Photographing Computer Monitors

hark

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I am working a project for church and am looking for information. My pastor is retiring, and I've asked church members to submit digital images and/or prints to be used in a book covering the church's history during my pastor's time here. The problem is many people don't know how to submit a decent digital image. Some of the ones I've received are small and pixelated.

They don't look too bad in a small size on my monitor, but when trying to upsize them, the files aren't that great (using On1 Resize 10). So I am trying to photograph the images my monitor but am running into an issue. There are vertical lines showing up which probably has to do with some type of flicker rate of my monitor.

What shutter speed works best to avoid those lines? I'm having trouble finding the info when searching online. I'm not knowledgeable about flicker rates of monitors so any help will be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
 
I am working a project for church and am looking for information. My pastor is retiring, and I've asked church members to submit digital images and/or prints to be used in a book covering the church's history during my pastor's time here. The problem is many people don't know how to submit a decent digital image. Some of the ones I've received are small and pixelated.

They don't look too bad in a small size on my monitor, but when trying to upsize them, the files aren't that great (using On1 Resize 10). So I am trying to photograph the images my monitor but am running into an issue. There are vertical lines showing up which probably has to do with some type of flicker rate of my monitor.

What shutter speed works best to avoid those lines? I'm having trouble finding the info when searching online. I'm not knowledgeable about flicker rates of monitors so any help will be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

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nickt

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I have a feeling the shutter speed that works best will vary with the monitor and the lines might come and go at various speeds. I can't take a picture of my laptop screen without it looking like a canvas print when I zoom in. Every pixel is very apparent.

Would a screen shot help you out? Windows Print Screen key, then paste into PS. Not sure what key it would be on a mac.

edit... maybe not. Print screen probably won't grab any extra pixels even if you happen to viewing on a nice big monitor.
 
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hark

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Thanks. I will give it a try. :encouragement:

I have a feeling the shutter speed that works best will vary with the monitor and the lines might come and go at various speeds. I can't take a picture of my laptop screen without it looking like a canvas print when I zoom in. Every pixel is very apparent.

Would a screen shot help you out? Windows Print Screen key, then paste into PS. Not sure what key it would be on a mac.

edit... maybe not. Print screen probably won't grab any extra pixels even if you happen to viewing on a nice big monitor.

I need files that can be printed, and screen shots tend to be low res. :( Unless there is a way to obtain a screen shot with a higher resolution. :confused: The end files probably wouldn't need to be printed any larger than 5x7 with a resolution of 300.
 

aroy

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If the images are low res to begin with, taking screen shots will not help, especially if they are less than HD resolution - 1.9K x 1K.

Just check the size of submitted images. If they are even 2MP, you will get reasonable prints at 200 DPI. 5x7 at 300 DPI is 1500 x 2100 about 3MP, so any thing larger will not be useful at these print sizes.

One work around, will be to collect the original prints, and use your DSLR to take RAW images of the prints. You will get much better resolution that way. I have used my D3300 to convert hundreds of my older 3x5 prints to 24MP RAW images and then processed them to get beautiful prints. If you install DigicamControl, you can shoot tethered, so that you will be able to fine tune each image's focus and lighting (glare and shadows included).
 

hark

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One work around, will be to collect the original prints, and use your DSLR to take RAW images of the prints. You will get much better resolution that way. I have used my D3300 to convert hundreds of my older 3x5 prints to 24MP RAW images and then processed them to get beautiful prints. If you install DigicamControl, you can shoot tethered, so that you will be able to fine tune each image's focus and lighting (glare and shadows included).

I am using my DSLR to take RAW shots of prints, but the problem is some people are submitting very low res digital images. And they don't understand the concept of low res images. I've never shot tethered so thanks for the info. :encouragement:
 

hark

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Why don't you use screen capture?

I am making a book to commemorate my Pastor's years serving the church. It will also incorporate the history of the church during that time. So I need printable images. Taking a screen capture of an already low res image won't allow a lot of latitude for editing because of the upsizing involved to make them printable. Taking images of small files will give me a larger file to start with.
 

480sparky

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Using a 50mp in raw won't give you more resolution. A huge file size doesn't mean you can print a 80 x 100 print.

If the image is being displayed on the monitor, it exists as a file somewhere. That file will have all the resolution in it. The monitor may not be using all that data in the file to display the image. Locate where the file is, and you'll have the highest-resolution image right there.
 

hark

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Using a 50mp in raw won't give you more resolution. A huge file size doesn't mean you can print a 80 x 100 print.

If the image is being displayed on the monitor, it exists as a file somewhere. That file will have all the resolution in it. The monitor may not be using all that data in the file to display the image. Locate where the file is, and you'll have the highest-resolution image right there.

I want to display the small digital image on my monitor then photograph it shooting RAW. That way the new file will be a larger size without me having to upsize the original file. The original file is only @3.7" x 2.5" with a resolution of 120dpi. When I take a photo of it shooting RAW, it should become @19x13 with 300dpi. Then since I only want to print it @4x6, it should turn out better than upsizing the original.
 

480sparky

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I want to display the small digital image on my monitor then photograph it shooting RAW. That way the new file will be a larger size without me having to upsize the original file. The original file is only @3.7" x 2.5" with a resolution of 120dpi. When I take a photo of it shooting RAW, it should become @19x13 with 300dpi. Then since I only want to print it @4x6, it should turn out better than upsizing the original.

If you took a photo of a single pixel in raw, you will still have a huge file, but it's still one pixel. File size is not a function of resolution, only data.

If the original image file is 800 x 450 pixels, that is the absolute maximum resolution you will ever get regardless of how big the file is from the camera. 10mb, 100mb, 100,000,000 mb. It's still only going to have 800 x 450 pixels of resolution.
 

Texas

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Yes, too bad. No free lunch with data.

Otherwise a tiny sensor size would work just fine for most any desired final print resolution.
 

hark

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No matter what settings I use--fast or slow shutter speed, changing aperture and/or ISO--I cannot get rid of the lines. Plus there is moire present in the images from my camera that isn't there in the original images so this option isn't going to work. :( I went as slow as 1/25" with my shutter as well as 1/60", 1/250", 1/320" and up to 1/400" but the lines are still there. Sometimes instead of lines, the individual pixels show up even though they aren't visible on my monitor. Used a variety of apertures, too. Oh well. Thanks for the comments.
 

nzswift

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It sounds like you are using a cathode ray monitor. These shoot horizontal lines at the screen going from top tp bottom then repeat it endlessly. As a result you need to use a slow shutter speed to capture the whole screen. I'd try 1/30.
 

Marcel

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I want to display the small digital image on my monitor then photograph it shooting RAW. That way the new file will be a larger size without me having to upsize the original file. The original file is only @3.7" x 2.5" with a resolution of 120dpi. When I take a photo of it shooting RAW, it should become @19x13 with 300dpi. Then since I only want to print it @4x6, it should turn out better than upsizing the original.
I don't think it will turn out better than taking a screen capture since you only will be making the original larger. Larger doesn't mean more definition. It's like if you were taking a macro shot of a newspaper picture. Even if you end up with a 20Mp file, you will only have a more definite grain pattern or the printing screen.
 

hark

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It sounds like you are using a cathode ray monitor. These shoot horizontal lines at the screen going from top tp bottom then repeat it endlessly. As a result you need to use a slow shutter speed to capture the whole screen. I'd try 1/30.

The lines are vertical for some reason. Other times, the image I capture is pixelated even though the image on my computer screen isn't.

I don't think it will turn out better than taking a screen capture since you only will be making the original larger. Larger doesn't mean more definition. It's like if you were taking a macro shot of a newspaper picture. Even if you end up with a 20Mp file, you will only have a more definite grain pattern or the printing screen.

I am simply trying to enlarge it because I know there won't be a lot of info available for editing. I used On1 Resize 10 to enlarge it to 4x6 with 300dpi for printing. I was hoping to get something bigger via my DSLR. But I don't think it's going to happen.

Thanks for all the info everyone. It was worth a try. ;)
 

nickt

Senior Member
Useless information:):
I just tried this and the colored vertical lines were pretty wild. It got me thinking. I have a pair of polarized sunglasses. Its really hard to view my camera's lcd when I'm wearing them. So I tried looking at the computer screen with the glasses. Same thing, especially turning my head one way or the other. Definitely polarized light coming off the screen. I'm not up on all the light science, but the polarized light is probably the reason for the crazy results.
 

aroy

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What you must understand is that a small image, say 300 x 200 pixels, will be upsized by software displaying it on the monitor. Though it may look better on the display, the fact is that it is still a 300 x 200 image, and most monitors are only 72 to 100 DPI (my 24" HD monitor is 20 inches wide and it displays 1920 pixels ~ 96 DPI.

ON1 and other software do a much better job of upsizing the image, than display software. So the options you have are
. Use ON1 (or other software) to resize the small images
. Ask members who submitted small files to give you the printed photographs which you can digitize using a DSLR.
 

aroy

Senior Member
or even better, by a factor of 100, a flat bed scanner

Actually for small photographs, DSLR beat scanners in resolution, that is besides the fact fact that very few of us have a functional scanner.

I have an HP all-in-one. The scanner is handy for documents, but for photographs I use my D3300, as that gives me better resolution and RAW image which is easier to post process than the JPG/TIFF from scanner.
 
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