January 6, 2006

Tim’s Checkin' Things Out

George's Going to Market: Pixels, DPI and Image Quality

Rich’s Ramblings: My Low-Resolution Plan for the New Year

Greetings!

Welcome to 2006. May it be even cooler for you and yours than 2005—if that’s even possible.

Just wanted to touch on one of the most talked about emails of the holiday season. I would imagine that everyone got a taste of this one—where some guy fixed up his house so that the Christmas lights were brilliantly synchronized to music. It was done so well that immediately our radar went off that this might be a fake.

Whenever we receive an email that might seem fishy, we try to check out if it is real before passing it along. Where? One of the best sites on the web: www.snopes.com.

Snopes really has it down to a science and you’ll find all your favorites here—both TRUE and FALSE ones. If you go to the site, prepare yourself to spend some time there—especially in the “photos” section.

Anyway, we found out that this was in fact TRUE. If you want to know the story behind the email, read on...

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“Truth is more of a stranger than fiction.”
     —Mark Twain

“Humanity is acquiring all the right technology for all the wrong reasons.”
     —R. Buckminster Fuller

George's Going to Market: Pixels, DPI and Image Quality

It looks fine on my screen. Can we print it?

A picture is worth a thousand words. Whether they are professional shots, computer-generated images, or snaps from your digital camera, using pictures within your marketing communications is a complex but important business. While a great image communicates well, a poor image will hurt your image.

So what is resolution anyway? And what is the difference between digital and print?

Digital. It’s about the pixels.

For digital pictures, resolution refers to the number of pixels in the image. So four Megapixels is about 4,000,000 pixels. It is roughly equivalent to pixel width times pixel height of the image. For instance, a four Megapixel image could be around 2400X1600 pixels.

What does this mean? Well, the computer screen you are looking at right now is set at a particular resolution. The larger the screen, the larger you likely have your screen resolution set. If you have a smaller monitor, it may be set at 800X600 or 1024X768. If you have larger screen it may be at 1280X1024 or even higher.

Now, if your monitor is set to 1024X768 and you open up an image that is 640X480, it will only fill up a part of your screen. If you open up an image that is 2400X1600, however, you will find yourself moving the slider bar around to see all the different parts of the image. Some consumer picture programs automatically re-size the image to fit on your screen. Most of the time, however, you can find the option to view the image at 100%, which will show you the true size.

Smaller pictures can be “stretched” larger than 100%, but they’ll start to look rough around the edges or “pixilated.”

Printing Digital Pictures

So you open a .jpg file or view your logo on your website and it looks good. Can you reproduce that exact image in your brochure? If so, how big? Well, you can make as big a print as you want but you will start to see the quality drop off. On your computer monitor, “inches” don’t really exist. It’s how many pixels you’re seeing. But on paper, we need to pay attention to dots per inch (DPI).

For standard 4-color lithography (how most marketing materials are printed), a minimum of 300 DPI is the ideal. As you go lower, your image quality will be reduced.

Pixels to Print – Estimating Resolution Needed

Say we want to print an 8X10 picture at 300 dpi. What resolution must we have to do this? Well, remember we want 300 dots per inch. Therefore, 300 times 8 is 2400 and 300 times 10 is 3000. Therefore, we would need a 3000X2400 image. 3000 times 2400 is 7.2 megapixels! It’s also a file size that will be perhaps 10-18 megabytes.

The bottom line here is that the resolution of the image should meet the 300 DPI threshold in order for it to look its best in print. A picture saved off the web or used in a PowerPoint may only be about 300X300 pixels. Do the math again and you get a “printable” size here of only 1”X1”!

There is so much more that could be discussed, such as RGB vs. CMYK, file compression, image correction and many other details. But knowing the basics outlined above can be very valuable and will save a good deal of time, money and frustration. As for the rest, unless you want to devote yourself to studying this broad subject in a lot of depth, you will probably want to leave it up to the professionals!

George Couris
george@peppergroup.com

Rich’s Ramblings: My Low-Resolution Plan for the New Year

Once again, it’s time for everyone with writer’s block to meet their deadline by trotting out a list of New Year’s resolutions. Taking this grand tradition one step further, I present the Top 10 New Year’s Resolutions, painstakingly researched by someone other than myself. According to an authoritative source I stumbled across while browsing the Internet for more pictures of Paris Hilton, they are as follows:

1. Spend more time with family and friends.
2. Exercise more.
3. Lose weight.
4. Quit smoking.
5. Enjoy life more.
6. Quit drinking.
7. Get out of debt.
8. Learn something new.
9. Help others.
10. Get organized.

Of course, few would create such a list with the intention of actually following through. For most of us, just the effort of making our list of resolutions is effort enough for one year. With that in mind, I present my own Top 10 New Year’s Resolutions:

1. Spend more time buying lottery tickets.
2. Exercise just a bit more than Elvis did.
3. Lose enough weight so I can still reach the bag of Cheetos propped on my stomach.
4. Read more. (All those scores at the bottom of the ESPN screen, for example.)
5. Buy every new electronic device the moment it becomes available.
6. Build six-lane bridge across Pacific Ocean with my recycled obsolete electronic devices.
7. Stop rotating tires for longer wear; start rotating couch cushions.
8. Stop dwelling on my past (so I’ll have even more time to worry about my future).
9. Quit drinking a shot of tequila for each resolution accomplished.
10. Save time by shortening next year’s list to Top 5 Resolutions.

Now these are resolutions I can live with. If, on the other hand, you are more idealistic and plan to exercise, eat right and annoy the rest of us with your good habits, let me take this opportunity to recommend our clients’ fine products to help you accomplish your goals.

Fitbug
Fitbug is a comprehensive fitness program that connects you with personal coaches online. It includes a next generation pedometer called the "Bug" that uses two patented piezoelectric sensors to deliver 98.7%+ accuracy.

Fitbug tracks the number of steps you take, distance covered, calories burned, fat grams burned, and the time spent in aerobic activity—a critical factor because that affects the health of your heart and lungs.

The Bug fits in your pocket (or on your belt, or even in a shoulder purse); fits in busy schedules (you're already walking, Fitbug encourages you to walk more); fits in tight budgets (discounted rate of $99 includes a year of personal coaching services); so you feel healthier (research confirms even moderate walking is great for your health).

Regularly priced at $139, you can join for only $99 including a one-year subscription! Just log on to myfitbug.com and use the promo code GetFit (case-sensitive). But hurry, this special offer expires January 31, 2006!

The Herbal Garden
When it comes to eating right, it doesn’t get much better than food prepared with fresh, natural herbs. The Herbal Garden fresh herbs can be found at your favorite grocery stores in the fresh produce section. Visit them at theherbalgarden.com for recipe ideas and much more.

Here’s to a healthy and prosperous 2006 for all!

Rich Adkins
rich@peppergroup.com

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