scanning pics (what dpi setting)

[glenpinn]

hi everyone.

i am in the process of archiving all my older family photos dating from as early as 1921 up till 1980 and need to scan these photos ready to print them at 6x4 size.
some of the very old photos are very small in size (3"x"2 or 2"x2" or 4"x3" etc) and some are big (5x7) so i have decided to stick the photos onto both sides of coloured A4 card and slip them into clear plastic folder sleeves and then store them in a nice presentation folder.

after i layout and stick the photos to each page, i want to scan the pages in my canon scanner, then crop each idividual photo from the scanned pages and re-size the photos in picture-it to 1015x1524 (4x6) and get them printed.

my scanner default setting is A4 size, 100% magnification @ 75dpi scan resolution, 75dpi output resolution and the scan size is 618x875 pixels and if i scan at that setting the photos are very poor quality when magnified to say 100%.
i scanned the old photos using 400% magnification @ 300dpi scan res, output res was still 75dpi and the scan size was 2475x3503 pixels and when magnified to 100%, each of these photos is so crystal clear compared to the scan using default setting.

what i need to know is will the photos print at better quality using 300dpi scan res than if scanned at 75dpi scan res.
i know that i need to scan the small pics at a higher dpi setting to enable me to resize them to print at 1016x1524 (4x6) so do i actually scan at a higher dpi setting for smaller pics as opposed to say scanning larger pics, or is it safe to just use say 300dpi scanning for all photos no matter what size or age or condition the original photo might be.

one thing for sure, the file size of each A4 page when scanned at 75dpi is about 200kb, and the same page scanned at 300dpi is about 1.5mb.

also, is it possible to simply scan each page at say 300dpi and just have the whole page printed with all the photos printed at thier original size, i can then keep the printed A4 page without having to cut out each photo seperately.

any thoughts or am i confusing you ????........GLEN

i have attached one of my A4 sheets with 11 photos so u get a picture of what im trying to do.

[Michael Fanelli]

hi everyone.

i am in the process of archiving all my older family photos dating from as early as 1921 up till 1980 and need to scan these photos ready to print them at 6x4 size.
some of the very old photos are very small in size (3"x"2 or 2"x2" or 4"x3" etc) and some are big (5x7) so i have decided to stick the photos onto both sides of coloured A4 card and slip them into clear plastic folder sleeves and then store them in a nice presentation folder.

after i layout and stick the photos to each page, i want to scan the pages in my canon scanner, then crop each idividual photo from the scanned pages and re-size the photos in picture-it to 1015x1524 (4x6) and get them printed.

my scanner default setting is A4 size, 100% magnification @ 75dpi scan resolution, 75dpi output resolution and the scan size is 618x875 pixels and if i scan at that setting the photos are very poor quality when magnified to say 100%.
i scanned the old photos using 400% magnification @ 300dpi scan res, output res was still 75dpi and the scan size was 2475x3503 pixels and when magnified to 100%, each of these photos is so crystal clear compared to the scan using default setting.

what i need to know is will the photos print at better quality using 300dpi scan res than if scanned at 75dpi scan res.
i know that i need to scan the small pics at a higher dpi setting to enable me to resize them to print at 1016x1524 (4x6) so do i actually scan at a higher dpi setting for smaller pics as opposed to say scanning larger pics, or is it safe to just use say 300dpi scanning for all photos no matter what size or age or condition the original photo might be.

one thing for sure, the file size of each A4 page when scanned at 75dpi is about 200kb, and the same page scanned at 300dpi is about 1.5mb.

also, is it possible to simply scan each page at say 300dpi and just have the whole page printed with all the photos printed at thier original size, i can then keep the printed A4 page without having to cut out each photo seperately.

any thoughts or am i confusing you ????........GLEN

i have attached one of my A4 sheets with 11 photos so u get a picture of what im trying to do.

The dpi of the image depends upon the printer you will use, not the output. There is no direct link between the image dpi and the printer dpi. Same names, two different meanings.

Scanning the photos at 300 dpi will give you the best result for most inkjet printers. You can get away with 250 dpi if you are printing small pictures. Note that matte prints don't scan very well (I can't tell what you have). If you have the negatives or slides, the results will be vastly superior if you use a film scanner rather than a flatbed.

[glenpinn]

thx michael.

im using a flatbed scanner, and most of the photos im scanning are the really old gloss ones, and back in the old film days (1920's up till 1950's) lots of photos were very small when printed, and very unusual proportions compared to photos taken today.

the photos in my post are very rectangular, and you can see that compared to the A4 paper size they are stuck to, those 11 photos are small, and if i was to scan at normal 75dpi setting, they wouldnt print out at 4x6 very well, thats why i asked about if i scan them at 300dpi, they will print out much better quality even when they are re-sized to the 4x6 print size of 1016x1524 pixels.

im having them printed at my local digital imaging store, so im not doing it myself, they are being done professionally as they are almost family treasures.

anyway, thanks for your help, all i can say about dpi settings is that the scan size and file size is much higher the higher the scan dpi setting is, ant the pics scanned at 300dpi all look almost crystal clear on my screen as opposed to them scanned at default 75dpi, when they look very pixelised and grainy.

anyway, im having some of these pics printed tomorrow, will print a few that were scanned at 75dpi and the same ones scanned at 300dpi and see how they turn out.

ill let u know how it goes.....GLEN

ps: i dont have any negatives for these photos, thats why im archiving them and having them all printed in 4x6 size where possible (just have to resize them and get what i can into the print proportions that i need

ANY THOUGHTS ON A REALLY GOOD QUALITY DIGITAL PHOTO PRINTER AND PRINTING SOFTWARE, and the best type or quality paper to use (brand, gloss, matte, gsm etc) here in australia kodak is about the best quality on the market as compared to say fuji etc for photo paper etc

my current photo editor is microsoft picture-it 7.0 (old but very good for learners like me) but i do have adobe photoshop CS 8.0 and am about to take classes in learning how to use it.