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What do we mean by "Image Resolution" anyway and how it's related to printing on paper?

Is resolution related to displaying the image on computer screens too?

What is the meaning of "High Resolution"? High to what perspective?

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possible duplicate of Is there a general formula for image size vs. print size? – mattdm Apr 2 '12 at 19:50
2  
You're right to ask "high from what perspective" when confronted with the term "high resolution". The answer depends on the target medium and on the era — ten years ago, six megapixels was "high resolution" for a digital camera; now, in some contexts, an image isn't really high resolution until it's on the gigapixel scale. (Or, alternately, an image where the smallest features are 100 meters wide might be high resolution in some contexts – mattdm Apr 2 '12 at 19:53
+1 for "The answer depends on the target medium and on the era" – akram Apr 2 '12 at 20:34

1 Answer

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A good way to understand resolution is thiking in the grid of pixels that you have on your screen, rows and columns. More lines, smooth curves, better images. Less lines, more "squares" on your image...

High Resolution is always relative. It s more like an ad than a default standard.

Whatever, in industry, usually 300 ppi (150 dpi) is a nice start resolution for a good printing.

Sounds funny, but video monitors, and computer screens use 72 dpi as default.

Usually, photography cameras offer higher resolution than the video/cinema high-resolution cams can do.

I guess you are looking for this chart:

http://www.design215.com/toolbox/megapixels.php

and a little bit more information:

http://www.design215.com/toolbox/print_guide.php

I hope this helps to clarify you.

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Note that the DPI of 72 for computer screens is largely irrelevant when it comes to photography. The DPI of a computer screen is used as a reference number when dealing with fonts, but the physical PPI (pixels per inch) which determines the level of detail displayed in a photo at a given physical size varies between screens. Also note that Windows uses a nominal DPI of 96, not 72. – Freed Apr 4 '12 at 8:22
@Freed Well pointed. And that's not to talk about pixel aspect ratio. =P – H_7 Apr 4 '12 at 12:17
Pixel (point) aspect ratio is an issue in print too, no? – Freed Apr 4 '12 at 14:08
I guess all "print" jobs work with square pixels. Another diff aspect ratio for pixels are usually used in video/cinema. So, IMHO, its not an issue in print. – H_7 Apr 4 '12 at 14:32
closely related question: photo.stackexchange.com/questions/15699/what-is-pixel-density – H_7 Apr 4 '12 at 14:33
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