Cropping & Saving Images to send to processor in CS3

[stephanie5d]

I'm wondering if I'm on the right track w/ saving my images to send to a photo processor. I shoot jpeg & process in CS3. Most of the time, I crop to 5x7 size at 350 pixels per inch. Once I'm done with touch ups & other stuff, I flatten the image & save as 10-quality.

Is this right? Am I degrading my image more than I have to? Is there another way??

Help, if you can! Thank you!!
Stephanie

[Eero Makela]

I leave the resolution field Blank and only set the size 8 x 10 or 11 x 17

I let the photo lab handle the ppi

[EOS_JD]

Originally Posted by stephanie5d

I'm wondering if I'm on the right track w/ saving my images to send to a photo processor. I shoot jpeg & process in CS3. Most of the time, I crop to 5x7 size at 350 pixels per inch. Once I'm done with touch ups & other stuff, I flatten the image & save as 10-quality.

Is this right? Am I degrading my image more than I have to? Is there another way??

Help, if you can! Thank you!!
Stephanie

Why do you save to 350ppi?

Use the crop tool and enter the sizes you want. I generally leave the ppi box blank as I don't like throwing away pixel info but it depends on the lab's (or my own) requirements. Generally 300ppi for any given image size is the max resolution you will require. If you have less, your lab should easily be able to upsample (better than Ps can).

If you are printing larger than 10x8, you can reduce the ppi value without any noticeavble reduction in quality. I print my A3+ images at around 150ppi. They look great!

Other than that, what you are doing seems fine.

[KmH]

Originally Posted by Eero Makela

I leave the resolution field Blank and only set the size 8 x 10 or 11 x 17

I let the photo lab handle the ppi

Yep. Their RIP software beats the snot out of PS.

Stephanie,

You're losing quality when you capture your images in JPEG. JPEG is a print image format, not a capture image format.

If you have a 10 MP camera, JPEG immediately throws away 3/4 of those pixels. The camera recorded them but you never see them, and you start with about 2.5 MP left to do any editing on. To me, that's like going to the gas station putting 10 gallons of gas in your vehicle and then draining 7 1/2 gallons out onto the ground before you drive away.

JPEG has fewer colors because it only has an 8-bit color depth, not the 16-bit color depth that capture formats have. RAW and TIFF are capture formats. They retain all the image data the image sensor recorded. Post processing with the larger data files gives you more control when editing.

Converting to JPEG should really be the very last step in your image processing workflow.

If you're willing to consider making a change check out all the benefits of capturing your images in RAW or TIFF. Your camera may not offer either choice. RAW is the more common format offered and the one most pro's use.