How To Print A Very Large Photo

I have three sources of inspiration for my articles: waiting for my computer to break, waiting for someone else’s computer to break, and waiting for my Uncle to want something done. And the winner is – my Uncle wanted me to print up a three-foot-wide picture of a horse. This one. I drew this by looking at another picture of a horse. That’s what he wanted.

I drew the picture by hand on ordinary paper and then scanned it into my computer.

First, I had to make and save the picture at least 3 feet wide (36 inches or 99.44 cm). Photofiltre let me down. I got an “out of memory error”. So, to Xnview, I went. I opened up the picture and in the top menu I clicked on “Image” and then in the menu, “Resize…” Towards the bottom of that box, check the “Keep ratio” if not already checked and I typed the width “36” in the “Print Size” section. Then “OK“.

Then I clicked on “File” then “Print” and chose “PDFill PDF & Image Writer”. If it could be done, PDF was the answer.

Then I clicked on the “Configure” button. For paper size, I had to choose “A0”. Then I clicked on OK.

Click here for more on paper sizes: Paper Sizes

Before printing, I clicked on the “Layout” tab in the Xnview printing options, and for the “Page layout” I chose “Single – Best Fit to Page“. Then I clicked on “OK” and then “Print“.

Note: Microsoft’s Print to PDF didn’t give me the option to use the A0 paper size. So you’ll need a PDF printer that can offer large paper formats.

This created a PDF with a resolution of 10799 x 947. Now, could I print it? I found a video on YouTube showing how to do it using Adobe Acrobat: How to Print Large Scale Images on a Regular Printer

But can I do it in Foxit? And the answer was Yes.

I opened it in Foxit and clicked on “File” and then “Print”. When the picture/PDF was opened in Foxit I clicked on the “Tile Large Pages” box.

All I can do now is click on OK and hope it works. And it did. It prints up like a large jigsaw puzzle. 20 Pages on my HP printer but my printer kept complaining about no paper even when it was full of paper so I switched to my Canon (25 pages). The image itself only took 14 pages the others were reusable blank sheets.

After the pages are printed you basically have to tape them all together, I did mention it was like a puzzle. You might have to trim the edges a bit. Watch the video mentioned above to see how this YouTuber does it.

For more printing issues, click here.

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