Originally posted by: LordSnailz
How do I know if I have the "original" picture? Is there anyway to check? I've done what's listed above and it looks correct but the picture still comes out grainy ...
The picture I have is 2048x1536 JPEG image, and the size is about 859kb.
I don't think you can tell really. Only by how good the picture prints I'm guessing. If the picture is grainy and you are printing at 300dpi it could mean that some resampling may have been carried out or you are trying to print the picture below, say 150dpi which can cause this grainy look. Some say however that depending on the quality of the printer the eye doesn't necessarily notice any difference between 300 and 150dpi (although technically there is).
A picture of 2048 x 1536 and JPEG is a 3.1 MP image and if I'm honest at 859kb sounds as though it wasn't taken at the highest quality, could be wrong though. I know that on both my IXUS 2.1 MP camera I got 1600 x 1200 pics and they were about 1mb in size on the highest setting and my IXUS 4MP camera tends to take pics around the 1.5mb (forget the size, heads no working this morning).
What I have found whilst printing photos, is that is is so important to not only have a good high resolution picture, you also need a printer (with the highest resolution, some say 1440dpi as a minimum) and photo paper of equal quality. I had a HP Deskjet 890Pro which printed at 300dpi and to be honest ALL my pics looked grainy. Printer quality is of huge importance if you want photo quality pictures. Sorry for stating the obvious but it's true.
As an example I have an Canon IXUS 400 Digital Camera (4MP), a Canon S9000 Printer and I use Canon's Photo Paper Pro (Ref: PR101?) and I can get away with a full A4 size photo quality print, which doesn't print at 300dpi.
Hope that helps.
