Expert: Scott Valentine - 2/4/2010

Question
hi scott
iam a novice at photoshop, using CS3 how can i change the resolution of a background picture that i downloaded from the internet, i wish to be able to enlarge the final picture to canvas size 75x100cm
many thanks

Answer
Hi Jada,

Unfortunately, there is no simple way to change the resolution to make larger images. When you try to make an image larger, you are moving the pixels further apart. You are effectively asking Photoshop to invent pixels to fill in the gaps left behind, and it's not great at doing that.

Some applications may be able to help, like AlienSkin's Blow Up plugin, but they are very expensive and meant for high quality photographic work.

Now, that being said, you may be able to simply stretch the image using the Transform Scale tool. Try it and see if the quality is still acceptable to you.

Start by opening your image in CS3, then go to the top menu and select Image > Canvas Size. From there, make sure the following settings are enabled: the 'Relative' box is *not* checked, and the Anchor is in the center of the 9 squares. Change the drop down selection to cm (it is probably showing pixels), then enter the canvas size you wish in cm. Click OK

Under the Edit top menu, choose Transform > Scale, and drag the image handles out to the boundaries of your canvas. When you are done, press Enter and the scaling will apply. Keep in mind that this is a very crude approach, and the results may not be acceptable.

I hope this helps, even though it may not get you the result you wanted.

Best of luck - and if you have further questions, please don't hesitate to ask!

-Scott