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  • High resolution graphs for publishing

    Dear Users,

    I would like to ask you if do you know how to deal with graphs' resolution for scientific publishing.

    I have to send my graphs for a publication in .tiff format, but the result is not fully satisfying (graphs are not very neat and a bit difficult to read). I searched on internet for some procedure to obtain the best resolution (on the base of the graph dimension asked by the journal), but I did not find anything really useful to me.

    DO you have any clue on how tackle this issue?

    Thanks a lot, best, G

  • #2
    There are a whole bunch of packages to cope with this problem.

    Most journals have specific demands in terms of extension, size and dpi.

    Coreldraw, Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator are examples of software on this track.
    Best regards,

    Marcos

    Comment


    • #3
      Dear Marcos,
      thanks for your answer.

      I do not have any of these programs, is there any other viable option to deal with graph resolution? Once I have the parameters of the journal, should I eventually just open the .tiff with one of those programs and set the correct parameters?

      Thanks, G.

      Comment


      • #4
        Dear Giorgio,

        Stata certainly can meet your needs, but it does take some tools and effort. Please read this page for more on the control of the resolution of graph exports, see my comment under #5 here.
        But, note that my remarks about transparency under #10 are now outdated since Stata implemented the opacity parameter of colors.

        Happy graphing!
        http://publicationslist.org/eric.melse

        Comment


        • #5
          You don't need those programs, you just need to export your graphs in another format (.emf if you and the journal work with MS Word, .eps or .pdf you and the journal work with LaTeX, .svg could also be an option)

          Typically you do not use .tif or .png to export graphs for printing. The problem with this type of graphs is that they are stored as a raster of points with different colors. If you increase the size of the graph you only make the points bigger, and you get the blurryness you saw in your graph. Instead you should export them in a vector format. That way the graph is stored as a set of math, and increasing or decreasing the size of the graph is much smoother. You can export your graphs as .emf or .svg or .eps or .pdf depending on the preference of the journal.
          ---------------------------------
          Maarten L. Buis
          University of Konstanz
          Department of history and sociology
          box 40
          78457 Konstanz
          Germany
          http://www.maartenbuis.nl
          ---------------------------------

          Comment


          • #6
            My experience about this issue is a litlle bit different, I mean, I have sent papers to journals, and some of them are very finicky about the graphs. In other words, it is not just changing the extension to, say, .tif or .pdf. Most of them demand graphs to be above a specific threshold of dpi. Others go to the point of specifying height as well as width, plus a specific dpi. I could not help but muster courage to learn how to tackle this issue once and for all. This is the reason I decided to come to grips with these kinds of software. I do think such a task should be ideally accomplished by the journal's editing board. Oftentimes it has not been the case so far.

            This prompts me to suggest a machinery to produce and edit high-quality graphs as Stata 16's wish list.
            Last edited by Marcos Almeida; 12 Feb 2019, 04:34.
            Best regards,

            Marcos

            Comment


            • #7
              Dear everyone, thanks a lot for your feedbacks.

              The parameters of the journal I am publishing on are: - delivering a graph in .tiff - the graph must have a widht of 10 cm (is an Italian journal).

              Having said this, do you have any suggestion on how playing around with graphs to make them the best possible? Sorry if the question sounds silly, but I am really puzzled on this.

              Thanks, G

              Comment


              • #8
                Giorgio,

                A couple of recommendations for you, in line with what others have said. Stata may export graphs as TIFF files with custom height and width (using the -height- and -weight- options). However, this is not the best options because Stata lacks the ability to create LZW-compressed TIFF files, meaning the resulting image will be *huge* in size (a 4000x3000 pixel image is about 4 MB).

                it is more laborious, but more effective, to export as SVG (scalable vector graphic). Open the graphic is Photoshop or GIMP, which will allow you to exactly specify the height, width and DPI resolution. (Note: journals often require line art graphics to be 1000 dpi and other figures to be 300 or 600 dpi for sufficient quality to print.) Then export the image as TIFF as a (compressed) tiff, which will reduce the file to a more reasonable size (say around 1 MB).

                Comment


                • #9
                  Dear Leonardo, thanks for your response.

                  So, you suggest to use another software (Photoshop or GIMP), but there is no way if I do not have any other software, right?

                  Maybe I can try with the options -height- and -weight-, even if they create a 'heavy' file this may be not a problem, right? Where can I find in the editor those options?

                  Thanks, G

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Search for "IrfanView" (https://www.irfanview.com/), and see whether it can resize your image in the ways that have been suggested (Image menu). Files can be saved as TIF

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Let me add a late comment on post #5. Like Maarten, I prefer to export a scalable graphic format from Stata for the reasons he cites. However, care must be taken in the choice of a format. The topic linked below has a long discussion with contributions from StataCorp experts, and EPS is no longer a recommended format, even though some journals continue to suggest it.

                      My particular experience is that a recent journal requested "electronic artwork files be submitted in one of our preferred formats: EPS, PS, JPEG, TIFF, or Microsoft Word (DOC or DOCX only)."

                      That seemed odd to me, because Word is not a "graphic format". So I stuck my SVG (my current preferred vector format) into the Word document containing our submission. :-)

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        Originally posted by Giorgio Piccitto View Post
                        Dear everyone, thanks a lot for your feedbacks.

                        The parameters of the journal I am publishing on are: - delivering a graph in .tiff - the graph must have a widht of 10 cm (is an Italian journal).

                        Having said this, do you have any suggestion on how playing around with graphs to make them the best possible? Sorry if the question sounds silly, but I am really puzzled on this.

                        Thanks, G
                        The manual for -graph export- says width(#) and width(#) specifies the width (or height) of the graph in pixels ... an integer between 8 and 16,000. The max dimensions of your image are determined by your dpi. At 1000 dpi, your max image size is 16 in x 16 in. It's no problem for you to make larger files, but I have found that journal submissions often place restrictions on file size, which is why I suggest using software that will compress your image (TIFF compression is lossless, by the way) or a vector graphic format that can be resized to any dimension without loss of quality. So if you can work within those parameters, then Stata will make your images, but that doesn't mean it's the most effective method when it comes to graphics and what you do with them.

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