Preparing photo for Print

[Cody Covey]

So do you guys have any tips and tricks for preparing photo for print? Can you recommend any tutorials? I really suck (read new) at PP so not sure where to begin. Thanks guys!

[Roger Clark]

Cody,
I don't have any tricks, but here is what I do:

Interpolate to the size I want to print and set the ppi for the printer (default 300 ppi. Some printers can show finer detail than 300 ppi, so if I have the pixels, I'll go up to 600 ppi.

Sharpen as needed (unsharp mask or smart sharpen, or better yet true sharpening with Richardson-Lucy deconvolution).

Apply ICC profile for the printer and paper.

Send to the printer.

Roger

[Doug Schurman]

Question for you Roger on Interpolation.

Let's say at you desired printing size you original file is 140 ppi. I've read that Photoshop does a better job when you enlarge in 100% increments (maybe you can comment on that). What would you do, would you enlarge 200% to 420 PPI and leave it or save as 300ppi from there? Or is there some other way to accomplish this?

Thanks
Doug

[Roger Clark]

Hello Doug,

Personally, I'm not impressed by any of the interpolation algorithms I've seen in commercial image processing systems like photoshop. When upsampling around 2x or more, they produce jagged edges on diagonals. I've tried doing the upsampling in smaller steps, but it does not help. I figure I should write my own sometime. Having said that, I use photoshop to upsample to wherever needed then repair jagged edges by hand.

Roger

[Chris Korman]

If you are at all concerned about printing in a color managed way see here:

http://www.birdphotographers.net/forums/showthread.php/80710-Free-Tutorial-on-Colour-Management

And here:

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/videos/camera-print.shtml