Revet Loc: Fairview Park, Ohio

Let me start by saying I know nothing about printing my RAW photos from Lightroom. (D7100 body) Anything anyone can do to point me in the right direction would be greatly appreciated.

I am re-doing my office and my daughter wants me to put up some big B&W prints of some of my pet photos (I am a veterinarian). We figure we would need a portrait sized print with a height of about 4 feet.

I plan to use a print shop obviously.

To save me some time, is this even doable, retaining some quality of the photo (ie. not a bunch of dots). If not, do these print shops have software available that can improve the resolution to give me an acceptable large print. If so, any recommendations of an online printer that could handle this at a fair price??

Thank you for any help.

bkyser Loc: Fly over country in Indiana

First, I don't know of any "print shop" that can print from a RAW file. You need to convert it to JPEG, or sometimes TIFF. Just ask the printer.

People often get all concerned about "can't print over "x" size with so many mp. That's crap.

Read some posts by MT shooter. I personally have had a billboard printed from a 6.1 mp camera. It all has to do with viewing distance. If you print a 30x40 print, nobody will be standing 12 inches away from it to view the whole thing. If the image is sharp, you can easily print a 30x40 print, or larger, and it will look fine. A good printer, (not Wal-Mart) will let you know before the print is made, if the resolution isn't high enough. I personally use Meridian Pro, or MPIX, or Adorama for prints, and have never had issues printing even 30x40 with my old 10mp D-200. The key is a very sharp photo to begin with.

Nikonian72 Loc: Chico CA

As mentioned, any commercial print shop will want a high Mp JPG for best print resolution. And viewing distance is a factor. I suspect that large B&W prints will be of less cost that large color prints, so you may be able to do a bit of progressive trial & error to find the best print size for your individual images. A photo print shop local to you may be a good place to start.

Michael Hartley Loc: Deer Capital of Georgia

I like to receive TIFF files for enlargements, but good JPGs work too. I've printed wall size prints from a 8mp image. We've been printing stuff like that, a lot longer, than there have been 20mp cameras.

Revet Loc: Fairview Park, Ohio

Thanks all for your responses. That is great to know that I can enlarge some of my really nice photos. I guess I knew I wouldn't be giving anyone a RAW file but I was just giving everyone my equipment and starting point in Lightroom. Thanks again

OddJobber Loc: Portland, OR

Suggestion from the cheap seats over here. Without resizing, crop a photo to 1/4 of height and 1/4 width (black and white area in sample below), then have the cropped portion printed as an 8 X 10 for a buck or two. Stand back a few feet and see what the details look like.

If you like it, have the uncropped photo printed as a 30 X 40 or so. :-D

Michael Hartley Loc: Deer Capital of Georgia

Just how many megapixels, does a D7100 produce?

OddJobber Loc: Portland, OR

24.1 MP CMOS APS-C

Michael Hartley Loc: Deer Capital of Georgia

Heck, that's enough for a wall print, on the outside of an apartment building.