We're talking resolution issues here! I don't remember specifically about PSE 1, but I suspect that it, like PSE 2, has 72ppi as the default resolution for printing from the picture package. That's way too low to get nice prints from an inkjet printer. A target resolution would be in the range of 150ppi to 300ppi.

Try this experiment: Open a COPY of an image that has just come out of your camera. Go to Image>Resize>Image Size and take a look at the document dimensions (which is usually set in inches) and then look at the resolution at the bottom of the page. Many cameras save at a resolution of 72ppi. If this isn't increased to something higher, prints will appear pixelated.

Now with that window still open do this: First, look toward the bottom of the Image Resize screen and make sure there is NO checkmark in the box that says Resample. Now try changing the resolution only and watch what happens to the document size. The higher the resolution gets, the smaller the document gets.

I strongly suspect that when you chose to print an 8 X 10 image, the resolution was 72ppi and the document size was considerably larger. The automated resizing process cut down the physical dimensions of your photo but left the resolution at 72ppi. It was resampling downwards, which means it was throwing away digital information that couldn't be utilized when printing an 8 X 10 at 72ppi. That degrades the quality of your print a whole lot.

Most of us here on the forum usually do all of our resizing manually so that we can retain control over the resolution. Generally speaking, it's advisable to increase the size of a photo through managing the resolution without making use of resampling. There are some situations in which this can't be done. When that happens, we resample upwards in increments of 10% using the Bicubic resampling option of Elements.

This is really a common issue for people new to using Elements. If you have more questions, please feel free to repost. There are a lot of knowledgeable people here on the forum who can help, and there are also a couple of good internet sites with information about resolution issues, printing, etc.

John_W_Bower

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Pixelated printing in Elements 1.0 w/Epson printer?