Working with Halftones

[Kelly Thorson]

This one is for you Photoshop gurus.

I want to convert a photograph to halftones in order to blast it using a photoresist stencil system. I've got the blasting part pretty much figured but can't seem to crack the art work portion of it. I've been trying in Corel Photopaint 12 to convert my image to halftones with very little success. Any information I have accessed seems to direct me to Photoshop as the tool of choice. I was playing around on version 7 without much luck.

How complicated is this? I don't mind spending the effort if I have the tools and ability to produce a quality result. Would I be better to just forget about doing it myself and send the photograph away to have it done? If so where would I send it? Is there a "minimum" version of Photoshop for working with this? I'm hoping to do a bit of this, so I would like to do it in house if at all possible, but if it is quite complicated it might make more sense to farm it out. With the internet and email that is so much simpler now.

Thanks

[Patrick Mackle]

Hi Kelly,
I am currently working on a project of hotel windows reguiring sand blasted halftone images, some as large as 3' x 4'. I am using Photoshop to create halftone films, I think its the best. Call me in California at 626-359-0300.
Pat
www.decoglasspro.com

[Mike Jackson]

Kelly,
You will need to find out the optimal minimum resolution you can use for your brand of photo stencil. Once you know that, I believe all you have to do is to set the DPI (Image Size) settings to that amount...60 DPI for example. It could be as course as 10 DPI. Your printer will then make dots that are bigger or smaller based on the halftone values.

Mike Jackson

[Kelly Thorson]

Thanks for your help Pat & Mike.
I guess Iwas actually having reasonable success, just unreasonable expectations.