Printing Issues - Decreased Sharpness/Clarity

[KelSS90]

I'm sitting at a friends house and she has some pictures on her fridge that I took of her sweet girls.... And the quality looks MUCH different than on my computer/on the disc I gave her. They look sharp and clear in Lightroom when checked at a 1:1 ratio, but the prints on her fridge look pretty awful. I'm sure she printed them at Walmart.... But I have had cheap prints made up at Walmart of professional shots and the clarity was never effected.

When I export from Lightroom do I need to be doing something specific? I export from Lightroom, format the cd, and then copy onto there.

Any and all advice would be wonderful. I am super concerned about this!!!

 

[table1349]

Making fine prints in your digital darkroom: Getting started

 

[KelSS90]

Thanks for that info!! I don't think I'm quite to the point of printing for everyone though... Is it possible that I am saving the image incorrectly? Or there is an issue in the conversion (RAW when imported but exports from Lightroom as JPEG)?

 

[bribrius]

Thanks for that info!! I don't think I'm quite to the point of printing for everyone though... Is it possible that I am saving the image incorrectly? Or there is an issue in the conversion (RAW when imported but exports from Lightroom as JPEG)?

Thanks for bringing this up because ive been wondering the same thing. And of the conversion they do for image size to ..

 

[KelSS90]

Bump. I know someone here can help

 

[minicoop1985]

Are you sure she got it done at Walmart? When you get prints made, do you use the little photo kiosks? I have a feeling those things murder IQ.

 

[table1349]

It could be a multitude of issues that has caused the problem and it may not be printing. I take it you didn't bother to read what I linked to. If you had you would realize there is much you need to do at your end before you even begin editing. For all we know with the lack of information provided, it may well be that what you gave her looked good on your computer but not anywhere else. Do you know that what your monitor shows is what truly on the disk. Has it been hardware calibrated? Have you adjusted the sharpness to high or to low on the monitor and they are compensating for that adjustment in processing? Do you know what the exact export setting was for the file format you chose? There are dozens of reasons there could be an issue, but if you haven't eliminated the things that have to be done first and then worked through your process it is nothing more than a bunch of guesses.

 

[KelSS90]

Are you sure she got it done at Walmart? When you get prints made, do you use the little photo kiosks? I have a feeling those things murder IQ.

It's very possible she did it at an instant kiosk. I had order prints (specifically that one I saw at her house and several others) from various locations/printers, so I'm curious to see how they look when I get them back.

 

[KelSS90]

It could be a multitude of issues that has caused the problem and it may not be printing. I take it you didn't bother to read what I linked to. If you had you would realize there is much you need to do at your end before you even begin editing. For all we know with the lack of information provided, it may well be that what you gave her looked good on your computer but not anywhere else. Do you know that what your monitor shows is what truly on the disk. Has it been hardware calibrated? Have you adjusted the sharpness to high or to low on the monitor and they are compensating for that adjustment in processing? Do you know what the exact export setting was for the file format you chose? There are dozens of reasons there could be an issue, but if you haven't eliminated the things that have to be done first and then worked through your process it is nothing more than a bunch of guesses.

I did read the article that you linked to, which is why I thanked you for providing it and then explained it wasn't the info I was looking for (because I read it, and it didn't answer my questions.) You are clearly irritated at the question/post, and I appreciate you taking the time to answer, but if you are going to be rude then it's probably better to just not post. There is a reason it is posted in the beginner section.

 

[KelSS90]

Thanks for bringing this up because ive been wondering the same thing. And of the conversion they do for image size to ..

I have some time today to do more research and play around with it -- I'll let you know if I have any success with what I find! I'm mainly looking into the settings when I'm exporting from Lightroom.

 

[KmH]

Open Lightroom.
Open the Print module.
In the upper right of the screen click on Help > Lightroom Help OR just press the F1 key on your keyboard.

When the Adobe Community Help page appears click on Printing Photos > Print Module Basics.
There is also an Exporting Photos section.

I highly recommend the comprehensive and relatively inexpensive book: The Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 5 Book: The Complete Guide for Photographers

 

[KelSS90]

Thank you, KmH. After following the help sections on Adobe Help, I think I have everything set right... the only changes I made was setting the resolution to 300 instead of 240, and also changing the image quality from 60% (which is the default) to 75%. I am going to print some images with these changes and hopefully they come back nice and sharp!