photo being clipped

[mrelmo]

recently i noticed some of my photos are being clipped or cropped when printed, when i take a picture i try to fill the frame with the subject, that is when i noticed that a few of the prints were missing part of the subject on the sides, i print to 4x6 paper and i use either the mircosoft photo wizard or the canon software that came with my power shot camera maybe it is not the software maybe it is the settings on my camera i noticed that i can change the size 2816x2112, 2272x1704, or 1600x1200 i have been shooting at 2816x2112 thinking that this is a higher quality there is also a postcard 1600x1200 setting and a widescreen 2816x1584, i have also tried elements 6 but i can not get a 6x4 ratio if i go with 4" the other measurement is 5.xxx under 6" hmmm any ideas

 

[aussierob]

mrelmo

The short answer is you wont get exactly a 4 x 6 ratio from the image directly from the camera.

The sensor size from a compact camera such as the Poweshot is 5.3 x 4 mm. An APS-C camera has a sensor size of 23.6 x 15.3 (Nikon) or 22.3 x 14.9 mm (Canon). So some cropping will have to be applied depending on the print size.

You will remember that the negative size from 35 mm cameras was 24 x 35 mm; so images have always had some form of cropping applied when printing.

 

[l_d_allan]

I believe that 35mm film was 36x24 mm, which is the same aspect ration as 6x4 / 3x2. IIRC, the 35mm is related to the height of the roll itself, from above the top sprocket holes to below the lower sprocket holes. 35mm film originally came from film made for movie-making.

Every DSLR that I'm familiar with has a 3x2 aspect ratio, which corresponds precisely to 4x6" prints. Compact point-n-shoots can vary. My Lumix has an option to select the aspect ratio (which is nice). My understanding is that the recent Canon 7d has provision to view different aspect ratios, or at least confirm what they will look like.

It may be happening that borderless print issues are involved. There is some "over-spray". My Canon printers have options for none, min, std, and max over-spray when making borderless prints.

 

[mrelmo]

ok so i will not fill the frame as much in the future, but what about the numbers 2816x2112 and so on are they for quality the higher the numbers the higher the quality?

 

[aussierob]

mrelmo

The numbers such as 2816 x 2112 refer to the dimensions of the image in pixels. Now if you divide the dimensions in pixels by the dpi you desire in your printed image, it will aproximate to the largest size you can print that image at a set dpi. As an example if you wanted to print at 300 dpi the maximum image size you could expect approximates to 9 x 7 inches. And at 150 dpi it would approximate to 18 x 14 inches.

Pixels and dpi are not strictly interchangable but it will give you a rough enough approximation. So in conclusion I would capture images at the setting that approximates to the final desired image size at the final desired print resolution.

 

[mrelmo]

i thought that i understood the explainations above however i still have more questions, if i print a photo with a border the picture comes out fine on a 4x6, when i print borderless on 4x6 the photo is cropped quite a bit, i would think when you go to borderless it is no different than going from 4x6 to 5x7 it would seem that you are just making an enlargement and no cropping should take place, it seems more frustrating than anything else

 

[ghwellsjr]

If a picture fits perfectly on a rectangular piece of paper with a given size border and then you enlarge the picture to make it borderless, some cropping is absolutely necessary.

Let's say you have a 1/4 inch border on 4x6 paper. That means the picture is 3.5x5.5. Now if you enlarge the picture by 14.3% it will be 4x6.3 which crops 0.3 inches off the width.

But Canon printers allow you to control the "Amount of Extension" when you select borderless so you have a little bit of control over how much cropping takes place.

 

[mrelmo]

ok i will try the least amount of extension thank you

 

[stratman]

mrelmo:

The problem is that the Length X Width dimensions of the images you take do not correspond exactly with the dimensions of the photographic paper you use (4 X6). The issue may begin with the sensor array of your digital camera, which may not be an exact ratio of 4 X 6. This is what aussierob wrote about in Post #2. Simplistically, if you divide 4 by 6 you get 0.667. Using aussierob's example of the Poweshot of 5.3 x 4 mm, 4 divided by 5.3 equals 0.755. Since the Powershot's ratio is greater than the 4 X 6 photo paper's ratio, the image will either need to be cropped to fit the aspect ratio of the paper or some of the edges of the photo paper will be left unprinted as the image is shrunken to completely fit onto the photo paper. If you have ever watched a 16:9 widescreen movie on an old squarish analog 4:3 tv screen, then you have seen the black bars added to fit the whole image onto the tv screen. A similar process occurs when you print an image whose dimensions do not fit exactly with the paper size used. You either have to shrink it and have empty boarders in order to see the entire image OR you crop the image to make it fit the dimensions of the paper used (borderless)

The dimension of the images you take are in pixels, not inches. In order to understand how pixels relate to inches you must first define the size of the pixel, which is done with DPI = Dots Per Inch. For instance, if DPI = 100, then each side of the pixel is 1/100 of an inch and 100 dots (pixels) lined up end to end covers 1 inch in length. Now we get into what aussierob was talking about in a later post. Defining the DPI and the ratio of pixels, one can understand why the images you take at a specific pixel ratio do not fit nicely onto a 4 X 6 piece of photo paper. Using a web site like http://mystic-nights.com/poser/tools/pixels-to-inches.html can sometimes help with your calculations if you don't have a calculator handy.

The numbers such as 2816 x 2112 refer to the dimensions of the image in pixels. Now if you divide the dimensions in pixels by the dpi you desire in your printed image, it will aproximate to the largest size you can print that image at a set dpi. As an example if you wanted to print at 300 dpi the maximum image size you could expect approximates to 9 x 7 inches. And at 150 dpi it would approximate to 18 x 14 inches.

In aussierob's quote, at a DPI of 300, the pixel conversion to inches is ~9 X7 inches, which I'll refer to as 7 X 9 inches for comparison purposes. Compared to your desired 4 X 6 dimensioned photo paper, a 7 X 9 inch image is a greater ratio of ~0.77 (closer to 0.75 when using the actual values of 7.04 X 9.39) than the 4 X 6 ratio of 0.67. Therefore, the image is too large to fill the 4 X 6 photo paper dimensions neatly without either cropping the image to force the image to fit or by adding a border so that the enire image is seen but some edges of the paper are not printed on (similar to the black bars seen when watching a widescreen movie on a non-widescreen tv).

Cropping can be done manually by you or automatically by the application used. It all depends on the application used and your desire to be more or less involved in the process. Also, depending on the application used, you might be able to alter the dimensions of the image - stretching it - to fit the final desired dimension wanted. You may end up with the entire image stretch or compacted to fit your paper size but this may introduce unwanted artifact into the image. Likewise, cropping may zoom/enlargen the image too much and introduce unwanted artifact as well. You need to play around and experiment to find inherent limitations in these processes that are or are not acceptable to you.

Hope this helps.