I can tell you what i did with the eagle picture in my avatar, and twice with dog pictures. My printer has a "poster" option. I printed my picture so that it was blown up for 16 pieces of paper. Many instant print or T shirt shops will do this as well, from your photo on disc or memorty stick, often on one very large piece of paper. My picture was WAY past the stage of being fuzzy, but that did not matter. Your picture quality should be even better.
After taping my pages together, I cut the whole thing into color areas. Remember, since it was my picture, I also had a regular sized print as a guide. I labeled the segments as I cut them, as well. My cut up segments served as templates. Of course, I needed to add seam allowancesas I cut. A quilting diva I saw on TV said to make 2 full sized prints. I did not find that necessary.
Remember to do the background first.
After I'd appliqued the whole thing together, I added texture with my free motion quilting. For my border collie and the eagle, this was very important, but less so for my friend's shorthaired dog.
The collie wall hanging was the first I'd ever tried. It brought very good money at a local auction, higher than several bed quilts.
I can't draw worth beans, so I was delighted that this technique worked so well. It was not terribly hard, but was very time consuming and also took lots of time shopping for exactly the right fabrics.