biiiig prints

[mentos_007]

oh goshhh... I know that is a newbie question but:
I was wondering how do photographers take photos that can be enlarged to huge dimension such as 50cmx60 cm and they are still of a great quality? Low iso, ok I get it. but what kind of camera? film?

 

[Artemis]

I would have though thats what a medium format is for?

 

[Hertz van Rental]

It sure is - and 5x4 and 10x8. The big formats are used for 48 sheet posters (billboards).
Having said that - you can get 35mm to do it if you have a top quality prime lens, the right film and the right lighting. I wouldn't push 35mm much beyond that size though.

 

[PreludeX]

eh, how big is that in iches , im currently doing prints on 11x14 and they are lookin pretty knarly, but yeah, like stated medium or large format is where youd get prints like that

 

[Hertz van Rental]

50cm is about 18-20 inches.
The size you can punch the neg up to is largely determined by the resolving power of your camera lens and the resolving power of your enlarging lens.
Doing things like this is where you discover why pro's spend £3000 on one lens ;-)

 

[Digital Matt]

With my 6.3mp digital I get prints up to 20"x30" that look great. That's 50x76cm.

 

[GerryDavid]

You can probably do it with 35mm. If you can get a 6mp picture to poster size through interpolation techniques, then you can scan the 35mm neg and get the same 6mp or larger file and do the same. But thats my theory.

Im going to try to interpolate my 3mp file to something like 20X30 and crop it and see how it looks. It does a good job on 8x10's. :0)

 

[Big Mike]

When making large prints. It helps to maximize the sharpness of you image by using a tripod & remote release etc.