What I thought would be a simple project has turned into a bit of a monster. Thanks Jonathan, Russ, Ray, Jerry, and anyone else who contributed to the solution.
The problem appears to be the resolution. I am now exporting the photos from iPhoto to Appleworks Drawing. I am using Appleworks because that is the only program I can work in which I can vary the sizes of several pictures on one page. I have Elements, but learning it for that purpose hasn't happened yet. I had to start over. I exported and printed one page at 500 and another at 300. They were all cropped before exporting, and then I had to make them smaller in order to get all eight on one page. Some photos looked better at 500, and some looked better at 300. Thank you for all the help. I had no idea that what one sees on the monitor may not be what comes out of the printer. This is one case where WYSInotWYG! Luann Jonathan Fletcher wrote: > LuAnn, > > Ditch Appleworks. Use the export function in iPhoto and send those > photos to the disk for printing at the store. In iPhoto 5 it's under > the Share menu: "Burn Disk." That will put the highest res file on a > CD for printing. I am suspecting that Appleworks does not understand > the file format of the shots from your camera, or (more likely) the > drugstore's machine does not understand the Appleworks file format > you saved it in. > > Hmmmm, Maybe... > OTOH, if you are using Appleworks to add other elements to the pages, > that might not be enough. I would try some of the options in > Appleworks' Save As dialog. I would experiment with JPEG, PNG and > TIFF file formats and see what prints better at the drugstore. If it > isn't the resolution issues described by Russ and Ray [Hey! I once > knew a guy named Russ Ray!) then it's probably the file format. > > Here's how you tell: > > In the final prints do the graphics from Appleworks look fine but the > pictures don't? Then it's AppleWorks not being able to work with the > file type out of iPhoto. Try exporting it out of iPhoto in a > different format. (In iPhoto 5 under the Share menu select Export.) > > In the final prints do the graphics look just as bad as the photos? > Then it's the file type you are exporting out of Appleworks that's > the culprit. Again, try Save As and choose JPEG, TIFF or PNG, in that > order. My money is on JPEG solving it for you. DO NOT leave it in > Appleworks format if you want the drugstore to know what it's looking > at. > > Keep us posted. I'm on digest, so if you copy me when you respond I > can get back to you sooner. > > HTH > > j. > > > On Jan 5, 2006, at 5:15 PM, LuAnn Johnson <lizzielu at insightbb.com> > wrote: > >> I edited some pictures with iPhoto, and sharpenening them just a little >> made them look clearer on the monitor. I then put 8-10 on one 8.5x11 >> page in Appleworks drawing and printed them at Wal-mart for a friend to >> use in scrapbooking. The results are horrible - everything is splotchy >> and grainy - the way it looks when I over-sharpen. >> >> I printed them again on my home HP printer, and they are just as bad. >> >> The pictures look perfect on my monitor, so I don't know why this is >> happening. Could it be because I shouldn't have adjusted the >> sharpening? >> >> When I've done slideshows on iMovie, I have always sharpened the photos >> just a bit, and they look much better. The pictures that look great in >> iMovie look horrible when printed. > > > -- > Jonathan Fletcher > jfletch at newmediaconstco.com > > > > > | The next meeting of the Louisville Computer Society will > | be January 24 at Pitt Academy, 6010 Preston Highway. > | The LCS Web page is <http://www.kymac.org>. > | List posting address: <mailto:macgroup at erdos.math.louisville.edu> > | List Web page: <http://erdos.math.louisville.edu/macgroup> > | The next meeting of the Louisville Computer Society will | be January 24 at Pitt Academy, 6010 Preston Highway. | The LCS Web page is <http://www.kymac.org>. | List posting address: <mailto:macgroup at erdos.math.louisville.edu> | List Web page: <http://erdos.math.louisville.edu/macgroup>
