Printing Question

obewan

I took a bunch of photographs in RAW format. Converted them and they are on average 23MB (TIFF) in size. I sent a few to a Printer and asked for one of each at 5 X 7. Happy enough with most of them but one or two had part of the heads cut off. When I questioned this I was told "it happened because of the actual print size." I fiind this hard to accept as they are full size and therefore should be easy to print at 5 X 7. I have to say this is not the first time it has happened but this is more important to me.

Do I have to alter the images in size before requesting certain dimensions or is this just a load of codswollop?

Any help is much appreciated.

Mick.

Calina

Each photograph has a specific aspect ratio. I have no idea what yours is but I'm guessing 3:2 is about right if you have RAW capability. This means it will fit a 6x4 shot perfectly.

7x5 is marginally different, and so to print that size, your photograph will be cropped. If you want to control how it is cropped, you do the cropping before you hand it over to the printer, otherwise they will do and probably automatically with no regard to the contents of the photograph. In short, you need to ensure that the aspect ratio of the photograph/image (that is the ratio of the the short side to the long side) matches the aspect ratio of the print you have ordered.

obewan

Thanks for the quick reply. I'll do that in future.

Mick.

Calina wrote:

Each photograph has a specific aspect ratio. I have no idea what yours is but I'm guessing 3:2 is about right if you have RAW capability. This means it will fit a 6x4 shot perfectly.

7x5 is marginally different, and so to print that size, your photograph will be cropped. If you want to control how it is cropped, you do the cropping before you hand it over to the printer, otherwise they will do and probably automatically with no regard to the contents of the photograph. In short, you need to ensure that the aspect ratio of the photograph/image (that is the ratio of the the short side to the long side) matches the aspect ratio of the print you have ordered.

ThOnda

All labs should give you exact size (mm, inches, dots) what they can print. And you should adjust our pictures to it. Or to tell them to shrink it and leave whit/black borders.

rahtkennades

Calina wrote:

Each photograph has a specific aspect ratio. I have no idea what yours is but I'm guessing 3:2 is about right if you have RAW capability. This means it will fit a 6x4 shot perfectly.

7x5 is marginally different, and so to print that size, your photograph will be cropped. If you want to control how it is cropped, you do the cropping before you hand it over to the printer, otherwise they will do and probably automatically with no regard to the contents of the photograph. In short, you need to ensure that the aspect ratio of the photograph/image (that is the ratio of the the short side to the long side) matches the aspect ratio of the print you have ordered.

It's a while since I've sent film or digital for processing, but surely at this stage it would make more sense for photo labs to switch to 3:2 ratio formats for prints. Aren't most (except Olympus E- cameras) 3:2?

Calina

The standard is 3:2 ie 6x4. You can print at 9x6 12x8 18x12 and 30x20. I have printed all these sizes.

The problem is that a 7x5 is not 3:2. The OP specified 7x5 prints. Even from film that will result in some cropping. If you want to enlarge to 10x8 you have some cropping to face. The last lot I sent for printing I sent mostly at 9x6.

I'd also that there are a lot of point and shoot digital which have a 4:3 aspect ratio which is 6x4.5 inches for standard printing.

There are a large number of standard print sizes but they don't all have the same aspect ratio. I don't think it would even be desirable because I have a lot of photographs with 1:1 AR and then I have the panoramics at 12x5 inches which is what 2.4:1, right. I would find it limiting if everything had to be 3:2 or some such standard.