Printing

12 years 1 month ago #215532 by Joshwell
I've noticed that while my pictures look sharp on my monitor, when they print, they're soft.

I read that when printing, you want to over-sharpen. My first question is, is this correct? If so, how much over-sharpening do I apply? I guess if it is correct, the amount of over-sharpening depends on each individual image.


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12 years 1 month ago #215535 by Graphix
You tend to do an unsharp mask before printing but i wouldn't go over bored with it... I have not had many printing problems on luster and gloss but my mat prints tend to be less sharp.


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12 years 1 month ago #215536 by Joshwell
I usually use smart sharpen when sharpening. Does this produce a different result than Unsharp Mask?


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12 years 1 month ago #215538 by ccy 58
I think it's a somewhat different process...but the results between unsharpen mask and smart sharpen are pretty close. I'd stick with smart sharpen.

As for how the prints look and how it looks on the monitor...that may be a different issue. What zoom setting are you viewing the images at? What size/resolution are you sending to the printer and what size print?


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12 years 1 month ago #215541 by Baydream
Shots on a monitor tend to be sharper due to presentation resolution. Printing, especially in larger sizes, can be similar to zooming in on your monitor. Sharpening can help on some photos but after doing so, zoom in again to see if you have distorted the lines and edges. You will see the difference.
The sharpening tool can not make an out-of-focus photo sharp.

Prints on matte paper are "softer" because the ink is absorbed into the paper and spreads.

Shoot, learn and share. It will make you a better photographer.
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Photo Comments
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12 years 1 month ago #215542 by Joshwell

ccy 58 wrote: I think it's a somewhat different process...but the results between unsharpen mask and smart sharpen are pretty close. I'd stick with smart sharpen.

As for how the prints look and how it looks on the monitor...that may be a different issue. What zoom setting are you viewing the images at? What size/resolution are you sending to the printer and what size print?


Whenever I do sharpening and some other edits, but always sharpening, I view it at 100%

For example, the last image I had printed was an 8x10 image, resolution was 240, and I sent a roughly 65MB tiff file. And it came out soft.


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12 years 1 month ago #215543 by Graphix
Are you talking about your printer or a lab? Why TIFF? JPEG should be fine and it's a much smaller file size.


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12 years 1 month ago #215544 by Joshwell
I send my photos to mpix to be printed.


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12 years 1 month ago #215547 by ccy 58

Joshwell wrote: I send my photos to mpix to be printed.


Well mpix does a really good job at printing. Is your monitor calibrated? If not, I would try that first, then get a photo printed and see how it comes out. You don't want to mess around with too much editing and in the end mess up your photo altogether.


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12 years 1 month ago #215549 by Joshwell
I don't have any calibration software. I guess I should give that a try first. Thanks.


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