What's the biggest print from a 1.6X crop factor camera

[Colin Southern]

That explanation helps a bunch Colin. I'm about to get a picture of my daughter printed on a 20x30 or maybe bigger. I was a little worried if it won't turn out as good like the 8x10 i tested it on. Do you have any tips on what too look at before getting it printed?

Hi Chriss,

The major thing to remember is that EVERYTHING is increased in size -- including things that you possibly DON'T want; so it's important to go through the image - carefully - at 100% magnification. Unfortunately it also comes down to experience a bit too in determining if things of a certain size will be big enough to stand as elements in their own right, or still be small enough to be distractions. I'd be happy to look over the file for you before you have it printed if it helps.

[Alis]

Very interesting topic.

Colin, what about noise in the picture. How much of that would show in a enlarged canvas print? Is it going to be like anything else or there is a difference when it comes to noise?

[Colin Southern]

Very interesting topic.

Colin, what about noise in the picture. How much of that would show in a enlarged canvas print? Is it going to be like anything else or there is a difference when it comes to noise?

Hi Ali,

To digress for a second, the question of "what's the biggest print from a" etc is really an invalid question ... what it should be is "what's the minimum viewing distance for a print of 'X' size, taken from a 'Y' camera?".

To answer your question though, noise doesn't show up as much, for a couple of reasons:

(1) As a rule, noise is only something we tend to see on monitors when viewing the image at high magnifications and/or heavily cropped images. Printing an image really large DOES make the noise physically bigger - but - your eyes can't resolve it at normal viewing distances. Sure - you can go right up to the image and/or view it with a magnifying glass ... but that's like me coming to visit and having a "quiet word" about the filthy carpet in your home ... you might argue that it's just been vacuumed and looks absolutely fine ... I counter with "no no - come and look at these dust mites through my microscope" ... to which you reply "are you crazy? How the heck examines carpet with a microscope!!!). And of course you'd be right ... so why do photographers examine large prints "up close" or "with a magnifying glass"?

(2) Print media doesn't have the save dynamic range as monitors ... so dark noise isn't as contrasty. My "Nelson Harbour by Night" shot is actually quite blotchy in the sky areas when viewed at 100% -- but on canvas it looks just fine.

Bottom line is "don't ruin your images trying to save the pixels" - just print the darn things and enyoy!

Hope this helps!