I was visitng a photo forum and a postr asked if he needed to worry about the dpi of his uploads to his gallery for printing purposes and the reply was just to upload all the native pixels and let us worry about the rest...DPI IS MEANINGLESS......
That really depends on if the client understands viewing distance and most do not....I have even had professional interior decorators, with fine art degrees none the less, that did not understand viewing distance.......so dpi or ppi (which is more accurrate for photographs and dpi is for printers) is not meaningless......in my way of thinking due to the many responses I have had over the years of wwhy does an enlargement of this picture not look as good as the 8 x 10 in your portfolio catalog......my answer was always to have the client step back a few feet and then view the enlargement and WOW it looks great....a billboard looks like crap up close, very grainy or pixelated now tht we;re in the digital age.......
So in many ways DPI is very meaningful.......so for my own peace of mind I do a couple of things while still in Photoshop.
I go to Image and then clik on image size in the dialouge box that appears I make usre that constrain proportions is ticked and nothing else....then I change my DPI to 300, this brings me very close to an 8 x 10 aspect ratio and now I can finish my work in photoshop ...... doing everything EXCEPT my final sharpening with unsharp mask......now I take that file into GENUINE FRACTALS and I upsize that photos to whatever size Iwant upt ot 30 x 40 inches (the largest size I currently sell since I am using 6 and 8 mp cameras right now).....then after uprezing the file..it is back to Photoshop for sharpening........
YES this makes for very large files sometimes but, it also gives me a 30 x 40 inch print that is at 8 x 10 quality....so needing to understand viewing distances is of no importance for my clients......there is no pixelation to worry about, is here is noiseware or noise ninja to the rescue........but I know that at 300dpi I am getting the best possible image from the file at the largest enlargement I want to take those files to.
When I upgrade to a Full Frame camera then I probably will be offering prints in the 60 X 80 or 120 by 160 inches aspect ratio (actually that is still 8x10 aspect ratio :-}} ).......
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Have a great day
1 comment:
You make a good point that DPI has a meaning --- IF (and only if - and even then an argument could be made that DPI doesn't matter*) you are going to print.
But if the file isn't going to print (or, I should say, if the file is being referenced in a purely digital form... such as image submission to a stock site or something) DPI doesn't make one iota of difference.
*because if you sent a 1200x1800 image set to 72dpi or 300dpi to a printer - and asked for a 4x6 print, it's going to look 100% identical.
Thought provoking, none-the-less.
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