Printed pics look grainy...help!

Greetings,

I am new to this forum, so sorry if this has been discussed.

I'm using Photoshop 6, and Sony Mavica CD300 camera, and an HP 932c inkjet printer.

I just tried to print a few pictures, and from a small distance, they look great, but up close, I they look "grainy," almost like when I print pictures from my video camera.

How can I get them to look perfect?

Do they look grainy because I resized them in Photoshop?

Thanks for any advice!

Rob

it might be because of what you have done on photoshop. and this can be found out easily. if they look grainy in photoshop on your computer then they will print grainy. but if they only print grainy and don't look as good as in photoshop it is probably your printer. im just guessing here because im not a expert on the sony mavica but i think if the picture you take looks fine in photoshop and not grainy then in should print non-grainy.

The pictures look great in Photoshop, but so/so on photo paper.

I tried printing a picture on my laser printer that I didn't resize. It looks much better than the ones I printed on my ink jet. (Although it is b&w)

Any suggestions? Does resizing a pic cause it to print differently?

Thanks,

Rob

open photoshop, open the image file from the digital camera, then goto image> Image Size then go down to the bottom of that window and uncheck resample image, then mess around with image size settings, 300dpi is normal for print, thats why the images taken with a digital camera are so huge Ex. 1280x1024 and up... unfortunately the only way to get the dpi high enough is to reduce the image dimensions.. hope this isn't written to confusingly, and hope this helps..


Snore

just out of curiosity, what resolution does your camera shoot?


my olympus camedia d-450 takes 1280x960 pics at 72dpi, and after being resized for print they generally are about 4.5 to 5 inches wide on paper.


Snore

I just opened a picture, and when I resized it, it said 72 pixels per inch at the bottom. Should this be 300? Do you think this was the cause of the problem?
Thanks!!!

Rob

Oh yeah. 72 dpi is fine when looking at it on a computer, but when you print, it has to be at least 300.

Settings they use at work:

600 dpi
CKMY Color
Save as .TIFF
(It'll be like a 40MB file, but it's worth it when you print it)

If you are not doing any type of curves, levels or unsharpmask on the photo before printing it, I suggest you do. If it looks good now, it will look amazing when you play with it a bit. (if you need some tips on those, let me know)

Now, to help with your question, check out this link: http://www.luminous-landscape.com/monitor_profiling.htm

The guy is very knowledgeable about digital images. The profiling is a great section and may take care of your problems if you cannot solve them in a simpler way.

Cal

I'm still a little confused...

If I set the PPI to 300, then the image size shrinks to around 6 inches or so. Then, should I hit "Print Options" and select..."Fit to Media?"

Thanks in advance...I hate wasting EXPENSIVE ink trying to figure this stuff out.

Rob