference in upsampling more than this - and I do remember Michael Reichman also mentioned something about this in one of his videos.  I think he said if it was under 360 ppi he will uprez to 360 but that he didn't see a difference when uprezing to 720ppi (this is just from memory, I may be wrong)

When printing a high quality file I will always print at 300ppi or 600ppi.  However when you own a print shop, people send you 1mb jpegs that they want 30x40's from.  I guarantee that you will not see a difference if you uprez from 80ppi>200ppi compared to 80ppi>600ppi when you start with a crappy file.

My final point and my first point is to do testing and different ppi's/ different upsampling/ different sharpening amounts etc. if you are really concerned about pixel peeping. 

This is all my opinion, and based on my experience running the most successful print shop in my very large city.

Thanks,

Upsampling in Lightroom does not create a larger file for storage unless you are exporting such a file.
Merely printing an uprezzed print from the Print module makes nil difference - nada.
As for more data being spooled to the printer - who cares.

With regard to uprezzing to 720ppi (or 600ppi if one uses Canon) if the original resolution (for size of print) was greater than 360ppi (300ppi for Canon), yes, do the experiment and see.
I agree entirely with the comment that one cannot make a silk purse from a sow's ear - if the original file is rubbish and too small uprezzing only makes it worse.

Tony Jay

[Schewe]

I agree entirely with the comment that one cannot make a silk purse from a sow's ear

Actually you can...Arthur D. Little, Inc., of Cambridge, Mass. did so for promotion...read: Report: "On the Making of Silk Purses from Sows' Ears," 1921

They have one in a museum at MIT.

Now, I'm not saying it's practical and I can't say the purse looks very good...but one can make a silk purse from a bunch of sow's ears.

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

When printing a high quality file I will always print at 300ppi or 600ppi.

Okay.

However when you own a print shop, people send you 1mb jpegs that they want 30x40's from.  I guarantee that you will not see a difference if you uprez from 80ppi>200ppi compared to 80ppi>600ppi when you start with a crappy file.

Okay, while I understand from a volume and little intervention standpoint, I still disagree from a quality standpoint.

Attached, a screen grab from Photoshop with a small file (also attached) upsampled from 80 to 200 PPI, and one copy upsampled from 80 to 600 PPI. They were then both downsampled on screen by Photoshop to simulated an output size of 300PPI, and placed side-by-side for comparison.

The smaller version was upsampled with biinear resampling (as is common for printer drivers) and then deconvolution sharpened with FocusMagic (which is much better quality than built-in USM based sharpening), and the larger version was upsampled with PhotoZoom Pro and only sharpened with that application's built-in USM sharpening (to minimize the number of manual processing steps for efficiency).

IMHO, even a blind bat would be able to see the difference at simulated identical output size (on a low resolution monitor display). Of course, if one doesn't have material to compare against, both would be usable, but to guarantee that there will be no visible difference is 'misrepresenting' what is possible. And that is even without specific output sharpening for a given medium or tonal adjustments, because that would take more time than one may want to invest in a low cost high volume workflow (although a lot can be automated).

What may also be obvious is that with bilinear upsampling, despite the subsequent deconvolution sharpening, the overall image looks more dull, which is caused by the resampling algorithm itself (bi-linear uses simple averaging between pixels to create new pixels, which virtually always reduces contrast) and the lower resolution at which the output sharpening took place. So even the choice of upsampling algorithm in printer drivers (if a choice is given), will already pay-off in better output quality.

Cheers,
Bart

[summit68]

Anybody ever do similar testing with Imageprint, or happen to know how Imageprint interpolates? I've always been impressed with their output, no matter the resolution I send, but have never done testing.

[Tony Jay]

Actually you can...Arthur D. Little, Inc., of Cambridge, Mass. did so for promotion...read: Report: "On the Making of Silk Purses from Sows' Ears," 1921

They have one in a museum at MIT.

Now, I'm not saying it's practical and I can't say the purse looks very good...but one can make a silk purse from a bunch of sow's ears.

Thank you Jeff - really perked up my day reading this!

Tony Jay

[alfin]

Anybody ever do similar testing with Imageprint, or happen to know how Imageprint interpolates? I've always been impressed with their output, no matter the resolution I send, but have never done testing.

I have version 8 and it does bicubic interpolation up to 360 ppi.

[pw-pix]

Prepare your file to suit the output device.
As people have already noted, Epson printers work well with 360 or 720 ppi files.
I commonly have prints made on a Durst Lambda and it needs 200 or 400 ppi files.
Find out what works well for your intended output device and prepare your files accordingly.