Skip to Content
 

Resizing cards without blurriness

8 replies [Last post]
PaulG
Offline
Joined: 07/21/2012

Hi!

I've been printing out prototype copies of my cards, but I make them all larger than necessary. I've been resizing them with Irfanview, but they get blurry. I'm about to release the PnP playtest version of a game, so I want the cards to look right.

Anyone have any idea what I should be doing?

Thanks!
Paul

ninjaneer
ninjaneer's picture
Offline
Joined: 03/11/2013
Oversized Art

I think your best bet is to make your art oversized to begin with and then shrink it down to the proper size. Upscaling alone will always result in a blurry image because your image only has so much resolution to begin with. Otherwise you will have to go over and clean it up by hand for the new size.

Or upscale the image in MS Paint or something, but that will make it look blocky.

nand
nand's picture
Offline
Joined: 07/27/2008
Irfanview has six filters for

Irfanview has six filters for resampling an image (and one resize function). Which method have you tried?
Can you post an example?

PaulG
Offline
Joined: 07/21/2012
Ah, my cards are all too big,

Ah, my cards are all too big, it's making them smaller that causes the blurriness.

I've been using the batch resize - what do you mean by an example? I just set a bunch into the batch, change size, and convert from .psd to either png or jpeg (have tried both with no luck).

Thanks,
Paul

questccg
questccg's picture
Offline
Joined: 04/16/2011
Use TGC templates

PaulG wrote:
Ah, my cards are all too big, it's making them smaller that causes the blurriness.

You should use The Game Crafter (TGC) templates (.PSD). It gives you the EXACT size cards should be at 300 dpi.

Here is the link for the .PSD: http://s3.amazonaws.com/www.thegamecrafter.com/templates/poker-card.psd

The size is 2.5" x 3.5" at 300 dpi. This makes the image LARGER (due to the resolution) but gives you EXACT size when you print.

NOTE: You can prepare a .PSD using the template to create a 1 page with 9 cards (for PNP). It's tight - but I know it is doable. Once you have it setup properly all you need to do is LOAD a card (without the bleed) and then paste it into your 9 card template...

PaulG
Offline
Joined: 07/21/2012
I kind of wish I'd started

I kind of wish I'd started with a template! At the moment though, a friend of mine made the basic card design and I've just been plugging the text and numbers in. My photoshop abilities are actually pretty low, and I'm unsure what methods exist for me to efficiently resize a large number of cards. :(

nand
nand's picture
Offline
Joined: 07/27/2008
In batch conversion

In batch conversion (IrfanView) there is a checkbox "Use Resample function (better quality)", you have checked it?

Maybe Irfanview has some problem converting psd directly (or yours psd specifically). You can try saving them in another format, then resizing them with irfanview.

heruca
Offline
Joined: 05/15/2009
After downsizing your cards,

After downsizing your cards, use an "Unsharp Mask" filter in Photoshop to reduce most of the blurriness. Experiment to find the ideal settings for the filter, since it varies according to how drastically you resized the image.

PaulG
Offline
Joined: 07/21/2012
Testing your suggestions out

Testing your suggestions out one by one whenever I have time! Thank you kindly, I'll get back to you with more details as soon as I'm sure. I don't own a printer, so the blurriness is a bit hard to test for, heh.

Thanks,

Syndicate content


forum | by Dr. Radut