Printing photo looks great but printing same photo from a layer is lower resolution

[Gadgethound]

I've searched but didn't find a similar topic so I must be doing something wrong and  I'd like to ask the group here about an issue I'm having with printing from Affinity Photo (v1.8.6) on macOS Catalina, where images printed from a layer are much lower resolution than when the same image is printed on its own from Affinity Photo.

For years I've been using a template in Affinity Photo to print greeting cards on 7 x 10" stock - I would import images, position them in the template then print, which typically results in a 5 x 7 output that always looked great. Recently I've noticed two unusual quirks:

1. The first image printed is always misaligned as if I had the wrong paper size selected even though the printer presets are saved. To fix this issue I just go into the printer settings and reselect exactly the same paper size setting that is already showing in the preset and this action resolves this issue for subsequent prints (so I have a workaround for this quirk)
2. The output which is a 5 x7 card (after I fold it in half from 10 x 7) prints as a lower resolution image vs printing the same image by itself from Affinity Photo under the same printer presets. I've checked all the printer settings and everything seems to be in order - paper size, print media, colour matching, printer resolution. The card template document has a background layer with guide-lines that show on-screen where the borders of the printed output would fit (but those lines don't actually print on the card) and I add a layer with a photograph (using File - Place, select image which is 4606 x 3456 pixels in size) and I will resize the image by grasping the corners so it fits onto the template (because after the Place action, the image comes into the document much larger than the canvas). To recap, the document consists of a background layer that is white + pixel layer with an image. The image looks perfectly crisp and detailed on-screen but after printing, much of the fine detail is lost as though I've printed at a lower resolution version (edges are not sharp, details fuzzy looking)
3. As a test I've opened the same image  (the one I would Place into the 'card' document) in Affinity Photo and simply printed it as a 5 x 7 photo, onto the same card stock media (I just cut the 7 x 10 card in half) and that output looks great (renders in print with the same clarity as it looks onscreen)

I have two versions of this template and both are exhibiting the same behaviour. Both versions of this card printing document have been fine in the past and aside from upgrading Affinity Photo software, I'm using the template in the same way, so I can't figure out why the output is so poor vs opening the same images in Affinity Photo and just printing as 5 x 7. I've attached a photo where I've placed the output side by side (the sharper left side image is printed as a photo and the softer right side image is printed from the card template document where the image sits in a layer). 

Edited November 23, 2020 by Gadgethound
uploaded a photo to help illustrate the issue

[Gadgethound]

After investigating further into my own issue I have found a solution for item #2, #3 so just leaving it here in case anyone else has a similar issue. I'm not sure why I didn't notice in the past but this problem stems from my inexperience with printing resized images. When placing the image in to the original template, I would always have to resize the image to make it fit within the template margins but this resizing action was reducing the quality by lowering the pixel dimension of the photos I wanted to place into the card printing template. 

To fix the issue I changed the default resolution of my document from 300 DPI to 720 DPI by clicking Document - Resize Document and adjusting the values. My original document sized at 3000 x 2100 pixels at 300 DPI needed to be bigger so that when I placed the images into it, I would not have to resize the image and I could leave it at full resolution. At 720 DPI the document becomes 7200 x 5040 pixels and I could add layers with images of size 4606 x 3456 without resizing. When I printed at the new DPI the full resolution of the images remained and the output was sharp and clear. 

To recap - my printed output is still a 7" x 10" card but the document is now resized to 7200 x 5040 pixels @ 720 DPI instead of 3000 x 2100 pixels at 300 DPI, which allows me to Place full resolution images (in my case 16MP images of size 4606 x 3456) into a layer without resizing. This allows me to maintain the highest print quality for the size of image I'm working with. 

 

 

[Callum]

Hi Gadgethound,

Welcome to the forums

Thank you for sharing the solutions to your other questions, In regards to your first point if you export the file to a location such as your desktop then right click the file and hit Print does it print out misaligned?

Thanks

C

[Gadgethound]

Hi Callum, thanks for the suggestion on printing to PDF - I will try that the next time I encounter this issue. Since posting the original problem for item #1 with the print misalignment, I ended up reselecting all the correct settings again (even though they were showing properly) and resaving the print settings as a printer preset (through the operating system printer handling feature) so that seems to have resolved the first print mis-aligned problem. 

 

Edited November 27, 2020 by Gadgethound