Question a Day | The Right Resolution
Q: Thanks for this blog! I’m enjoying following along. My question is that I want to blow up some of my photos to an 8x10/11x14 or include them in photo books, but I get warnings that my resolution is too low. What does this mean, and how can I fix it in future?
Thanks in advance,
Melanie (via email)
A: Great question, thanks!
Image resolution discusses how many pixels (little dots) make up an image. A common reference of measure is DPI (dots per inch) which is exactly as it sounds, the number of little colour dots per inch in the photo.
The more dots, the clearer the photo (to a degree). For example, an image on the web requires only 72-100 DPI to be seen clearly whereas an image to print will require a minimum of 300 DPI.
If you nip a picture off a friend’s Facebook album and try to print it, it will only be 72 DPI and not print clearly. And, if your camera has only been capturing low-quality JPEGs, they won’t print clearly either, beyond a wallet size or maybe a 3x5.
When taking pictures, you want to accommodate the best quality your camera, memory card and storage (computer’s hard drive, external hard drive, burned CDs or DVDs, etc.) can take on.
I debated RAW vs. JPEG here. For now, we’ll focus on JPEG for both DSLR and point-and-shoot. On many cameras, you can choose the quality of image within the menu settings.
You want to always opt for a high quality JPEG. Sure you’ll have room for 300 pictures on your memory card vs. the 1,000 for a medium or low quality JPEG, but you’ll gain the flexibility of blowing that image up as large as you like.
Hope that helps!
Tamara
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