Every outstanding large-scale visual, whether it be a simple poster or sweeping 50-foot banner, has one thing in common: picture-perfect photographs and visuals.
Large-format graphics are a surefire way to draw in the attention of several onlookers, but finding the ideal images to sell your company might be a little more challenging.
You must ensure that images used for large-scale graphics will remain vivid and sharp even when enlarged to almost life-size proportions.
What steps can you take to ensure that your work will still look its finest after being freshly printed in large format?
When submitting your images to a print solutions provider, keep the following things in mind to help them and your company succeed:
WHAT SIZE AND RESOLUTION WORK BEST?
You must first and foremost confirm that your photographs adhere to the precise requirements set forth by the provider of print solutions. The print vendor will usually tell you their preferred requirements, although some of the language can be difficult to understand.
The common unit of measurement for image resolution is pixels per inch, or PPI. The PPI of an image measures how many pixels fit into a square inch of space. The resolution of an image increases with PPI, making your image appear crisper in a large-format graphic.
The majority of professionally printed publications have about 300 PPI, but you may wish to inquire with your print solutions supplier about their preferences.
The minimum number of pixels per inch required to produce a huge, high-resolution image is likewise set at this level.
On the other hand, the majority of the images you’ll see online and other smaller shots are 72 PPI. This is why trying to enlarge an image on your computer screen might have caused it to become pixelated and blurry.
With more pixels per inch, each pixel is less likely to be deformed when the entire image is enlarged, allowing photos to be enlarged with less pixilation.
HOW DO I TAKE THE VIEWING DISTANCE OF THE IMAGE INTO ACCOUNT?
Audiences will view the images at various distances depending on the setting and each large-format graphic’s specific characteristics.
Your audience’s proximity to a picture on a menu vs a billboard, for instance, will vary just as you gaze at a phone screen closer than you would a TV screen.
Other crucial factors for large-format graphics include viewing distance and audience proximity because, logically, greater viewing distances call for larger pictures. Additionally, photographs lose effective resolution when they are magnified.
However, the effective resolution of an image can be lesser the farther away it is being viewed. Stretched across a 15-foot banner, a photo that has 300 pixels per inch in a magazine would only have 14 pixels per inch.
This is due to the fact that although a photo may be pixelated up close, it looks great when seen from a distance. Additionally, as a photo is enlarged, the number of pixels per inch naturally decreases.
Your print solutions provider will be able to inform you if you can get away with a lower resolution even though 300 PPI is the industry norm.
WHY SHOULD I USE THIS FILE FORMAT?
Finding the best image file format for your purposes might easily become too difficult due to the enormous variety of picture file formats available. An overview of some of the most useful formats is provided below:
The most popular choice is JPEG files, which use a technique called lossy compression to reduce the file size of an image. Since each alteration increases the chance that compression artefacts may be included, the quality of the image degrades the more you modify and resave a JPEG.
You can use the JPEG format for almost all of your photo demands as long as the shot’s size and resolution remain high.
When image quality is crucial and file size is unimportant, the TIFF, or tagged image file format, is utilized. Many seasoned photographers use this as their favorite file format since it employs a technique called lossless compression. TIFF files can be altered and saved repeatedly without sacrificing image quality or creating compression artifacts, even though the file size is still larger than a JPEG.
GIFs and PNGs – For the most part, GIF and PNG file types should be avoided. PNG stands for portable network graphic. These two different file types.
