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Printing at Home
Printing can be one of the most difficult parts for the new digital photographer. You spend $200 on a nice inkjet
printer, but still, your prints don’t look nearly as good as the ones you get from Wal-Mart. What’s the deal?
First, make sure to read our tutorial on Color Management here. It’ll take you through some of the first steps you
need to make quality prints.
Printer
Obviously one of the single biggest factors is your printer itself. Canon, Epson, and Hewlett-Packard are all
offering very competitive models, often for as little as $100-$200. This article assumes you already have a printer,
but if not, there are many sites out there for reviews. Just realize that printers designed for solely printing
color photos will be significantly better than trying to print images on a standard Office-style color printer.
For standard photo printing I'm currently using a Canon PIXMA and with glossy Canon paper it does a very nice job.
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Making sure your printer is effectively calibrated is important. Most printers have some sort of self-calibration –
usually accessed through the printer software. Some printers require calibration every time you install new print
cartridges, others detect whether or not they need calibration. Make sure to follow your printers directions – an
improperly calibrated printer will produce poor images. Whether you print a lot or not as |
often it would be wise to clean the cartridge heads and printer rollers from time to
time to ensure your images are as crisp as possible. While I am sure there are plenty of specialty cleaners in the
market I have seen numerous people use common isopropyl alcohol as the cleaner of choice.
Paper
Paper is KEY. There are hundreds of choices out there – from the generic glossy photo paper that’s $5 for 20 8x10s,
to $125 for a 50 sheet box of 11x17 Hahnemuhle Fine Art Pearl. Fortunately, there are plenty of options out there
that are perfect for the needs of a home photographer – and almost always manufactured by the same company that
made our printer!
The advantage to buying paper offered by the same company that manufactured our printer is that the paper is
specially formatted for the ink system used by that printer. For example, using Hewlett Packard paper in a Hewlett
Packard printer will generally be a great first step in getting better prints. There are quite a few varieties out
there – different weights, different finishes (glossy, semi-glossy, pearl [my personal favorite], matte), and
different levels of “brightness” (how many and what type of optical brighteners were used in the paper). How to
tell the difference? Buy some! Pick up a few small packs, even 5x7, and try printing the same image on different
types of paper. Which one do you like? Printing is a highly subjective process – an image I might like on Pearl
paper, you might like on Glossy, and vice versa. The only way to know is to try!
Ink
Ink can be expensive, so it’s tempting to try one of the generic options, or the refills offered online. Resist
that temptation at all costs. These inks are of an inferior quality, and depending on your printer, may actually
damage the print heads (the parts that disperse the ink). Generic inks often fade faster, have inferior color,
and may display other undesirable effects. It might cost more, but it is ALWAYS better to stick with the manufacturer’s
ink. I also hear too often of people saving a couple of bucks on generic ebay or wholesale print cartridges only to
have one ink or another not work or only work for a short time so, by the time you have to deal with returns or limited
use you could have simply bought the name-brand cartridge and had less problems. If the cost of ink cartridges is a
big issue for you then take that expense into account when purchasing the printer.
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