Scaling up images for print

Question

Ok, this is a complicated question (well maybe just to me). Here goes. So I make digital art and scale up the size a bit to make prints from my website. When I take a , say , 3000x3000 px image and make it much larger for print, it gets super pixelated. THAT I GET. The original needs to have more pixels for larger prints. Here is my curiosity. I took that original 3000x3000 px image and just put it up on my laptop screen, then plugged it into my 55" tv. There it was, my image from my computer, blown WAY larger then when I tried earlier (and it was pixelated), but looked PERFECT. Is there some strange effect going on when you see your image blown up like that simply through the hdmi cable from my computer to tv? Because why can't I blow it up like that on photoshop and have it look so great at such a large size. On my tv it's like im looking at the original image file but like 20 times larger in size without any loss of quality. Someone has to have the answer!

davescm · Accepted Answer

Simple answer - viewing distance.

A large screen TV, say 55", at 4K UHD resolution uses 3840 pixels along the long side (2160 on the short side) and has approx 81 pixels per inch resolution. But at normal viewing distance (several feet away) the pixels are not seen by the normal human eye so they look sharp.

In Photoshop we tend to zoom in and pixel peep from a viewing distance of just a few inches. Then wonder why see pixels

Dave

D Fosse · Answer

danec555169 wroteThe original needs to have more pixels for larger printsNo, it doesn't.This is a very good demonstration of why you normally should not upsample for large size print. Just print it as it is - it will look just as good, because it's seen from a greater distance (as Dave explains). With a large image, you naturally tend to move that much further back, so that the eye can take the whole in comfortably. So it ends up occupying the same area in your total field of vision. Optical resolution remains the same.In fact upsampling will usually make it look worse, because upsampling introduces artifacts and destroys the clean and crisp pixel structure.A lot of people suffer from the "300 ppi syndrome" - they think everything for print has to be 300 ppi. That's a misunderstanding. That's for a standard book/magazine print line screen frequency of 150 lines per inch (lpi) - to be viewed from less than arm's length. And even so, there's nothing special about the 300 number.

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