Why does the monthly contest template specify 72 dpi?
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@chrisaakins Graphic designer checking in! 72 dpi is standard for web display, meaning that for the Critique Arena Template, you wouldn't be able to see the difference if it was 300 dpi. It's kinda like pouring gasoline on a fire. You're house is already on fire; who cares if the flame is a 100 degrees hotter? Case in point, here's a side by side comparison of an image of mine, originally created at 450 dpi, exported at 72 dpi and 342 dpi JPGs.
At 100% magnicfication, they're indistinguishable on the monitor, with the added bonus that the 72 dpi image is a small enough file type to upload to the forum or Critique Arena.
However, if you're having issues with the template, I played around with it, and what you can do is (before placing your artwork in there) resize the PSD file to 300 dpi (or whatever you created your native artwork in) - make sure "Resample" isn't checked - then place your artwork in there, and you won't lose any resolution. Then all you have to do is "Save for Web" out to a JPG, which will automatically optimize the resolution to 72 dpi for you. Here's one after the other: template left at 72 dpi, and template increased to 300 dpi, then creating the 72 dpi JPG with "Save for Web."
So, it looks to me that trick to the template is making sure that your native artwork is big enough to not lose resolution when you place and adjust the size of it in the template. That's causing a problem this time, since the template (at 72 dpi) sizes to 16.67 inches square. So, if you place a 10.5" wide artwork in there, and try to expand it at all, you're going to get pixelation. So, the three easiest soultions are:
- Resize (without resampling) the template to 300 dpi, which makes the template size to 4" square. You're artwork is guaranteed to be larger than that, so you won't loose resolution.
- Resize the artwork to larger than 16.67". Yes, the rule says 10.5"x9.5", but all that really matters there is that you have the correct proportions, because before you print, it's all just pixels, not inches anyway. PLUS, you can always save it back down to 10.5" wide when you're ready to export to JPG.
- And finally (and I would do this if it was me), recreate the template in Illustrator, which is a way cleaner program than Photoshp for resizing and exporting files for web display.
Well, this ended up being way more long-winded than I planned (since I was kinda figuring out the template in real time), but I hope it's helpful. Let me know if there's anything I can clear up
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@jdubz Thank you for answering much more succinctly and quickly than me
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Great explanation @ajillustrates.
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@ajillustrates Thank you!
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@chrisaakins I'm currently working on the same size canvas as the template, except I've got it set to 300 dpi. I'm planning on either saving it as a jpeg and dragging it onto the template document or copying and pasting it onto the template document. Crossing my fingers that it works out
Last month I just painted directly onto the template. This worked but I found it hard to get detail in as I have to zoom in really far and squint to see what I was doing as it was really small.
I think this is something that people just need to get used to as they wouldn't of restricted it like this without good reason. I suppose it just means everyone is starting on equal ground and it's good experience for following a brief for those who want to go into professional work.
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@ajillustrates get this guy a charleston chew. Arroooo!
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@SheerArt Hahaha!
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@ajillustrates Thanks! that totally worked! Sometimes my newbieness to Photoshop shows.
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@chrisaakins Great! Happy to help
