What is the best setting for my digital camera when taking pictures for printing?
Always use a high resolution setting for best results. Images should be at 300 dpi in their final size in your layout. Remember, when you bring an image into your layout, you can shrink it down in size but you are limited as to how far you can increase it in size. Example: if you have an image that is 2X2 at 300 dpi and increase its size in the layout to 4X4, the new resolution is 150 dpi. Remember to change the color space from RGB to CMYK. It is always better for you to change the color space than for us to do it. Not all colors that you can see that are created by elements of light (RGB) can be created by the elements of ink (CMYK) on press. If you do not have this capability with your software, do not worry about it. We will change it for you!
Be sure set the camera to the highest quality setting. This means that if you can only save one image on the picture card instead of 12 or 64 images, then this is good! You want to create the highest quality picture that the camera can take. This means large file sizes and slow downloads from the camera to your hard drive, but it will give you the best possible results from your camera. Dont forget, images should be at 300dpi in their final size in the layout so be careful if you are enlarging the file.
