: Photoshop a low-res image to make it appear higher-res I want to enlarge an image to a bigger size. This will cause pixelation. So I want to apply some treatment to it in Photoshop that will

@Murray664

Print the image out using a higher-quality photo printer onto glossy or matte paper and then shoot with a fairly high power camera. Then pull the image you have shot into photoshop and lay it over the original image. Make the layer 50% translucent so you can scale and warp the image to match the original file. Then adjust the layer opacity accordingly. A lot of the time you can use contrasting effects to give it a richer feel and take away from the low resolution as a final touch.

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@Hamaas979

You may wish to give Genuine Fractals (or Perfect Resize as it's now known) a trial. See half-way down this page for a comparison of bicubic versus GF enlargement.

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@Deb5748823

In Photoshop, enlarging should not cause pixelation by default. Go into Edit > Preferences > General... and make sure that "Image Interpolation" is set to one of the Bicubic options (there is even one for enlarging it looks like). Also, if using Image > Image Size... to resize a photo, make sure at the bottom the Image Size dialog you have "Resample Image" checked and one of the Bicubic options selected from the dropdown menu. Other than that... what Alan said.

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@Hamm6457569

In general, enlarge the image using Bicubic interpolation (sometimes, depending on the image, "Bicubic Smoother" works better, but usually straight Bicubic is more satisfactory), then either use Smart Sharpen to bring back the edge contrast, or copy the layer, set the blend mode of the copy to Overlay, and run Filter > Other > High Pass.

Sometimes you can get a better result if you increase the size by a smaller amount, apply a sharpen (not too much!), then increase it some more, apply another sharpen, etc., until you reach the size you want. This takes patience and a lot of trial and error to make it work for any give image, so I don't recommend it except in extreme cases, but once in a while it will allow you to push enlargement beyond where you can go without that intermediate sharpen.

My experience is that the best approach varies according to the image, the amount of upsizing and the result you're looking for. There is a limit to how far you can scale any image before the result becomes too fuzzy to be useful, and the definition of what is useful depends entirely on your application. For graphic design work it is almost never worthwhile to upsize an image more than about 10%.

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