image size question

i am trying to figure out the correct way to obtain these requirments in photoshop...

a jpeg of 300dpi with a minimum of 6.5" width

i understand somewhat about resampling (which makes the image larger) and not resampling (which gives it a size of ~2x2)

but what i am not sure of is if i have the image at 300 dpi and 6.5", which makes it rather large, how will that be translated to printing size?
can it be sized as needed for printing without losing quality?

thank you

If it is your document size that is set to 6.5" wide, even though it looks "large" in your photoshop window, it will print 6.5" wide. The 300dpi will give it a better resolution in printing than the typical 72dpi that a web photo would be. You can resize down without losing quality, but you will lose quality if you resize up. In other words starting with an image that is 10" wide will look fine resized to 6.5" but a 3" wide image will look like crap if resized to 6.5"

this is easy with fireworks ... you can set the DPI and page width in inches or pixels when creating a new document.

What version of photoshop are you using?

I just did this in PS6 in 5 seconds ....

height : 6.5"
width: 6.5"
pixels / inch: 300

done ....

that should print at high quality and 6.5" by 6.5" ....

depending what you wanna do it can be shrunken and be fine. You can only enlarge it so much before quality is lost.

why don't you just make it a high DPI and the size you want it to print at

thank you. the information helped.