Tech Olive

Part one of the rasterbating tutorial showed how to clean up that old ink printer and get it ready for some heavy print jobs. Here in part two I’ll explain two different methods to get your rasterbation up on the wall for the world to see!

For both techniques, you’ll need plenty of paper, scissors, tape, stick glue, blue-tack or thumb-tacks, paper clips and perhaps a stapler.

Before you begin, I forwarn you, it takes me about 4-6 refills for a 25 page rasterbation (who knew 5 dollars went so far?). So if your printer doesn’t refill cheaply it might be more adventurous to simply go to Kinkos and get a 60″ print for $10.

The first example is taking rasterbation by its technical term – making an enlarged image out of a series of dots. It’s the simplest and quickest method but the results leave something to be desired. You can either use the version online, or the downloadable version. They work the same except downloadable lets you change a few more settings and use larger images to begin with.

Pick a file, upload it, select settings, and you’re done. It will give you a compressed folder or a PDF (depending on which version) of the images and you can print them out, at the bottom of this tutorial is my technique for putting it together.

The second is by using my definition of rasterbation – enlarging an image and printing it across a span of paper. You’ll need the free image editor Gimp and plenty of spare time.

Begin by opening Gimp and loading up your image file. You’ll want a file that is relatively high resolution to begin with, as it will produce a better looking result.

Next, we’ll scale up the image. I’ve found roughly 1,000 width pixels per printed page is a good resolution. Its only a matter of how many pages you want. Let’s say you want a 5 page by 5 page rasterbation, simply multiply 1,000 by 5 and remember that number. In Gimp, select Image > Scale and in the width box type 5,000. The height box will automatically calculate its correct resolution. We’ll need to write this number down and use it later, then hit scale. If the image is excessively large, it might take a while and a lot of RAM. You may need to click View > Zoom > Fit Image to Window.

Moving on we need to divide this image up and make it printable. Select Image > Configure Grid. You can change the colors as you wish, but in the first width spacing box type 1,000. This time we have to calculate height ourselves. Begin by unchecking the ‘chain link’ icon. Next, take the height that was auto calculated for us above, and divide it by how many pages tall you want your rasterbation and type it in – simple enough! Hit OK.

The grid is pretty worthless at the moment. You cant even see it! Hit View > Show Grid. Then View > Snap to Grid. A grid should appear on your image, each rectangle representing a page to be printed. Click the ‘Rectangle Selection Tool” in Gimp (top left of the tool box) and play around with it to select different rectangles. You should notice that it likes to snap very easy to the lines. Select the very top left rectangle (with line snaps) and copy it.

Open up another Gimp window (File > New) and set the width to 1,000 and the height to the height we calculated earlier (where you had to divide). A new window will pop up. You can simply hit Edit > Paste. You can either save this ‘slice’ of the rasterbation or print it out now. Once you’re done with this, repeat the copying and pasting technique until you have all your slices saved or printed out.

So now it’s time to put your piece of art on the wall. No matter what you do, do not stack the pages and then try to cut them out. It will simply not work and you’ll spend more time trimming the bad cut then it would take to cut them individually. So simply cut them one at a time as you’re gluing, but WAIT! Only cut the top and left border off. We’ll keep the other two borders as a lip so we have something to glue to.

Hopefully you remember the order they go in, find a large work area and turn all the pages face down (and in order, of course). You might need a bright light to shine through to align the lip with the image, but paper clip 2 of the pages together at a time, glue/tape and then move on down the line. You might need to trim excess borders. Ive found placing a book on top of the two you just glued helps keep the image straight while it drys.

Eventually your gigantic image should come alive. Get a friend or family member to help you lift it up and tack it to the wall (you might use a level to keep it straight). Now you can show off your geekdom and be proud!

Special note: If and when you do spill ink on your brand new white carpet, dont fret. There is a cleaning agent called Resolve Carpet Stain Remover. Spray it on the ink while it’s still wet and use a rag to rub the stain vigorously.