When to up-rez

[mercphoto]

I have a client interested in a kart racing photo of him that I took, to turn it into a mural for his trailer. We've agreed on a price for the work. I'm going to use a Fred Miranda plug-in for uprezzing a photo. The question is, at what step do I do the uprex? Here are the details:

1. Starting with an in-camera 20D large fine JPG, sRGB, parameters 1.
2. Will need to add some text
3. Will do an auto-levels
4. Will do the "high pass filter" sharpening
5. Will up-rez to 300 dpi at about 4 feet by 6 feet.

I've done steps 1-4 numerous times in the past and get stunning 20x30" posters. But I know a big mural will require more pixels. Should I up-rez early? Up-rez as last step? Up-rez before or after sharpening as the last steps?

Thanks.

[DavidTO]

I have a client interested in a kart racing photo of him that I took, to turn it into a mural for his trailer. We've agreed on a price for the work. I'm going to use a Fred Miranda plug-in for uprezzing a photo. The question is, at what step do I do the uprex? Here are the details:

1. Starting with an in-camera 20D large fine JPG, sRGB, parameters 1.
2. Will need to add some text
3. Will do an auto-levels
4. Will do the "high pass filter" sharpening
5. Will up-rez to 300 dpi at about 4 feet by 6 feet.

I've done steps 1-4 numerous times in the past and get stunning 20x30" posters. But I know a big mural will require more pixels. Should I up-rez early? Up-rez as last step? Up-rez before or after sharpening as the last steps?

Thanks.

No way do you need 300dpi. 150 will be fine. I've always heard the best way to uprez is to do it by 10% increments in PS until you get where you want to be.

I've also been told, by Marc Muench, that the larger the print, the less sharpening, and that for something that large you shouldn't sharpen at all.