printing large

[Chad Howard]

I'm about to print a few of my pictures as 16X20 or bigger and need some advice on getting the best quality. Honestly, I find the topic confusing.

1) do I need to resize the file within photoshop first? I was thinking of using flickr or mpix for printing the files. In the past, I just upload the default size from my camera. I always take the largest and best resolution.

2) I take pics in raw and then convert to jpg generally. To print large, is it okay to print jpg? Most of the online places only take jpg.

3) Lastly, just a point of curiousity... I have a D70. On average, what would you expect regarding file size of the highest quality jpg?

By the way, I did search on this topic and couldn't find much. However, I might not have put in the best search terms. If you've seen another thread, please refer.

Thanks!!!

[Norm in Fujino]

One word: If you were printing yourself I'd say Qimage (assuming you work on a PC). Don't resize or resample the files in photoshop, just save them at full resolution and use Qimage for printing. If you're sending them out, I'd recommend Tiff if the places will accept them.

[Chad Howard]

Thanks for your comments. I've also seen comments on "multiple 10% bicubic upresing." Is that something you know about?

[Prospero]

Thanks for your comments. I've also seen comments on "multiple 10% bicubic upresing." Is that something you know about?

If I am correct, this technique is often used to supersize your images so that you get more pixel and you can use the picture for larger prints. Basically, the thing you do is enlarge the picture with 10% using the bicubic resampler. You repeat that progress several times, so that in the end you have a picture of, say, double the size as the original. I have tried this technique and I must say, the result was slightly better than when doing it all in one step. However, you do not get any extra detail, because the pixels are only added by interpolation. Therefore, I would say that it will not get you any better prints.

[wutske]

2) This won't be a problem if you set image quality high (over 90%, 100% is best, but creates huge files).

3) Average size should be 2,9Mb (got that from this review: http://www.dcresource.com/reviews/nikon/d70-review/)