Hey all! One of my most popular articles/tutorials is a rather large write-up on the difference between DPI and screen resolution because it seems like almost everyone is a a little confused on what the two mean and how they affect each other (or rather how they DON’T). The tutorial was called “Learn how to use the right DPI for Printing or On-Screen Graphics – Making Sense of the DPI Equation” and you can check it out by clicking HERE.

A TON of you have posted comments and questions and added more information on this article and I thank you all for your contributions! Recently I received an email from a fellow designer named Steven and he was a little confused about the tutorial and had a question regarding how to apply this article to his current project of printing our business cards. I thought it was a great question and one that I have received many times in one form or another, so I thought I would share it on here for anyone else that was having a similar issue. Here is the original email I received:

I loved your tutorial at 13dots.com about dpi and printing. Truthfully, you seem far more patient and methodical that many others on the net, many thanks.

*Dan blushes furiously*

I followed the links to Danrichard.com. There was one important piece of info that I felt was missing, and that’s why I’m writing.

What program works well for downsizing for print? My photos are at 2048×1536 at 72dpi. Because of you, I understand that the dpi is essential here. I want to print these in business card sizes, without losing detail. So I’m thinking 300 dpi (likely the max of the colour commercial laser printer I’ll be using) is my goal. 300×2in (height) is 600dots vertical by 900 dots horizontal…(hmm that doesn’t seem to help me, please disregard). What program (open source would be best, like gimp) will reduce to 3″x2″ at 300 dpi? I’ve spent the last 8 hours trying to do this, using gimp, browsing so many tutuorials, etc. My images look so blocky and lose so much detail.

Many sites said to use photoshop (Image> Image Size menu. Click on Resample Image and choose Bicubic Sharper from the drop-down menu). Is that the only way? I’m so trying to stay open source.

Legit question right? Here’s my windy answer…

The first thing you need to let go of is the screen resolution vs DPI, it’s meaningless. So if your native digital image is 2048 x 1536, then that is it’s screen size no matter what the DPI is… DPI is for printing, it has no bearing on screen size. So if an image is 2048 x 1536, then it will be that size no matter what the DPI happens to be when measuring it for printing in inches or CMs for example. So, now, what you want to do is calculate how big your native digital images needs to be in pixels to achieve a 3 x 2 inch image at 300 DPI.

By the way, first let’s see how big this image is at 72 DPI in inches, the math is very easy:

2048 pixels / 72 DPI = 28.44 inches wide
1356 pixels / 72 DPI = 18.83 inches tall

If you do the same thing with 300 DPI, then the image would print out to this size:

2048 pixels / 300 DPI = 6.83 inches wide
1356 pixels / 300 DPI = 4.52 inches tall

So, this means that if you were to print out this image in its native resolution, you would end up with an image 28.44″ x 18.83″.

The question is, how big does it have to be in pixels to be equal to a 300 DPI 3″ x 2″ image. So now we do the reverse:

3 inches x 300 DPI = 900 pixels
2 inches x 300 DPI = 600 pixels

So your image on your screen would be 900 x 600 pixels and when you print it out, you either set the image to 3″ x 2″ at 300 DPI or simply set force the image to print at 3″ x 2″ and it will automatically work at 300DPI. Do you understand what I mean by the difference of DPI for printing vs on your screen? The image on your screen is 900 x 600 no matter WHAT you set the DPI too. The only time DPI matters is when you go to print!

Now, on the other hand, your native image is a lot bigger than 900 x 600, so it would be a shame to limit yourself to 300DPI, why not go to 600DPI? If you do that, then you simply double the pixel count to 1800 x 1200 and if you print that out in 600 DPI, you would get a 3″ x 2″ print out.

You can easily do this with Gimp or any other program Just do a regular resample or resize to whatever size you need and you should be fine.

I hope this makes sense!
Dan

So basically, you don’t need any fancy filters or effects to do this… just do a regular image resize to the proper pixel size and it’s done. I mean really, you could even do this with MS Paint! Then from there depending on the program you are using, you either set the image from within the software to 3″ x 2″ at 300 or 600 DPI and print directly, or if the open source application does not allow you to do that, use the printer settings directly to force the image to the size you want in inches and the DPI will be automatically adjusted.

Hope that helps guys!
Dan

Good morning everyone! Just wanted to let you guys know that I wrote a short little tutorial on how to use pre-made image packs to create cool wallpaper texture effects without having to use extensive brushing.

This tutorial shows you how you can use the AMAZING and very cool GoMedia Vector Packs to easily create sweet textures and artwork in minutes. I was always seeing tutorials on how to use these graphic packs in Photoshop or Illustrator, so I figured that I would show you Corel folks how they can also be applied in Photopaint. We’ll use Object styles to generate some cool blending effects with multiple images from these packs.

This tutorial is hosted on the P2L publishing system, so please click here to check it out.

This is what you end up getting by the end of the tutorial, and once you’re familiar with this type of design, you can pull off simple pieces like this in a matter of minutes:

Hope you like this tutorial, be sure to post your comments!

Take care,
Dan

Good evening everyone! I am now on a new PC that I just built so I can finally work on those huge 300 DPI poster images without taking 10 minutes each time I try to do something in Corel Photopaint. Along with my upgraded PC I also went ahead and updated to the latest version of CorelDraw Suite X4. I’ve updated from version 12, so I’ve missed quite a few versions over the last couple of years so I’m getting used to the new changes and features and I am trying to work out some kinks.

First off, I am VERY happy to see that X4 has FIXED the NIB problem! I can now delete and add nibs and the thumbnails aren’t all screwed up! If you’re not sure what I am talking about, you can check out some posts I’ve made on the matter here:

It’s Official – Nib Bug is Unresolved Bug in Photopaint

Corel Photopaint Nib Error Explained… and it’s still a bug in X3!

So now that they’ve got the NIB problem fixed, I should be as happy as a pig in mud right? Nope, Corel has decided to throw a new problem in to the mix. You might remember a tutorial I wrote awhile back on How to import Photoshop ABR brushes in to Corel Photopaint. In one of the steps, we talk about opening up a PNG image, and in Corel Photopaint 12, 32 bit PNGs open up as a mask on a black background. So, all you had to do was click on “Create Nib from Mask” from the Nib toolbar and you were all set. Well now, when you open a PNG in Corel Photopaint X4, the PNG loads as an unmasked object on a blank transparent background.

Now, you can create a mask of the object and add that as a Nib, but it doesn’t work properly, the Nib seems to be inverted. So, the manual process here is to create a mask from the object, change the background color to black, then merge the object with the background and then add the Nib.

Let me first say, at this point I have no idea if there is a setting in X4 so that PNGs open as a masked black background. I’ve looked on Google and found a couple of people reporting the same issue, but no solution has been found. If I find one, I’ll be sure to post it, or if you know how to set this, please click the comment button below and share the knowledge!

In the meantime, I created a quick little Corel Script (.csc) to automate the process of creating the mask and merging it to a background. I have also included a new blank .Nib pack so you can easily have an empty template to create Nib packs.

Click here to download the Script and blank Nib pack.

This script and Nib file is confirmed to work in X4, but I suspect it will work in any of the X versions as well as 11 and 12.

Here’s what the script looks like:

Simple eh? If you’ve never used scripts before, they are extremely handy and a HUGE time saver. Here’s how you load this script:

1. Unzip the file and save the .csc file somewhere handy
2. Open Corel Photopaint
3. Set the background color to black
4. Click on Windows » Dockers » Recorder
5. The Script Recorder will now open… click on the folder icon and browse to where you saved the script file you downloaded.
6. Open the PNG file
7. Press the Play button on the Recorder Docker and you’re done!

PLEASE NOTE that you must have black selected as the background color before running the script!

And this is what you will end up getting… the object on transparent background becomes a black background with a mask of the image:

Once again though, Corel has failed to allow us to create a blank Nib file from the menu, so I went ahead and deleted every Nib from the default one and saved it as a blank template for you. So if you want to create a Nib pack of just leaves for example, you can load the blank template, save it as LEAVES.NIB and start adding your Nibs!

WARNING!!! Remember to first save the blank template as something else BEFORE you start to add Nibs. Remember, when you make changes to a Nib, it’s automatically saved right on the spot, so don’t make the mistake of adding Nibs to your blank template or deleting stuff you shouldn’t. For example, let’s say you load the blank template you downloaded and add a bunch of Nibs to it, then you do a ’save as’ and call it mynibs.nib. Well, not only do you now have Nibs in that mynibs.nib file, but if you go back to the blank Nib template, you’ll notice it now has all those Nibs too! Oops! So remember that changes to the Nibs are saved real-time, make sure you are changing the right file!!!

If you’re reading this and wondering how you’re supposed to load the blank Nib template or how to add the Nibs, please be sure to read the tutorials I wrote on how to do this:

Importing Brushes – How to import Photoshop ABR brushes in to Corel Photopaint! Learn how you can import Adobe Photoshop .ABR brush packs into Corel Photopaint and CorelDraw and use them as nibs on your brushes!

How to Load and Install Corel Photopaint NIB Brush Packs! Learn how to install NIB packs in to Corel Photopaint and learn about why working with the Nibs management is so difficult!

So let’s have a round of applause for Corel for finally fixing the Nib thumbnail problem… Bravo! Now, please fix these other 2 issues:

1. Would be nice to be able to create a new blank Nib template by clicking New in the Nib menu.

2. The 999 pixel limitation for Nibs sucks! I’ve got Photoshop brushes twice that size, but I have to reduce them to 999 pixels so I can work with them in Photopaint. Boooooo!

With that said, I am going to start working on some new packs for you guys to download, it seems the first few I made have been extremely popular. The old ones though are screwed up, they contain all kinds of different brushes, not just what the pack is supposed to be. I’ll work on cleaning those up as well as provide you guys with new pack conversions.

That’s it for now, enjoy!
Dan

UPDATE September 18, 2008

I was browsing the CorelDraw forums and I found this:

Hi,
this (mis-)behavior was intruduced in Photopaint X3 SP2. Corel states this as a new Feature:

GIF/PNG

Transparencies are preserved and displayed correctly when opened with Corel PHOTO-PAINT. Previously, transparencies were viewed as masks.

Image color and alpha channel transparencies are maintained on import into CorelDRAW.

Unfortunately the Second point is wrong! There seams to be no way to get back the color-information in 100% Transparent areas.

Photoshop suffers this same misbehavior since a long time (i think ever), but there is a 3rd party import/export-plugin “superPNG” correcting this and opening PNGs with a mask. Sadly this plugin doesn’t work with Photopaint (“File Format Plugins”,.8be), eaven if photoshop-filter-plugins (.8bf) do work in Photopaint.

@Corel: It would be greatly appreciated, if there would be a way to open PNGs without loosing imageinformation. Just as in all former Corel Versions.

So looks like this was done by Corel on purpose and there is no way to set it back to how it worked before.

Found a nice little post this morning for those of you that have removed from Google search results or have been penalized in any way. You may remember awhile back P2L was severely penalized by Google for not using the nofollow tags on our paid partner links. We’ve since had our PR status returned to normal, but I did get a lot of comments and questions from other folks with the same issue. So I figured this would be a great article, please visit Search Engine Watch Blog for the article.

The best part of the article is the video featuring Moeva from Google’s Search Quality Team with a great how-to presentation on what to do when you’ve been nuked from Google. Check it out, it’s definitely worth a look and very helpful.

Enjoy!
Dan

Just published a new article I received from Sitepro that I thought was a pretty cool little introduction to Social Media driven traffic and wanted to share.

SMO, or Social Media Optimization, helps build website traffic by using social media based websites. The dawning of web 2.0 has seen many different social media websites crop up in an equally large number of different guises. Content sharing, social bookmarking, and collaborative websites form the basis of this initiative and it is these types of websites that you need to use in order to leverage the power of the social web. In today’s article written by Matt Jackson, we’ll show you how to take full advantage of social media to start driving traffic to your website.

Please read the rest of the article by clicking here and reading it on the P2L Publishing System.

Comments are welcome!
Dan