InDesign export 300dpi to 72dpi
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Hi! I am creating some social media graphics and I have some issues when exporting from InDesign. The project has 1 picture of 300dpi (dimensions 6000x4000) and some graphics on top. When I export it at 72dpi to fit the social platform requirements, the picture becomes slightly pixelated/blurred. Do you have any suggestions on what might be the issue?
Thank you!
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Your 6000 x 4000 pixel image is beig reduced to 1440 x 960 pixels—the down sample affects image detail
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Thanks Rob! And yes, that makes sense. It's just that I have done this with other pictures and that hasn't happened.
Could it be anything related to the edit of the picture/a preset added on Lightroom?
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Try exporting the page to PDF/X-4, and open the PDF at 72ppi and see if that makes a difference. The InDesign JPEG export doesn’t always do a good job with placed images.
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The ppi (dpi) is absolutely irrelevant. You need to look at the size in pixels NOT the ppi. Social media has no ppi needs: it could be 72, 300, 3000 or 12.
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Try exporting to PDF and rasterizing in Photoshop. As another user stated, PPI is irrelenant. All images on scren are 1 ppp; that is one pixel per pixel. When you rasterize just worr about using the correct image dimensions in pixels.
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Also the amount you have scaled the image on the InDesign page will affect the JPEG export pixel dimensions.
If you place your 300ppi, 6000px x 4000px image at 100%, its dimensions in Inches will be 20" x 13.333"—(6000/300 = 20, 4000/300 = 13.333):
The export to JPEG at 72ppi will have a pixel dimension of 1440 x 960—(20"x72 = 1440px, 13.333"x72=960)
If I scale the placed image down, the JPEG Export pixel dimensions will scale accordingly. The placed image scaled down to 25% has an output dimension of 5" x 3.33", so the export to JPEG at 72ppi produces an image that is only 360 x 240 pixels (5"x72=360, 3.33"x72=239.9)
So if I needed to export the scaled image for Instagram, where the recommended pixel dimensions are 1024 x1024, I would export the selected 5" image at 205ppi (1024/5"= 204.8)
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