Ideas for "enhancing" photo accidentally shot at 320x240?

[parrothead]

Hi,

We got back from a trip to Egypt and have lots of good pictures. However, one of my wife and I, in front of the big pyramid in Giza was accidentally taken in "video" mode (Canon CoolPix L4) vs. "picture" mode. I've converted the video to jpg format using mplayer (linux), selecting quality at 100% (no compression), and would like to print one of the frames. The problem is that the video was taken at 320x240 resolution so unless we wanted it only for a wallet size photo, we're kind of stuck.

Ideally, we'd like to have this printed at 8x10 but that's probably unrealistic, so maybe 4x6? We usually just retouch with the software from Canon that came with the camera and upload to WalMart and that's it. But I was wondering if someone had some suggestions for enhancing this photo from such a low res.? One thing I had thought of was perhaps having the photo printed fairly small, and then enlarging it optically at a photo kiosk at the drugstore or something? I thought this might give better results than doing it electronically. Or maybe that's like looking for a perpetual motion machine - there's no real way to improve over the resolution it was shot with.

Anyway, suggestions would be appreciated. Like I said, we did get lots of good pictures so it's not like this is our only one so I don't intend for this to turn into a giant project. But it IS the only one of us in front of the pyramid so it would be nice if we could salvage it. I don't really have any commercial image processing software at the moment other than the Canon software with the camera, so if you have recommendations, let me know the software (preferably linux but Windows is okay, too).

TIA!

Pat

P.S. There are a lot of forums here - let me know if this is not the appropriate one for this type of question.

 

[Jim H]

Downloaded the trial when it first came out. Wouldn't say it was stunning or spectacular - but it was better than giving up.

 

[*Mike*]

Alien Skin BlowUp is a great app. But, as was said, it won't work miracles. You could also print on canvas, which requires a lot less resolution... But, you're starting with so little that just about anything will be a stretch. (

Start with BlowUp (or Genuine Fractals), and see how big you can go. Do some test prints...

Good luck!

 

[parrothead]

Thanks for the quick replies, guys! Looks like this is a plugin for PhotoShop? I don't have that either, but it looks like there is a free trial for it, too.

Thanks again!

Pat

 

[Rhubarb]

I use Genuine Fractals, and it is brillant for making big files huge, not so much designed for small files. That said if you want to pm me I would be happy to run your pic through it to see what happens...

 

[parrothead]

I downloaded and installed the trial version of PhotoShop. Wow, kind of daunting for the beginner! But nonetheless, it looks promising. I haven't got BlowUp but I'll try it out.

Rhubarb: I clicked on your name and brought up your profile and tried to email but it said not allowed. Is there another way to PM? I also am not allowed to post pictures to the forum, I think...

Pat

 

[Rhubarb]

Ahh should of sent you a pm with my details.. anyway have done so now.

And you're more than welcome and able to post pictures in the forums here.