Smugmug Original Size Digital Sales

tshaddick · July 4, 2009

I am currently selling original size photos, and I thought I was resizing them to 8x10, so when I click on original size I assume I am going to see a picture that is 8x10 on my screen, however I am seeing a huge image, like 3 times the size of my screen. I am confused why it is showing such a huge image, and concerned if this is what my customers are getting, because if they don't have a way to resize the image, it might be way to big.

Any suggestions on what is causing this, and is this how big of an image my customers are getting?

Allen · July 5, 2009

tshaddick wrote:

I am currently selling original size photos, and I thought I was resizing them to 8x10, so when I click on original size I assume I am going to see a picture that is 8x10 on my screen, however I am seeing a huge image, like 3 times the size of my screen. I am confused why it is showing such a huge image, and concerned if this is what my customers are getting, because if they don't have a way to resize the image, it might be way to big.

Any suggestions on what is causing this, and is this how big of an image my customers are getting?

Is the download for screen display or printing?

Your screen is set to display so many dots per inch, If your screen is set
to 96 dpi a photo 960 pixels wide will show as 10" wide on your screen.

For printing all you have to worry about is it an 8x10 crop ratio with
enough pixels that will print nicely at 8x10.

jfriend · July 5, 2009

tshaddick wrote:

I am currently selling original size photos, and I thought I was resizing them to 8x10, so when I click on original size I assume I am going to see a picture that is 8x10 on my screen, however I am seeing a huge image, like 3 times the size of my screen. I am confused why it is showing such a huge image, and concerned if this is what my customers are getting, because if they don't have a way to resize the image, it might be way to big.

Any suggestions on what is causing this, and is this how big of an image my customers are getting?

The size something shows on screen has absolutely nothing to do with the size of a print. A print is automatically scaled to the size of the print that is ordered. If an 8x10 print is ordered, the photo is scaled to that size by the printing software and the image is converted to something that matches the dots per inch that the printer uses. The more pixels you have in your originals on Smugmug (up to a limit), the more detail will show in large prints. The fewer pixels you have, the less detail will show.

tshaddick · July 5, 2009

Allen wrote:

Is the download for screen display or printing?

Your screen is set to display so many dots per inch, If your screen is set
to 96 dpi a photo 960 pixels wide will show as 10" wide on your screen.

For printing all you have to worry about is it an 8x10 crop ratio with
enough pixels that will print nicely at 8x10.

It's download for screen, but I want to give the customers the ability to print them if they want by not limiting the pixels in the picture. But that makes perfect sense that it would show differently based on the number of pixels on the screen. So does that make the original images less useful to customers to download if they don't have photo editing software?

jfriend · July 5, 2009

tshaddick wrote:

It's download for screen, but I want to give the customers the ability to print them if they want by not limiting the pixels in the picture. But that makes perfect sense that it would show differently based on the number of pixels on the screen. So does that make the original images less useful to customers to download if they don't have photo editing software?

Every modern computer/OS comes with built-in software that can take a JPEG image of any resolution and print it at a desired size. But, if your viewers want to print their own images from your originals, they are going to need to know how to do that. If they can't print at home, they could stick the image on a USB stick and take it to Costco, Wal-mart, Longs, CVS, Ritz Camera, etc... to get a print made. Of course, if they aren't going to print it themselves at home, they might as well order a professionally made print via your Smugmug site. For those viewers who don't really understand how this works, you should recommend they order prints via your site.

Smugmug Original Size Digital Sales

Comments