What is Resolution and Compression

What is Resolution?

You have probably seen the term ‘resolution’ numerous times already. But what does it actually mean? Resolutions tells us what the quality and sharpness of an image is, by measuring the density of the amount of pixels. A higher resolution means a higher quality image.

To make sure you have enough details and sharpness in an image for printing, you need a minimal resolution of 300 dots per inch (dpi). When this number of dots increases, the sharpness of your photo increases too. Anything more than from 300 dpi is not noticeable when it comes to normal print. This means you get the best results with images on 300 dpi.

When you have a picture with a resolution of 72 dpi and change this to 300 dpi, the photo will shrink. The 72 dpi photo under this text shows you just that. When we change this to 300 dpi, the photo shrinks.

Here you can see an impression of the photo at 300 dpi, but properly sized. This is the optimal size for the picture in order to be used for print. This leaves a small margin to make the picture a little bit bigger.

You can always make a picture smaller without loss of quality, but making a picture bigger always results in lower quality!

What is compression?

Compression happens to save an image to your hard disk using as little data as possible. That’s why they’re usually saved as a JPG file. Using this compression does come with a couple of quality risks.

When you increase your compression, your quality decreases. High compression means that pixels of approximately the same colours are made one colour. This results in a less detailed image. When you save a compressed image, it is no longer possible to increase the quality.

So always keep your images at 300dpi in the printable size, and always save your jpg as a high quality file to ensure super crisp high quality prints. Start printing today!