Here is how :

Upload an image from your computer into the Blockposters server, choose the number of sheets wide you want your poster to be and select the print settings (Portrait, Landscape, A4, and Letter-US). After you save the PDF file, print out the file. Make sure no edges are cut off when printed.

Put the pieces together. You will have a poster that will be about several feet wide and high. You could do all this with photoshop help, but the speed is what set it apart.

Blockposter creator Steffan Luczyn told us the laborious process of cutting up images to create a poster is what made him come up with the idea to automate it: "I decided to make a poster for my girlfriend from a (really) small picture she had of Dave Grohl (Foo Fighters). I manually spliced it up in MS Paint(!), counting pixels and saving each segment to a separate file. It took ages! I then printed each file as ‘fit to page.’ The resulting poster looked really cool – we really liked the pixelly/blocky look — each pixel printed out around cm squared."

This points to a couple of the app caveats: The smaller the original image file is, the more likely it’ll be pixilated when it’s blown up. It results in a cool optical illusion when it is placed on the side of a building — up close, the images are weirdly indistinguishable, but from afar, they look just right.

Also, the sheets of paper I used (regular Staples inkjet white paper) proved to be far too thin and flimsy, even as the picture came out clear and colorful. I recommend that you either purchase extra-thick paper or use photo prints.

Last year, GeekDad’s Dave Ebanks went to a local printer to blow up an image of his son’s favorite race car, but it cost him a bit of a bundle. He also had to get a picture at 150 dpi at full size (you can use pretty much any pic with blockposters and it cost him about $5 per square foot (not including installation). That said; this is an alternative that many parents should try.

And if they don’t like it, they’ll have plenty of money left to buy off Junior’s happiness.

This article was retrieved from http://www.wired.com/2008/11/blockposters/ wrote by Jose Fermoso