Resolution problems

If you have made sure the images are 300 ppi and you have fiddled with display then the only thing left to do is to make sure that your PDF export settings are correct. It seems that they are not. Try PDF/X-1a to keep things simple.

If they look pixelated in ID, go to View menu/display performance and pick high quality. You can select that as the default in ID prefs if you want.

I'm assuming that you did not up the resolution in PS, let's say from 72 to 300. Unless such a move is accompanied by a drastic reduction in the physical size of the image, it will look bad.

When exporting to pdf make sure you select te press setting - keeping images at 300 dpi.



Using OSX 10.3.9 on a G4

The main question here is where did the artwork originate from? Unfortunately, if the source art was anything less than 300 PPI, there's really nothing you can do to increase the resolution without resulting pixelation. Photoshop and other programs will attempt to fill in the blanks, but it's never easy to upscale. For print purposes, the end result is always bad. If it is original artwork, try recreating it at 600 PPI or as vector art (If possible) before importing it to InDesign at the desired resolution/size.

Like the other fellow said, make sure you are using a PDF Export preference that does not downsample images to anything less than 300 DPI.

...are these images scaled up in your layout application (indesign)?...

...this will have an effect on image resolution when output...

...the layout app will have pixelated look when zoomed in because all your seeing is a low res preview of the high res file...

...layout app previews are not to be concerned about if the image looks great at 100% in photoshop and place in the layout app at 100% or less....

...You can get away with about 110 to 120% scaling up most of the time. It is still worth resizing in photoshop before import to layout app where possible...

andrew