Horrible printquality ONLY from PS???

[evatgirl73]

Hi all, hardly have a chance to be on here anymore... But I have a problem that's been bugging me for a while. I edit all my pics in PS CS, and of course love the program. All pics I want to print out I save a 300dpi version as well as the "regular" 72dpi. My problem is that I cannot seem to print our ANYTHING directly from PS, the prints come out horribly blurry and look like I tried blowing up a wallet-size quality image to 8x10. I can take the exact same image and print it from another photoediting program and get a great printed image. Why??? I use the same printersettings etc, I've racked my brain and tried to check for some setting I might be missing, and this happens both in "automate portrait sheet" settings and if I try to print out an individual pic, no matter what size I print. It turns out this way even if I take a very high res pic and print a wallet size..! HELP!!! It feels so un-neccessary to start up a different program JUST for this reason, I'd like to be able to do everything from PS and I'm sure the print quality from PS isn't supposed to be like this...
Thanks in advance!!
Eva

[natatbeach]

not sure if it's right or not or if there's a better way...but I size everything the next size up when I crop it ( 8x10 becomes 11x14, 4x6 I crop as a 5x7) at 300dpi and I use the second crop tool that's located two down on the first column...the largets I've ever sent out is 16x20 and I edited on PS CS.... sometimes the pace has a lot to do with it.

Walgreens REGARDless of the size and quality ALWAYS does a crappy job....I use Mpix.com they have fair prices Wonderful quality and fast turnaround time. Good Luck
;)

[evatgirl73]

Hi Nat, and thanks! I've tried printing 3.5x5's out of much larger cropped pics, same thing happens... I should elaborate a bit more... this is when I print out on my own printer, I do the editing in PS and save to the computer, then open the same image (that I just edited and saved in PS) in a different photoediting program and it prints out fine, whatever size I print it. If I try to print the very same image (that just printed out beautifully) directly from PS, it looks awful, all blurry and horrible. Am I doomed to not be able to print from PS? Has anyone else ever had the same problem? Aarrgghh!! Pulling out my hair! ;-)
I've never actually taken my pics anywhere else to print, but I'm looking in to doing at least regular 4x6s "out" and save my home printer for enlargements.
Take care, Eva

[opus]

Have you checked your preferences and made sure that your "print resolution" is set at 300 dpi?

[Asylum Steve]

First of all, PS is the foremost image editing and printing program. Bar none.

If your prints are not coming out exactly as you see them on your monitor screen, YOU are doing something wrong.

Repeat that 100 times...

Before we can begin to solve your problem, we need to know EXACTLY what your workflow is; IOW what your capture device is, what your original file type is, what exactly you do to edit in PS, how exactly you resize your image, how exactly you set your printing prefs, how you profile your color, what printer you use, what printer settings you use, what paper you use, etc., etc., etc...

Everything...

[evatgirl73]

Thanks Steve! I totally know it must be something *I'm* doing wrong, that's why I asked so I can figure out what it is! LOL! OK, here's a quick rundown of what I do:
* download images from camera (Olympus C-5050) to a specific folder, in JPEG format (don't have the computer space to do RAW...)
* open image for editing from said folder
* edit it which usually includes a touch of curves, maybe some color correction, unsharp mask and sometimes other "fancy" stuff like vignetting or blurring the background etc (but USM is done last)
* crop the image and change the ppi to 300 if it's an image I know I want to enlarge, otherwise I leave it as is. If I crop it to 8x10 @ 300ppi it resizes itself UP, otherwise down, the "default" size of my camera is 2560x1920pixels. Sometimes I use the "preset" crop tools (under the crop tool, so to speak) and other times I set the size myself in the crop toolbar, and change the 72 to 300.
* save to my computer in highest quality (12)JPEG
* here's where I have the problem... if I now try to print it from PS, I end up with the problem described. If I open a different program, open the same file/image and print, I end up with a nice-looking, crisp print. One thing I did notice while fidgeting around with this and trying to figure it out, was that as I open a "print preview" from my printer (an HP 5550, I'm on a budget here..! ;-) )on the bottom of that, and only that window, it says "60dpi" when in 50% view, and "120dpi" in 100% view. Problem is, it says the exact same thing when I look at the "printer preview" from the other program! How do I change that?? The image has been saved in 300ppi... and even the images that have been saved in 72ppi come out sharp when printing from the other program... so it's clear that I'm doing something wrong in PS when printing, but I can't find how and where to change it..! I've been looking for anything sounding like "output to printer" etc, but can't find anything.
I can open a completely untouched image and try to print *that* out, same results. If I open the same, untouched image, in the other program, it prints out fine. I haven't really messed around with color profiling etc, I've just been using the default (I know, I know...), I only print in "highest quality" on photopaper, and again, it's coming out fine from the other program. Could it be some sort of "miscommunication" between *just* PS and the printer?? Where should I be looking, clearly I'm missing *something* here..! ;-) I mean, I *could* just keep doing what I've been doing, print pics out from the other program (I have 2 other programs that I can print from, I'm only keeping them around for that single purpose!!) and chalk it up to me being an idiot, but I'm just so curious to see what it could be, and it sure would be convenient to be able to print straight from PS... plus with it being the great program that it is, I'm sure the prints would be even BETTER than what the other programs produce. I hope this was thourough enough and gave a better picture of what's going on, I sincerely appreciate any and all help with this (and I *know* it's user error and can totally take it, so don't be afraid to tell me like it is, LOL!). Thanks in advance!!
Eva

[Asylum Steve]

eva,

After looking at your workflow, I have to say I don't see any glaring "smoking gun" that might be causing your problem. I can tell you that it's not really a good idea to edit images in jpeg mode then resave as another jpeg. That will always cause some loss of image information. Better to use "save as" from your original jpeg and create a PSD file to edit, then resize, sharpen, and save THAT as a high quality jpeg. Or simply print from the PSD file.

Still, that alone should not be enough to cause such a loss in print quality, and the simple fact that you're getting acceptable results with other programs must mean the problem isn't with the file itself.

So, let me ask you be for we go any further: what version of PS do you use?

[evatgirl73]

Hi Steve, and thanks for continuing to help me with this!! It's driving me nuts now more than ever, I figured it was something ridiculously simple and someone would just come on and post "ah, this happened to me, just click *this* and it will go away..." LOL! One can dream, right..? ;-)
I'm using PS CS, and here's the EVEN weirder part: I also have PS7 installed (have been procrastinating and not moved over all plug-ins etc so I can un-install PS7...*blush*) and I tried for fun to print a test pic out... it turned out OK! I'm getting low on ink and didn't use my "good" paper, so it wasn't "perfect" but a long ways better than the same image printed out from PS CS..! Pulling my hair out!!
Off topic, but if I save the JPG as a different file (i.e I open in folder X, and "save as" in folder Y under a different name) does that still result in loss?? I always save an untouched copy of all unedited pics on CD, but delete them periodically from my computer after editing and saving in the appropriate folder. Need an external hard drive BAD..! ;-) Great tip about creating the PSD file to work on, and then save, I'm going to try that. Thanks!!
Well, thanks again, worse case scenario I'll just print out from my other programs, but it sure would be satisfying to understand WHY this is happening..!
Take care, Eva

[Asylum Steve]

I'm using PS CS, and here's the EVEN weirder part: I also have PS7 installed (have been procrastinating and not moved over all plug-ins etc so I can un-install PS7...*blush*) and I tried for fun to print a test pic out... it turned out OK!

Well, actually, that may not be as weird as you think. As each version can be configured differently, this may simply be a case of you having a setting wrong in the CS version.

You know, the easiest thing to try (at least for me sitting here, heh heh) would be for you to uninstall and then reinstall CS on your system (or rather uninstall and reinstall the upgrade).

This would reset the program to its default settings, and give you a clean starting point. Then go through your printing workflow again. If you still have the problem, THEN you know something weird is going on...

BTW, copying a jpeg to a PSD file does not lose any image info...

[opus]

Again, I ask: have you checked your preferences??? There *IS* a setting there that asks what resolution you want to print at. It would be called something like "print resolution". It's under "Units and Rulers" in your preferences.

It really, really sounds like you have that set too low. It sounds like your problem can be solved as simply as fixing one setting. If you find it, set it at 300, then print.

[opus]

To address your other question:

If you open a jpeg and then choose "save as" to another folder, and save it again as a jpeg, there *will* be loss of quality. You have to "save as" either a TIFF or EPS or PSD to not lose image quality. Just be aware that the file size will balloon. But that's a good thing.

[Asylum Steve]

There *IS* a setting there that asks what resolution you want to print at. It would be called something like "print resolution". It's under "Units and Rulers" in your preferences.

Resolution prefs in CS are only for creating new documents. Any printing output resolution settings you assign to a file as you edit would override the initial setting, so, assuming she resizes the file to 300dpi (with the same total pixels as the original), the resulting file should print ok regardless of the prefs...

[opus]

huh. You're right. I didn't notice that.


I'm wracking my brain, there's got to be some setting...
sounds like she's printing just the lowers header file, but I can't figure out why.