enlarging photo

shazkhan111 · 4 March 2010 at 4:44PM

Hi

I want to enlarge a photograph that is 5 x 4 to a 18 x 12, i do not have a negative and the photo is not digital.

is there a way to do this maintaining the image quality

Please help??

closed · 4 March 2010 at 4:49PM

Only by scanning it at the highest dpi your scanner can handle, to uncompressed format, bmp.

davetrousers · 4 March 2010 at 4:50PM

Note that you are looking at different ratios there, so some cropping will be inevitable.

5 x 4 is 1.25:1
18 x 12 is 1.5:1

baby-mechanic · 4 March 2010 at 4:51PM

Would have thought to start by scanning it using the highest resolution possible, so that when you do come to enlarge it in Picassa or the likes, you're not stuffed by pixelation.

Just noticed 5x4 does not correlate with 18x12 ????
Would it not be enlarged to 15x12 ?

shazkhan111 · 4 March 2010 at 10:41PM

thanks for this. 15x12 is a possibilty. Are there any places in london that would do this for me and do it well??

totalsolutions · 4 March 2010 at 11:29PM

Any shop with a photo copier could do it. Even Tesco can print to a cake. Ok try Kall Kwik / Prontaprint

shazkhan111 · 5 March 2010 at 10:48PM

Will the quality of a photocopy be good enough to frame and put up on a living room wall given the ratio of enlargement we are discussing?

totalsolutions · 6 March 2010 at 12:46AM

Only you can judge that, Modern colour copiers are quite good.

kwikbreaks · 6 March 2010 at 9:06AM

The quality of the final picture will be heavily dependent on the quality of the original obviously.

If it was taken with a good 35mm SLR then you are in with a chance so long as the print has been looked after. If it was taken with a cheap point and click and/or it is a loose photo that has been knocking around a bit I'd say the chances of getting a good picture are slim.

That said as you want to blow this up then obviously the content is important to you so image imperfections may well be a lot less important.

shazkhan111 · 7 March 2010 at 3:02PM

thanks guys

ideally what i am looking for is a company that will scan the photo at the best quality and then "brush" out any imperfections due to enlargement. Any direction?

Photo was taken 25 years ago in a professional studio so guess the camera would have been the best at the time.

Farway · 7 March 2010 at 3:07PM

Bit of a long shot, but have you tried the original studio? You never know they may still have the negative to work from, if they have then that would be far better than scanning and brushing out imperfections