Size of Painting

[bcarll]

The one thing I have learned from this forum and other teaching site s that the larger the finished painting the more it looks like a real painting. I primarily do smudge type technique and have that to be true even more. My question is --- is there a way to work on a smaller canvas and achieve the painterly look? Most of the time I work on a 16X20 canvas but hardly ever print in that size. Most of the time anyone wanting my work ( few they are) are not wanting the bigger sofa size prints rather an 8X10 matted and framed with an overall size of 16X20. That's great for me because of the availability of the 8X10 size locally but am I sacrificing the look we want by using that smaller format? I did experiment with using 11X14 and it was a satisfactory look so please comment on this and if you have a trick or two getting the larger look on a smaller canvas please share.

bcarll

[mistermonday]

bcarll, if your canvas is your computer monitor, there will be no difference on screen between the two sizes, ot any other size with the same aspect ratio and image resolution. If viewers get a "more painterly" feeling form a larger size print, that is the result of their visual perception. If it makes you feel better to work on an 8x10 canvas, set it to that size but change the resolution to 600 ppi when you create it. When you are all done, if you want to print a 16x20, do Image>Adj>Image Size, turn OFF the resample check box and change either dimension (8 to 16 or 12 to 20). If you want to print an 8 x 10, just leave the size as 8 x 10 @ 600 ppi and it will print fine.
Regards, Murray

[Fluffbutt]

I'd disagree with that to some extent...

I've found that with many many plugins, you get a different output with a larger (or higher dpi) image that you do with a small (or lower dpi) image.

Presuming his work entails some plugin use, it would be beneficial to work on larger images and then resize down.

Having said that I've also had pretty good results with medium size images then resizing them bigger - I guess it really depends on how destructive the art working effects (either man-made or plugin) are. The more they change an image, the better it looks resized medium --> large.

It may be one of those questions for which there are too many variable to say "this is good" or "that is better", etc.

[palms1]

Hi bcarll

Brad buttry ( who does "virtual paintings" ) has wrote in another forum to try working on a image half the size of what you want to print at between 240 and 300 pixel
I have tried something similar but not at a higher res and it did come out better, Wether it is worth doing your painting at your normal size then making smaller to print larger (phew) not sure but maybe worth a try

please let us know how you get on

Palms