how do i import at 300dpi into my Mac?

[rudy]

hello,
i just purchased a Konica Minolta A200 8MP camera. running Mac OS X. when i import using iphoto then open image in photoshop its a huge 72 dpi instead of 300dpi. same thing when i just bypass iphoto and open the files directly from the camera's drive icon on my desktop when i plug in the camera to my computer. any ideas. is it something thats set that way on my camera or my mode of uploading?
thanks
rudy

[opus]

first check your camera settings, to make sure your resolution is set on "fine" or "best" or whatever the highest setting is. Check your manual.

I'm thinking it's your camera settings, because if you open directly into photoshop from the camera you should be getting the "real" settings of the file.

Another thing though. How "huge" are the files? Because if the file is like 48 inches at 72 dpi, it will be about 300 dpi if you scale it down (without loss) to about 12 inches.

[rudy]

thanks kelly,
i thought that scaling up to 300 from 72 is 'cheating' and your not getting a true resolution. or maybe thats only when you cheat by converting a small 72dpi file up to 300 which doesnt do anything for quality at all.
in any case, the camera is a konica minolta A200 8 MP and all shots are on highest non-RAW setting. Seems stupid to have everything in 72dpi come out of the camera then you have to manually set each to 300 which takes forever. should be 300 by default. Obviously a 8 MP camera is primarily used for 300dpi print and not a camera for posting ebay pictures with.
rudy

[Michael Fanelli]

hello,
i just purchased a Konica Minolta A200 8MP camera. running Mac OS X. when i import using iphoto then open image in photoshop its a huge 72 dpi instead of 300dpi. same thing when i just bypass iphoto and open the files directly from the camera's drive icon on my desktop when i plug in the camera to my computer. any ideas. is it something thats set that way on my camera or my mode of uploading?
thanks
rudy

You are not importing dpi. You have a certain amount of pixels and that's what the photo has regardless of what the dpi settings say. The dpi tells you how thickly or thinnly you are spreading those pixels around, it is irrelevent to the image itself.

If you change the dpi in an editing program from 72 dpi to 300 dpi, look at the physical size, it will get smaller. You are spreading the pixels more thickly so they cover the area better than before but you only cover a smaller area. Nothing about the image itself has changed.

You are looking for pixels/inch. For an 8x10 at 300 dpi, you will need 2400 x 3000 pixels. This can be real pixels from the camera or interpolated with software. Interpolation is a very good method to use as long as you don't go overboard.