InHim wrote:

> I am still trying to understand when I would resample and when I
> would not want to resample.
> Could someone explain this in plain English?
*****
Let me try to simplfy this for everyone.

All printers take an input of around 300-360 dpi if you send less to the printer it will interpolate (resample) the image up to the printers required input. Photoshop does a better job of resampling than most printers so I would always chage it to 300 dpi in photoshop. (on the better printers you probably will not be able to see the difference) do the resizing as the very last step before printing using bicubic resampling (use bilinier resampling if you are downsizing the image it seems to work better.)

your 20x30 72dpi file is a 6 megapixel file I assume from a film scanner similar to my minolta. at 300 dpi it will make about a 6x9 picture without resampling. If you want to print closer to 8x10 you have to resample (interpolate) the image or let the printer or the printing company to do the resample. If you want exactly an 8x10 it will have to be cropped.

Keep the constrined proportioned box checked or it will strech the picture to fit the size you requested. This is the famous movie screen on your TV saying the image has been reformated to fit the screen. Keep in mind you can resize without constraining proportions and it works well in many instances if you have to fill a specific space on a layout and can not do it by cropping. But it will not be your oringinal print anymore.

The simple english answer is you always have to resample to make a larger image or let the printer or print company do it. You can not add 2 + 2 and get 6 unless you interpolate.

so do it yourself but do it on a copy and keep your originals untouched. repeated resampling will degrade your images. always start from the non-resampled original

Your file can easily resample up to 13x19 without a noticible lost of print quality. And prints up to 20x30 can approach film print quality on a well exposed original.