Printing a JPG

All:
I'm by no means a digital art master. Look at my sig that should demonstrate my point.
My question is this. I'm trying to print a JPG image. However, when it prints out it's WAY to grainy for the quality I'm looking for!
I've got FireworksMX to do my image editing with. I feel like I've done everything I can to clean the image up but it still prints out too grainy ESPESCIALLY around the edges.

Any suggestion?

I asked a friend of mine that's in the graphic design field...he said there wasn't much I could do, due to the size of the image...actually images this is a problem I'm having w/ several images....they are 216px (wide) x 30px (high)

Thanks in advance!

What printer are you using?
Are you printing them with the original size?
Could you show an example?
What colors?

Could you awnser some of the questions mentioned above?

What are the dimensions of the JPG you're trying to print and what DPI are you printing at?

damn, you always ask for the right things dm!

well this will go on a letter sent to about 1.3 million customers first of all

I've actually reduced the size of the images, but I kept the integrity of the image b/c I reduced the image heighth and width proportionally

I can post the jpgs but viewing them they look fine...ok twist my arm I'll post one here:



dpi: I know what it is...the term I mean...but I don't know the answer... let me check

1200 x 1200 dpi in test...I don't know the dpi of the production printers though...

Artplay:


s15199d:

Typically, commercial printing is done at 300 DPI (dots per inch). So, if you have a digital image that is 1200px square it will be best printed at 4 inches square. (1200px / 300dpi).

So, what you need to know here are the dimensions of the final product when it's printed. When you create your images you should setup your document to reflect the final output.

If I know my output is going to be 4in x 4in on paper and printed @ 300dpi, I would setup my digital file to be 1200px by 1200px.

For jobs like this, you should always call the print shop and find out what file formats are prefered (PDF's these days), what DIP and what if any color restrictions there are.

It's hard to tell from the little image you posted, but it looks like you'd be better served by having this in a vector format, rather than a rasterized one.

Sorry DM but you pretty much lost me...I'm sure that's about as dumb as you can make it

Maybe I'm not being clear though... test as I mentioned b/4....by that I mean the printer on someone's desk...it has a max dpi of 1200x1200

the actual image will be approx 3in x 3/4in

production...we have our own machine to do the printing for the 1million + customers...I just don't work with it so I don't know anything about it...I just know I have to make the best possible image for them...one w/ the least amount of granularity on the edges.

I've already got the image the size they want...

I was just hoping to find out any tricks to clean up the edges w/ the JPG prints...ps it has to be in jpg format for this purposes

Thanks guys!

You want your IMAGE to be 300DPI, not 1200DPI.

Even though the printer prints 1200DPI, that's only 300DPI of quality, and you need a 300DPI image to start with (to prevent jaggies and other errors when it's sent to the printer and shrunk down).

The reason inkjet printers advertise 1200 DPI when they're only actually printing 300DPI quality is that inkjets use 4 times as many dots. CMY and Black. 4 dots per screen pixel. 300DPI screen image == 1200DPI print image.

On something like a dye-sub printer, 300DPI is just 300DPI in print, because dye-subs don't use dots to make up the colour. They simply layer the appropriate amount of colour on top of the other colours to get their shade, which is why they look so much more realistic.

I found out production DPI is 240.

If my original image is something other than 240 is there any possible way to get rid of the "jaggies".