Resolution and Print Specs for Interior Renderings
Tell us the largest output the image will ever be used at, the aspect ratio, and whether you need a print ready file, a web file, or both. We render at the largest requirement and downscale from there, because scaling down is free and scaling up is not. The two decisions that genuinely cannot be undone later are aspect ratio and camera position, since a wider crop needs image that was never rendered. Everything else is a delivery setting.
This is the least discussed input on an interior rendering job and the one most likely to force a re render. It costs one sentence at the start and a full production pass at the end.
Resolution
Print work is conventionally specified at 300 dpi at final size, which means an image printed at 24 by 18 inches needs roughly 7200 by 5400 pixels. Large format signage and trade show graphics are viewed from further away and are commonly produced at lower densities, often between 100 and 150 dpi at full size, which keeps file sizes sane.
Web use needs far less. Most site and social placements are satisfied well below 2500 pixels on the long edge, and oversized files are a page speed problem rather than a quality gain.
The practical rule is to render once at the highest requirement in the project and derive every other size from it.
Aspect ratio, the decision that binds
Aspect ratio has to be set before the camera is composed, because the composition is built for it. A 16 by 9 image cropped to a square loses the sides of the room. A 4 by 3 image stretched to a banner has no image at the edges to stretch into.
Where an image is genuinely going to multiple placements with different shapes, the right approach is to compose with the crops in mind, keeping the essential content inside the tightest of them and letting the wider formats carry more surrounding room. That has to be a stated requirement, not a hope.
File formats
- Print. TIFF or high quality JPEG at the print resolution, in the colour space the printer asks for. Print vendors usually publish a specification, and following theirs is faster than negotiating one.
- Web. JPEG or WebP, sized to the actual display size rather than the source size.
- Layout and editing. A layered or channel bearing file where retouching is expected downstream.
- Transparent background. PNG, and it has to be requested before rendering, because the background is part of the scene.
What to state up front
The largest physical print size anywhere in the project. Every aspect ratio the image has to fill. Whether any placement needs a transparent or replaceable background. Whether text or graphics will be overlaid, which affects composition because room has to be left for them. And any vendor specification that already exists.
Given those, one production pass covers every output. Without them, the most common outcome we see is a beautiful image at the wrong shape for the one placement that mattered.
The rest of the handover is in what an interior designer supplies for a rendering, specification detail in specifying FFE and materials, and the photography comparison in interior renderings versus interior photography. Plan level deliverables are on 3D floor plans.
Tell us the largest size and every shape the image has to fill and we will render once for all of them.