Desperate need of huge photos

[Macnoviz]

We need to find photos that are about 60 MB in size, for large printing in our parish. It needs to be something that suits a catholic church, something like the Last Supper, or something like that. Can anybody recommend good sites where you can find photos or art in those sizes. Money is no problem.

I tried iStockphoto.com, but to no avail.

 

[Applespider]

You might be better off giving an idea of the size you want these to be displayed at - or the resolution you require rather than a file size that might depend on format/etc

Are they going to be displayed where someone will be standing right next to them? Or will they usually be viewed from a distance - banners on the wall viewed from the aisle or perhaps hung from the ceiling? You might get away with a lower resolution for those images which would be easier to source.

 

[Macnoviz]

You might be better off giving an idea of the size you want these to be displayed at - or the resolution you require rather than a file size that might depend on format/etc

Are they going to be displayed where someone will be standing right next to them? Or will they usually be viewed from a distance - banners on the wall viewed from the aisle or perhaps hung from the ceiling? You might get away with a lower resolution for those images which would be easier to source.

Well, this was the requirement that was given to us by the company that will make it. It should be around 3 by 4 meters, and he gave 5 MB/m^2 as a requirement (we could get away with a bit less, too)

I actually have no idea what resolution this corresponds to, or even what compression he uses, but that will have to do. (I am only partially involved in the project)

 

[Abstract]

5 MB per metre squared? What does that even mean in real terms?

I think it'd be better if you got him to post here, or if you got the "pixels per inch" (ppi) he is looking for. I think we'd be able to figure out the rest from there in terms of how many MP he needs.

 

[Macnoviz]

5 MB per metre squared? What does that even mean in real terms?

I think it'd be better if you got him to post here, or if you got the "pixels per inch" (ppi) he is looking for. I think we'd be able to figure out the rest from there in terms of how many MP he needs.

Well, that would be rather difficult, I'll try to get decent directions, but for now, let's say I need about 40 MP photos

 

[Sweetfeld28]

i have a 30GB photo, and it took almost a whole day to copy my 30GBs of music to my iPod. So, if the newer iPods still used the firewire cords i would say to use that, but i think they don't work with the newer iPods.

ryan

 

[serpent]

I think your gonna have to find somebody local to you thats willing to shoot some high quality photos with a $30,000 camera. I don't think your gonna find anything uploaded on the net that meets your requirements.

 

[beavo451]

I think your gonna have to find somebody local to you thats willing to shoot some high quality photos with a $30,000 camera. I don't think your gonna find anything uploaded on the net that meets your requirements.

File size alone cannot determine the resolution or size of an image file. I can have a 4 megapixel image from a D2H saved as a NEF at ~6MB, JPG at ~ 1.5MB, or TIFF at ~12MB. I can then upsize it easily to well over 100MB.

Another example: A 24x36 inch image at 300 dpi is over 200MB as a TIFF file. It is around 6MB (IIRC) if it is a JPEG.

 

[Macnoviz]

i have a 30GB photo, and it took almost a whole day to copy my 30GBs of music to my iPod. So, if the newer iPods still used the firewire cords i would say to use that, but i think they don't work with the newer iPods.

ryan

I think your are confused. I need a photo or some sort of artwork that is about 60 Megapixels, which takes about 60 MB (your mileage may vary a lot)
I am looking for sites where images of this magnitude can be purchased.

 

[cube]

http://www.betterlight.com/contactRentals.asp

 

[Grimace]

You aren't going to find that very easily. The top of the range DSLRs are 16.7MP. These will print (.5 meter by .75 meters) pretty well.

If viewed from a distance, you can probably go (2 meters x 3 meters) - maybe check out places that print banners.

 

[cube]

Doesn't the Vatican have these pics??

 

[ChrisA]

Getting image files that large is not a problem. I have some scane taken of medium format film that could be printed quite large. However they are not what you'd want.

Why not hire a photographer. You do NOT really want to use stock photos because it looks "cheap" whenthose same photos appear some place else. Especially as you have no controlover where else those stock photos are used. Hire someone to get you exactly what you need.

 

[ChrisA]

I think your gonna have to find somebody local to you thats willing to shoot some high quality photos with a $30,000 camera. I don't think your gonna find anything uploaded on the net that meets your requirements.

You don't need a $30K camera. All you need is a medium format film camera and a scanner. You can rent the camera for $100 per day and have the lab do the high res scans. About a $200 total cost but you would need a photographer with some skill and artistic vision if the results are to be worth displaying

For this kind of work I would use a 4x5 view camera shoot transparencies and have them scanned on a drum scanner. and end up with about a 100MP file

 

[ChrisA]

5 MB per metre squared? What does that even mean in real terms? .

This is actually reasonable. He is giving square units per square unit.

5MP per M^2 is about 2236 pixels per meter or about 2 and a quarter per millimeter. or if you like inches roughly 55 dots per inch.

 

[Macnoviz]

Getting image files that large is not a problem. I have some scane taken of medium format film that could be printed quite large. However they are not what you'd want.

Why not hire a photographer. You do NOT really want to use stock photos because it looks "cheap" whenthose same photos appear some place else. Especially as you have no controlover where else those stock photos are used. Hire someone to get you exactly what you need.

It would be very hard to find something that would work, ideally we would need high quality scans from paintings or such.

I'm from Belgium, and I don't think there is a large chance such photos would appear elsewhere, or in the case of a painting it won't really matter.
This also means links to camera rentals or so are not really of use

 

[wordmunger]

I would suggest contacting a museum directly. Most museums have high-res photos of their works, and they will gladly sell them to you, for a price.

 

[serpent]

maybe you should look at the Blad forums you may find someone there who has some files that you can use.
an example of what can be done, from Potokina show booth:
http://www.dpreview.com/articles/photokina2006/Hasselblad/IMG_0692.jpg

 

[gauchogolfer]

You might check out the gigapixel project website to see if anything there catches your fancy.

 

[Qianlong]

hello

maybe someone from this Belgian website can help you out:
http://forum.belgiumdigital.com/index.php

(wel eerst een account maken vr je kan posten)

 

[Dafke]

this hubble website has some large pictures. don't know if they are appropriate for a church though. i think they are cool.

 

[GoCubsGo]

I think your are confused.

Actually by reading your posts, I think you're confused.

I'm not sure that you're going to find any 60mb photos for sale that you download on your own. I think you'll find someone who will sell you a photo that is 3x5 meters and you'll never know what the file size was.

 

[zync]

You could stitch a few photos together from a decent DSLR. There is also a plugin (I can't for the life of me remember its name right now—I think it starts with a 'p') that can up-res images pretty well without losing much in quality. You can print billboards from DSLR files, you just have to know how to do it (of course they're generally designed to be viewed from far away, but not all of them are).

As for finding a subject, most will probably be copyrighted. I have a bunch of photos from the Louvre but I'm sure one of us would get sued if you used them

I think, as was noted already, contacting a museum is your best bet. You could also try contacting various churches in Europe. Many of them contain priceless artworks and they might offer a copy at a cheaper price.

 

[Macnoviz]

I don't know wether you have saying like this, but we say "the monkey has come out of the sleeve"
I just heard from them, and apparently they forgot to mention that they need a 60 MB file in TIFF format, and CMYK colors. Which means I don't really need a huge photo. I'm not sure how large it should be, maybe someone can convert these specs to pixels?

 

[bousozoku]

You could stitch a few photos together from a decent DSLR. There is also a plugin (I can't for the life of me remember its name right now—I think it starts with a 'p') that can up-res images pretty well without losing much in quality. You can print billboards from DSLR files, you just have to know how to do it (of course they're generally designed to be viewed from far away, but not all of them are).
...

The same company, onOne Software, owns the two products used for such work.

pxl SmartScale and Genuine Fractals.