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Need Help Saving in PS as a tiff thats over the 4gb limit

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crny1

New Member
Ok all,
I have a file in PS that is almost 20gb when the design is done. The printed image will be 808" wide and 314" tall. It was built in PS at 1/4 scale.
After flattening the image it comes out at 4.46GB. PS will not allow me to save as a tiff in order to send to the printer. The only options for saving I get a tiff and psb. It is being sent to a wholesale printer and they are fine with tiff, but I cannot save it. Any workarounds or suggestions?
Thanks in advance.
 
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Gettin'By

New Member
I think TIF has a 4gb size limit. That's why you can't save to .TIF. If PDF isn't an option it's likely because of the 200" limit. Could probably scale the photoshop file down 1 or 2% so you quarter sized document would fit and see if that becomes an option. Then the printer just scales it up to size. I've never done a file this size before though, so I may be wrong/making it harder than it is.
 
Saturn

Saturn

Aging Member
For tif, are you picking ZIP compression in the tif save menu?

I've never worked with files that large, but .psb is still a "Photoshop" file (specifically for large documents), so you might be fine with that. Can you check with the printer? Their prepress should definitely have a solution if they are in the habit of printing stuff this large.
 
C

crny1

New Member
ColorCrest said:
Don't overlook the option of saving the tiff using LZW lossless compression.
Click to expand...
I am completely unfamiliar with any compression within PS. This would not make it lose any quality would it? I am absolutely pushing the limits of this thing as it is to look good. Unfortunately this isnt a billboard way up in the air. It will be from eye level and up.
 
Saturn

Saturn

Aging Member
Lossless means you wouldn't lose any quality. I think by default either LZW or ZIP compression are already selected, so it may not matter, but when you go to save as a tif, a dialgue box should pop up with these options, so you can verify.
 
Boudica

Boudica

Back to "educational purposes"
From my understanding, LZW compression is designed for large format files. It's literally a fraction the file size of a tiff saved with no compression at all. I save all my tiffs with the LZW compression checked.

ETA: make sure the tiff is flattened. A tiff exported from illy is not flat. You need to open it in PS to flatten.
 
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victor bogdanov

Active Member
Is the print getting tiled to print? If so tile it yourself and send the multiple tiled files.

for murals that large I work in .psb, and export individual panels/tiles in tiff or pdf
 
C

crny1

New Member
victor bogdanov said:
Is the print getting tiled to print? If so tile it yourself and send the multiple tiled files.

for murals that large I work in .psb, and export individual panels/tiles in tiff or pdf
Click to expand...
Unfortunately I have never tiled anything myself and usually just let the RIP handle it. But, yes it will be printed on 54" material so it will have just over 15 panels.
I am terrible with PS so tiling it myself is way over me at this point. I wouldn't even know where to begin. Building this file has been a large learning curve for me. Majority of my stuff is vector based so this is a new world for me. I would love to learn to tile, eventually. Just dont know where to begin with a finished file.
 
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victor bogdanov

Active Member
crny1 said:
Unfortunately I have never tiled anything myself and usually just let the RIP handle it. But, yes it will be printed on 54" material so it will have just over 15 panels.
I am terrible with PS so tiling it myself is way over me at this point. I wouldn't even know where to begin. Building this file has been a large learning curve for me. Majority of my stuff is vector based so this is a new world for me. I would love to learn to tile, eventually. Just dont know where to begin with a finished file.
Click to expand...
Create overlapping (if you need overlap) artboards in Illustrator

place your .psb file into illustrator, will probably have to use large canvas option.
Export artboards as pdf, you now have pdf files containing panels with the overlap you need.

1.png


You might need to crop the .psb inside illustrator to stay withing pdf size limits when you export or the exported pdf will not open.



2.png
 
C

ColorCrest

All around shop helper.
crny1 said:
The printed image will be 808" wide and 314" tall. It was built in PS at 1/4 scale.
Click to expand...
I'm curious to know the actual dimensions and resolution settings you're using in Photoshop and whether you're using RGB vs CMYK for the file.
 
C

crny1

New Member
victor bogdanov said:
Create overlapping (if you need overlap) artboards in Illustrator

place your .psb file into illustrator, will probably have to use large canvas option.
Export artboards as pdf, you now have pdf files containing panels with the overlap you need.

View attachment 169403

You might need to crop the .psb inside illustrator to stay withing pdf size limits when you export or the exported pdf will not open.



View attachment 169404
Click to expand...
This is great info for me to try and figure out how to do it. Thank you!
 
C

crny1

New Member
ColorCrest said:
I'm curious to know the actual dimensions and resolution settings you're using in Photoshop and whether you're using RGB vs CMYK for the file.
Click to expand...
The actual finished printed dimensions is 808"wide by 314" tall. All images were 300 dpi in the design, PS was set at 300dpi. Was converted at the end to CMYK and then added a adjustment layer to bump the saturation up just a touch.
Is this the correct way? I have no idea to be honest. But we are going to print a test area to make sure before printing the whole thing. To be honest my PS skills prior to this consisted of removing backgrounds and some very basic stuff. I have been working on this file for a month now on and off. Couple hours at a time. With lots of googling during that time and watching videos. I kind of got thrown to the wolves on this one. Sometimes we are our own worst enemies. I just cant say no sometimes and like a good challenge.
 
C

ColorCrest

All around shop helper.
crny1 said:
Was converted at the end to CMYK and then added a adjustment layer to bump the saturation up just a touch.
Click to expand...
The two steps were unnecessary on your end.

If the original images were RGB, keeping them so would have saved you from trying to boost color when you noticed a color hit of converting to CMYK. It's likely the CMYK conversion used a common default color space meant for a printing press which clipped color gamut from what your printing service is likely capable of.

Knowledgable print shops will gladly accept RGB files. Smaller files sizes, often more color gamut.
 
bob

bob

It's better to have two hands than one glove.
crny1 said:
The actual finished printed dimensions is 808"wide by 314" tall. All images were 300 dpi in the design, PS was set at 300dpi. Was converted at the end to CMYK and then added a adjustment layer to bump the saturation up just a touch.
Is this the correct way? I have no idea to be honest. But we are going to print a test area to make sure before printing the whole thing. To be honest my PS skills prior to this consisted of removing backgrounds and some very basic stuff. I have been working on this file for a month now on and off. Couple hours at a time. With lots of googling during that time and watching videos. I kind of got thrown to the wolves on this one. Sometimes we are our own worst enemies. I just cant say no sometimes and like a good challenge.
Click to expand...
300 ppi at that size? Have you been into the mushrooms? With sizes in that range you probably could get by with a resolution measured in feet, not inches.
 
M

Mark1979

New Member
crny1 said:
Ok all,
I have a file in PS that is almost 20gb when the design is done. The printed image will be 808" wide and 314" tall. It was built in PS at 1/4 scale.
After flattening the image it comes out at 4.46GB. PS will not allow me to save as a tiff in order to send to the printer. The only options for saving I get a tiff and psb. It is being sent to a wholesale printer and they are fine with tiff, but I cannot save it. Any workarounds or suggestions?
Thanks in advance.
Click to expand...
I would also do a test print. I have found using Tiffs alters the colour of the print away from what it would of been if it was a pdf or eps.

Not sure why but I now try to avoid Tiffs at all costs.
 
D

damonCA21

New Member
Why not just go old school? burn the full size artwork to a DVD, or save to a thumb drive and post to the printer. Most places you can send a letter next day delivery for not too much. Let them deal with the tiling. By the time you have faffed around for a couple of days trying to sort this, they could have the file in their hands
 
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