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ishfaqbaijoo
ishfaqbaijoo
Known Participant
September 15, 2017
Question

Image Enlarger

  • September 15, 2017
  • 4 replies
  • 1155 views

Hi,

I want to buy a software that make let me resize my pictures more professionally while getting better results in terms of quality and sharpening.

Any recommendations?

    This topic has been closed for replies.

    4 replies

    davidc1815
    davidc1815
    Legend
    September 15, 2017

    Notwithstanding the very expert advice already given here, if you want something third party to try, I like PhotoZoom Pro 7.

    David

    Derek Cross
    Community Expert
    Derek CrossCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    September 15, 2017

    There are a number of specialist applications that claim they do a better job of enlarging images than Photoshop, typically ON1 Resize 2017.6 Special Offer You'd need to test them to see if they do (some have trial versions).

    D Fosse
    Community Expert
    D FosseCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    September 15, 2017

    Yeah, and most of them come in a bottle labeled "snake oil" 

    The point I'm trying to make is that you usually don't need to enlarge. It doesn't do anything good. It just does something bad to the image.

    Let me tell you all something about "300 ppi", which some people think came down from the mountain on stone tablets. There's nothing special about that number.  It's just a theoretical upper limit, at which point there is no possible way to discern even traces of individual pixels when printed with a traditional 150 lpi screen. Note that this has nothing to do with sharpness, just individual pixels.

    Trevor.Dennis
    Community Expert
    Trevor.DennisCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    September 15, 2017

    https://forums.adobe.com/people/D+Fosse  wrote

    Yeah, and most of them come in a bottle labeled "snake oil" 

    Amen to that, although the slippery substance in question might be pronounced 'gulliboil'.

    We had an interesting discussion here a year or three back with Chris Cox and Jeff Schewe, in which they said that Photoshop's ​Preserve Details​ algorithm was as good or better than any of the third party alternatives.

    D Fosse
    Community Expert
    D FosseCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    September 15, 2017

    I agree. Enlarging never does any good. You'll always be better of using the file as is.

    A photograph always contains a noise structure, and this never enlarges well regardless of application or algorithm. Worst case you end up with an image that looks like it's covered with a worm-like structure. You've all seen it. Jpeg artifacts make it worse.

    People always overestimate the resolution needed for large scale printing. In most cases 75 - 100 ppi will look eminently sharp and crisp even when you walk right up to it. That's still 75 individual pixels to an inch of print, and you really have to rub your nose right into it to be able to make that out. And that's with the 20/20 vision of a fifteen-year old.

    The only reason to ever enlarge is to avoid visible pixels.

    If you have to enlarge, gun to your head, use Photoshop with "Bicubic Smoother" (which doesn't apply any sharpening) - and then carefully sharpen edges only afterwards. ACR is pretty good for this with "detail" at zero.

    T
    Test Screen Name
    Legend
    September 15, 2017

    If you want to reduce size, Photoshop is pretty good. If you want to increase it, give up.

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