Hello and welcome back for another PFF blog post! Old photos. We all have albums and drawers full of them. Over the years, they may have degraded; turned yellow, faded or even stained. Before they get any worse, you decide to preserve the captured moments by keeping a digital copy but, you’ve never done it before. You’ve got questions upon questions. Which scanner should you get, how high of a resolution can you achieve from an old photo and many more. Don’t be overwhelmed. This blog will answer your questions on issues with resolution when it comes to scanning and photo printing of your old photos.
First thing’s first, you need to understand a scanner and its process. If you’re planning to scan a small photo and print it smaller than A2-size, an A4 flatbed scanner is sufficient. These types of scanners can support resolutions high enough to be printed in sizes smaller than A2.
There are 2 main things you should take note of; optical resolution and optimised resolution. Both resolutions are measured in dpi (dots per inch) or ppi (pixels per inch). Both units are referring to the same measurement. To keep it simple, we’ll stick to dpi in this blog.
Optical Resolution
Optical resolution refers to the actual number of pixels the scanner provides. For example, if a scanner has an optical resolution of 4800 x 9600 dpi, that’s the maximum resolution it can scan without digitally enhancing the photo. Depending on the scanner, the optical resolution can differ.
Optimised Resolution
Optimised resolution is also sometimes known as interpolated resolution. This is what you should look out for if you’re planning to enlarge your old photos for printing. What the scanner and software does is to retrieve information from your existing photo and fill in the spaces between the scanned dots to enlarge it. Now, how the software does this is by making a guess based on the surrounding pixels. This would mean that it would not always be 100% accurate. So, if you are worried about this, you can also let us know and we’ll help to double check it for you!
Most scanners today offer an optimised resolution of up to 9600 x 9600 dpi. Technically, this resolution can print up to 32 x 32 inches (A2 is 16.5 x 23.4 inches). However, keep in mind that not all photos will be able to reach the maximum resolution.
So, what happens if you scanned your photo and realise that it’s not ideal to be printed in a big size? We have a couple of suggestions. First one being the most obvious, you can scale it down. Scaling down the size will help in ensuring that your photo will not turn out blurry when printed. However, if that is not an option, you could always collage a few old photos together to make up for the size. In a collage, each photo would be relatively smaller. This will help in maintaining the photos’ sharpness. You can use softwares like Illustrator or websites like Canva to create your collages that can use for photo printing.
And that wraps up today’s blog. We hope you’ve learnt a little more about scanning and printing out your old photos. If you have anymore questions, do write in to us and we’ll make a part 2 to this blog. We’ll be back for more real soon. In the meantime, if you have any scanned photos ready for printing, head over to our online photo printing store to place your orders.
Till the next time, cheers!