I’ve waited. I’ve practiced. I’ve experimented. I’ve made sure I knew how to get my prints to look the way I wanted to before going BIG, as big as my printer can handle. I finally took the plunge this weekend and printed my first 17×22″ print. I chose to print my favorite tree image from Spring Break, The Last Tree.
Even though I wanted to understand the ins and outs before I printed this big, this print was a bit of an experiment, too. The Last Tree is an iPhone 5 image edited in the Noir app. I love Noir for its dramatic monochromatic effects, but the app doesn’t save full resolution files. The info in the app says it does, but that must apply only to phones at the time it was first released (2011) and doesn’t apply to the newer, higher resolution iPhone cameras. I needed to “upsize” the file to increase the resolution, and for that I used the Big Photo app. I was a bit skeptical I would get anything useful out at the end, but the final file came out surprisingly well-processed.
I stepped up to the big print, printing first on 13×19″ paper to verify the new file would look ok, then printing the image on the 17×22″ paper. I was so excited to see the finished print! It came out great. Doesn’t it dwarf my usual prints on 8.5×11″ paper?
The next step was framing. I had purchased some 22×28″ frames and accompanying mats (see my resource page for sources), so that I would have a way to present larger prints. The image at left is the final framed print, temporarily hung on the wall of my family room to give a sense of the scale. The final scene is a bit monochromatic, and the print looks surprisingly small given the size of the frame, but I think it could be a great addition in the right location. In this location, I prefer the color of the painting that usually hangs in above the couch (on right).
So now that I have this print all matted and framed, what am I going to do with it? I’ve no idea! I’ll find a place to hang it in the house, and maybe it will go into an exhibition someday. Until then, I have achieved one of my goals to print as large as I can with my printer, I’ve learned a bit about increasing file resolution with apps and I am ready for the moment I need to print BIG.