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Participant
August 30, 2012
Answered

Photos blurry in InDesign

  • August 30, 2012
  • 10 replies
  • 217771 views

Hello,

I am new to Indesign and trying to create a documents with a few photos in them.  When I photoshop my image in photoshop the image will look fine but when i place it in Indesign it is blurry and choppy. I have checked my setting and everything is set to high quality.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

Correct answer DMS Foto Dude

The problem MDoudna86 had is with the view setiing, not with the image itself. If you experience this problem in InDesign go to the View Menu>Display Performance and select Typical Display or High Quality Display. This should resolve the issue.

10 replies

Participant
July 28, 2021

Hi all, 

 

Some really useful tips on this thread. I have also tried everything suggested expect from changing the pixels as I do not know how to do this. My blurry images currently have an actual PPI of 96 and effective PPI of 73 x 95. 

 

Can someone please help me on how I change this on the image itself if that is what is needed? And what I should change it to?

 

Thank you

Participant
February 1, 2021

I tried this on my software and my image was still blurry. Any other suggestions?

 

Derek Cross
Community Expert
Community Expert
February 1, 2021

I haven't read through this thread, so forgive repetition.

Some thoughts to check:

1) Do you have a retina (high definition) screen?

2) What is the effective resolution PPI of your image(s)?

3) Are you viewing images using High Quality Display under Diplay Performance?

4) Are your images Linked?

 

rjudge11110000
Participant
July 5, 2018

DMSPhotoDude…..this helped resolve my issue right away.

Inspiring
June 27, 2018

Does anyone else see that the 'Correct Answer' to the initial question in this thread doesn't actually answer it, but gives an answer to do something the person explicitly said they have tried?

If there are no moderators to correct this, I might create a new thread to get more responses.

BobLevine
Community Expert
Community Expert
June 27, 2018

The problem is that you hijacked a 6 year old thread and should have started a new on at that time.

I'll branch this off to a new one now.

BobLevine
Community Expert
Community Expert
June 27, 2018

Well that didn't work too well. Only got some of the posts.

You may be better off trying a new thread.

Photos blurry in InDesign (BRANCHED)

johndglobe
Participant
June 26, 2018

When I export to an interactive PDF, Ctrl+E.  There is a setting EXPORT to INTERACTIVE PDF>COMPRESSION, it appears Indesign automatically compresses any JPEG in the file.  By changing this setting to High and increasing the ppi, I resolved my blurry photo's.  I am not a great user of Indesign, just trying to help out some other new users as well.

Inspiring
June 27, 2018

@johndglobe Thank you.  That is a very important thing to know.  Knowing where the export setting are for image quality have been critical to being able to manage export quality and file size.

Have you any ideas as to why the display of the graphics within InDesign might be blurry?  Keep in mind the solutions already suggested and tried above.

jean-michaelt81400308
Participant
February 1, 2017

Hi,

I'm having this insane blurry issues when high-res when I create an interactive PDF out of indesign. It continually happens and always happens after I've finished creating a document and am trying to submit it. The blurriness is like a virus that just comes and goes when it pleases.

I have DISPLAY PERFORMANCE > HIGH QUALITY - checked and under PREFERENCES > DISPLAY PERFORMANCE > I have "preserve Object-Level Display Settings" NOT checked and I have DEFAULT VIEW "High Quality"

My images are always a larger pixel count, then the bounding box I place them in, and then I check fit content proportionally.

I have NO IDEA why my page counter logo will not become high res.

The EFFECTIVE PPI is 581 // ACTUAL PPI is 72 - WHY WON'T it become high res, the images is 500 x 220 and the image box I've placed it in can't be more than 100 x 50 pixels.

It always looks fine in the document, and then the export is blurry.

Please advise anyone.

yu.ri.et
Participant
September 30, 2017

Same issue here. I wonder if yours got solved?

Participant
November 25, 2015

I'm having a similar issue.  Saving things at 300ppi in PS, then when placing in ID they're jagged.  Displaying at high quality doesn't fix it.  I've tried saving different ways, uploading to the CC library and dragging in, nothing seems to help so far.  On one of my images, I have an 'Actual PPI' of 72 and an 'Effective PPI' of 983 somehow.  My other image has an actual of 300 and effective of 304.  Ugh, why is this so confusing.  I'm new to ID as well, if you couldn't tell.

Peter Spier
Community Expert
Community Expert
November 25, 2015

Is Object Level Dispaly enabled? If it is, have you  right-clicked the images and checked to see they are set to High Quality Display?

What version of InDesign, OS and display resolution do you have?

Participant
November 25, 2015

It's not enabled.  I have InDesign CC, and it looks like I haven't updated it lately, so I'll do that first.  I was using the 2014 version.  I'm on Mac OS X Yosemite (10.10.5) and my resolution is 2560 x 1440.

Participant
October 13, 2015

I found that clicking each image and going to Object > Display Performance > High Quality Display fixed the issue for me. Seems to be the easiest way!!

Peter Spier
Community Expert
Community Expert
October 13, 2015

Faster to go to the prefs and disable object level display....

DMS Foto Dude
DMS Foto DudeCorrect answer
Participant
January 8, 2015

The problem MDoudna86 had is with the view setiing, not with the image itself. If you experience this problem in InDesign go to the View Menu>Display Performance and select Typical Display or High Quality Display. This should resolve the issue.

inderevery
Participant
January 19, 2015

it works! faced similar problems as MDoudna86 and your method helps!

DMS Foto Dude
Participant
January 20, 2015

Great!

Peter Spier
Community Expert
Community Expert
August 30, 2012

Select the photo in ID, then open the Info panel or the Links panel and check the value for "effective ppi." What does it say?

MDoudna86Author
Participant
August 30, 2012

It says 89  x126... thanks for responding!

Peter Spier
Community Expert
Community Expert
August 30, 2012

89 x 126 means you scaled it unevenly, and 89 is a pretty low resolution, so it's very likely the source of the problem. Your pixels are being rendered large enough to pick them out with the naked eye.

In photoshop youare viewing the actual image pixels, and waht you see on screen is not affected by the resolution you choose to save at as long as you don't resample. In ID you are looking at those same pixels (well, a screen preview of the pixels, really), but now you've defined a physical size for the image, and the larger you make the image the bigger the pixles must be rendered, like blowing up a balloon with printing on it. No new pixels are added, they just get expanded or compressed as you scale.