How large a a print can be made from a 6 mp SLR

I am a film shooter, using an EOS 3 and Canon lenses.

I am thinking of going digital. The new 10D has my interest as the price is getting right and it seems the functionality, like autofocus, is getting close to the film SLR's.

My object is "fine art photography" (prints/englargements to hang on the wall) Today, with a high resolution film scan I can get good results at 24" x 36", but more typcial is 11x16.

With the Canon 10D, and its 6mp, approximately, how large would I be able to print with exceptable results?

Thanks in advance for your help. I realize "acceptable" is subjective but hope some of the D-SLR shooters with experience can help give me some advice.

--
Chris

...with prints as large or larger than you've been happy with from 35mm.

For me, I've never seen a fine art print at 24x36 that originated from 35mm that I was impressed with...I don't believe there is that much information in a 35mm frame. I've seen plenty of impressive 11x14s from 35 though....

The 10D looks to be better than the D60, and I've seen some incredible shots from that.....certainly printable to 20x30 which I'd never do with 35mm.

dave

Chris Loffredo said:

I am a film shooter, using an EOS 3 and Canon lenses.

I am thinking of going digital. The new 10D has my interest as the
price is getting right and it seems the functionality, like
autofocus, is getting close to the film SLR's.

My object is "fine art photography" (prints/englargements to hang
on the wall) Today, with a high resolution film scan I can get good
results at 24" x 36", but more typcial is 11x16.

With the Canon 10D, and its 6mp, approximately, how large would I
be able to print with exceptable results?

Thanks in advance for your help. I realize "acceptable" is
subjective but hope some of the D-SLR shooters with experience can
help give me some advice.

--
Chris

Click to expand...

go to the canon site and download the sample images in TIFF and print 'em

keith

Chris Loffredo said:

I am a film shooter, using an EOS 3 and Canon lenses.

I am thinking of going digital. The new 10D has my interest as the
price is getting right and it seems the functionality, like
autofocus, is getting close to the film SLR's.

My object is "fine art photography" (prints/englargements to hang
on the wall) Today, with a high resolution film scan I can get good
results at 24" x 36", but more typcial is 11x16.

With the Canon 10D, and its 6mp, approximately, how large would I
be able to print with exceptable results?

Thanks in advance for your help. I realize "acceptable" is
subjective but hope some of the D-SLR shooters with experience can
help give me some advice.

--
Chris

Click to expand...

Chris Loffredo said:

I am a film shooter, using an EOS 3 and Canon lenses.

I am thinking of going digital. The new 10D has my interest as the
price is getting right and it seems the functionality, like
autofocus, is getting close to the film SLR's.

My object is "fine art photography" (prints/englargements to hang
on the wall) Today, with a high resolution film scan I can get good
results at 24" x 36", but more typcial is 11x16.

With the Canon 10D, and its 6mp, approximately, how large would I
be able to print with exceptable results?

Thanks in advance for your help. I realize "acceptable" is
subjective but hope some of the D-SLR shooters with experience can
help give me some advice.

--
Chris

Click to expand...

Chris,

This is easy for you to determine. Take Phil's D100 samples, and try printing them. I wouldn't spend 2k on a camera without seeing for myself what kind of results I could get. You should select 2 different photos...one with a lot of busy detail, and another with a simpler subject, as the results will vary depending on the nature of the subject. For example, a bold photo without a lot of background detail (eg a portrait) will scale up much better than something with a lot of small detail.

A D10 photo printed at 36x24 would only be 85 ppi...about the same as a computer monitor, which should give you an idea of the quality you could expect. 300 ppi is about all the printer can use. I've printed a cropped 8x10 from my 3 MP camera that had just 180 ppi...I rezzed it up to 300 ppi and printed it on a frontiers system...it 'looks' like a photograph, but not quite as nice as a professional portrait.

Very easy.

Excellent print quality is at 300 dpi (dots per inch)

Depending of the picture and the detailes, a lower printing resolution like 200 dpi will still be acceptable.

so,

printing at 300 dpi, you need 90.000 dots per square inch
printing at 200 dpi, you need 40.000 dots per square inch.

Now all you have to do is, to devide your max resolution of 6Mb pix by

• 90.000, and you can print 66 square inch at best quality or
• 40.000, and you can print 150 square inch at medium quality and

of course, everything in between.

A slide (Kodacrome 64) has a resulution equal to about 20Mb Pix scanned in a professional drum scanner.

Bernie

If a pixel were a pixel were a pixel a statement like that might hold water...but fortunately EACH pixel gets better with each new generation.

I've seen 600 square inch prints from a 6mp camera that were outstanding....kinda throws off the math!

And now we've got Foveon files printing like files much larger....just imagine the size print you'll be able to get from a 6mp Foveon!

dave

Bernie* said:

Very easy.

Excellent print quality is at 300 dpi (dots per inch)
Depending of the picture and the detailes, a lower printing
resolution like 200 dpi will still be acceptable.

so,

printing at 300 dpi, you need 90.000 dots per square inch
printing at 200 dpi, you need 40.000 dots per square inch.

Now all you have to do is, to devide your max resolution of 6Mb pix by

• 90.000, and you can print 66 square inch at best quality or
• 40.000, and you can print 150 square inch at medium quality and

of course, everything in between.

A slide (Kodacrome 64) has a resulution equal to about 20Mb Pix
scanned in a professional drum scanner.

Bernie

Click to expand...

Chris,

Hi I made a 20x30 from a jpeg file shot with a D60 which has the same 6mp sensor as the 10D. The file was rezed up with genuine fractals and printed by Miller's It was great and rivaled the quality of a 20x30 from a Mamiya RB shot on 400 speed film. Hope this helps

Chris Loffredo said:

I am a film shooter, using an EOS 3 and Canon lenses.

I am thinking of going digital. The new 10D has my interest as the
price is getting right and it seems the functionality, like
autofocus, is getting close to the film SLR's.

My object is "fine art photography" (prints/englargements to hang
on the wall) Today, with a high resolution film scan I can get good
results at 24" x 36", but more typcial is 11x16.

With the Canon 10D, and its 6mp, approximately, how large would I
be able to print with exceptable results?

Thanks in advance for your help. I realize "acceptable" is
subjective but hope some of the D-SLR shooters with experience can
help give me some advice.

--
Chris

Click to expand...

13x19
Anything bigger with that camera & you'll start to visably lose detail.

1DS, 14n, or S2 can get somewhat larger, but not upto 24x36.

As you increase size, your image exponentially decreases as your sq in rapidly climb. You also see a gain in the frequency which you will see noise & artifacts.

The poster who stated a 6mp Fovian would print well is correct. SuperCCD & Fovian are the best options in CCD technology for large format printing, unfortunately the Sigma S9 isn't that good of a camera imho, but fovian is brand new so it will come along & probably be king, at least for a day.

Chris Loffredo said:

I am a film shooter, using an EOS 3 and Canon lenses.

I am thinking of going digital. The new 10D has my interest as the
price is getting right and it seems the functionality, like
autofocus, is getting close to the film SLR's.

My object is "fine art photography" (prints/englargements to hang
on the wall) Today, with a high resolution film scan I can get good
results at 24" x 36", but more typcial is 11x16.

With the Canon 10D, and its 6mp, approximately, how large would I
be able to print with exceptable results?

Thanks in advance for your help. I realize "acceptable" is
subjective but hope some of the D-SLR shooters with experience can
help give me some advice.

--
Chris

Click to expand...

--
--

There are 10 types of people in this world. Those that understand binary & those that don't.

check the FAQ at most professional digital image printing services, a major one in my country uses 100dots per centimeter, so thats a little bit more then 250 DPI, and so is it from most others, so if you send them a 6mp file theyr system will downsize it.

basically you wont see the difference between 250 and 300 its when it goes below 200 that you start to notice the difference.