What digital background is good enough quality to print?

Hello all,

I am not a pro but not one person has given a reply to my questions. I hope some of you are willing to give me your input.

What file size is good to print as large as a 16x20 print?

I was thinking about purchasing a set of digital backgrounds on ebay but I don't know if they are what I would need (even though they advertise as being able to print large prints). The company name is Chromafx. Has anyone purchased these backdrops? What did you think of them? Good quality? The link is below.

http://cgi.ebay.com/8-VOLUME-DIGITAL-BACKDROP-BACKGROUND-PHOTO-SCRAPBOOKING_W0QQitemZ300170509587QQihZ020QQcategoryZ30079QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

I am fairly new to digital backgrounds and I am clueless as to the file size, PPI, resolution needed to print 8x10 to 16x20's. Any other digital background suggestions would be appreciated. And if you think the above digital backgrounds are something I could use for prints up to 16x20 please let me know.

Regards,
Joe

I just looked at the link you provided. It says right in the auction that they are 8x10 sized files @ 300ppi. so natively they are photo quality 8x10. Does that mean you can't use them as 16x20? well it kind of depends. you can uprez them and since backgrounds shouldn't be the main point of the photo they will probably be ok but only you can decide if the resulting file meets your standards. my gut feeling is they would be ok but I don't know what "quality" the files are to begin with.
--
I shot the White Album and other untruths by,
David Phipps

Lets be honest.

Digital backgrounds look like s* . Tacky with a capital "T". They look fake and unless you shoot on greenscreen or pure white bg you'll have hours of fun extracting hair etc.

Really no excuse for having a small range of bg's and doing it for real if studio portraiture is your thing.

PP
.....................................................................
http://www.thephotographybiz.com

cyrus530 said:

Hello all,

I am not a pro but not one person has given a reply to my questions.
I hope some of you are willing to give me your input.

What file size is good to print as large as a 16x20 print?

Click to expand...

My files, whatever the native size, I interpolate up to about 100 megs when I print at 16x 20. This works fine, with little if any diminishment in detail. Of course the shots are tack sharp to begin with...

cyrus530 said:

I was thinking about purchasing a set of digital backgrounds on ebay
but I don't know if they are what I would need (even though they
advertise as being able to print large prints). The company name is
Chromafx. Has anyone purchased these backdrops? What did you think of
them? Good quality? The link is below.

Click to expand...

Why not just make your own? These are just tacky designs, and not worth the effort of using...

Dave

cyrus530 said:

http://cgi.ebay.com/8-VOLUME-DIGITAL-BACKDROP-BACKGROUND-PHOTO-SCRAPBOOKING_W0QQitemZ300170509587QQihZ020QQcategoryZ30079QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

I am fairly new to digital backgrounds and I am clueless as to the
file size, PPI, resolution needed to print 8x10 to 16x20's. Any other
digital background suggestions would be appreciated. And if you think
the above digital backgrounds are something I could use for prints up
to 16x20 please let me know.

Regards,
Joe

Click to expand...

I assume you are doing portraits. I have gotten good 30 x 40's from my Fuji S2. The file used to print is 30 x 40 at about 143 dpi and in the 30 mb range. Your 100 mb file seems like overkill to me.
--
new 5d owner

kevin Auyong said:

I assume you are doing portraits. I have gotten good 30 x 40's from
my Fuji S2. The file used to print is 30 x 40 at about 143 dpi and
in the 30 mb range. Your 100 mb file seems like overkill to me.
--
new 5d owner

Click to expand...

Actually, almost all my large prints are of birds. I do my own printing on my own machine.

I do these interpolations UP, to avoid any trace of "jaggies." My files start out as either native 14 Meg or 30 Meg images. (Nikon D1x and D2x)

I find that less interpolation is visible. Not VERY visible, but visible nontheless.

It is easy to confirm my analysis. If you have only a small printer, than interpolate the image up and print the cropped result at 8x10, vs the uninterpolated image at 8x10. There is a difference, and since I actually sell my prints...

Dave

and I get 30x45 prints from my D2X. I get great detail.....dont sell many in the gallery at the price I am asking...but the corperate world buys them and returns to buy more...(hospitals..businesses...etc) the quality is that good.

Roman
--
'Miles to go before I sleep.'
--Robert Frost
http://www.pbase.com/romansphotos/

WOW!!! Thanky you everyone for your prompt replys. I still undecide but I think this might be a simlpler method when using chromakeying. Thanks again.

Regards,
Joe

You can sometimes find some good background images in your outs. Look for the out of focus ones or crops of blurred areas. Or as mentioned, shoot your own, that way your work looks original. Most backgrounds are out of focus anyway so interpolating them shouldn't be a problem unless you want the background sharp.

Here's an image I shot with a projected background (sky) which was very low resolution (1024 x 768) but had shadow DOF so it didn't matter.

http://billfrymire.com/gallery/world_oyster_beach_sand.jpg.html

Here's another one where I created my own background.

http://billfrymire.com/gallery/pearl_oyster_perfection.jpg.html

goodluck.

Bill