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inkjet printers

Six Tips to Printing Better Photos

by Rich on October 20, 2009

Printing out your own photos from home can be fun and convenient-and it can give you more control over the way your images look than you’d typically get at the store. But to get really great pics from your printer, you need to know what you’re doing. Here are a few tips to get the most from your digital images.

Better cameras equal better photos. No matter how good your printing setup is, if your camera isn’t taking good pictures, you won’t print good pictures.  Typically, the higher the resolution the better; if you’re planning to make a 4 x 6-inch print, you’ll need a .5-megapixel camera with approximately 800 x 600 dpi capability. For bigger prints, look into a 1.2 or 2-megapixel camera. The higher the resolution, the more expensive the camera-and the images tend to take up more memory and load more slowly on your computer. But the pictures are better, too.

Choose the right printer. Inkjet and dye-sublimation printers both have their strong points and drawbacks. Dye-sublimation printers work by fusing layers of film onto paper, and they typically print photos faster. Dye-sublimation prints are also water- and dirt-resistant.

Inkjet printers used to produce lower-quality prints than dye-sublimation printers as a rule; it wasn’t unusual to see smudging on prints. However, today’s inkjet printers have made marked improvements in photo printing quality. Their ink tends to be less expensive, their photos are more water-resistant now than they were in the past, and some models offer six or even more ink colours to provide improved colour gradation.

File type matters. The type of image file you make with your pictures does make a difference when it comes to photo quality. Most of the time, cameras save pictures in JPEG format. This is a common file type for images, but the compression involved can damage the image slightly. If you’re printing, save your pictures in TIFF format first.

Touch up your pictures. If your pictures are under-exposed, you can control light saturation by adjusting brightness and contrast-it’s one of the advantages of digital printing. You can also use more creative effects like black-and-white or sepia-tone imaging to give your pictures a unique look. Before you print, make sure you adjust for the best exposure possible.

Get your printer ready. You may need to do some reconfiguring to make sure your printer is on the best settings for printing photo-quality images. Unfortunately there are no one-size-fits-all directions for this, as each brand and sometimes different models of the same brand have different procedures.  Check your manual for ways to increase your dpi settings; this will improve picture resolution.

Choose the right paper. In most cases, glossy photo paper is best for printing photos. If you’re printing black-and-white photos, matte may be your best choice. But test the image out first on plain white paper to make sure it looks as it should before you commit to using your expensive glossy or matte photo-quality paper; you may not get your print settings right the first time.

Take care of your printer. The way you take care of your printer can affect the way your photos print out. With inkjet printers, it’s critical to clean the print heads if you’ve gone weeks or months without using your printer beforehand; if not, your print heads may have clogged and your pictures won’t print well.

You should also do your best to keep dust out of your printer. Even the tiniest pieces of dust can get into your printer, accumulate inside and trap ink on the printer components-leading to smudges on your photos once you print. If you want to avoid dusting regularly, buy a dust cover.

Printing your own photos can be extremely rewarding. If you do it right, it’s convenient and fun-and you often get flexibility in adding special visual effects and improving the quality of your pictures.  But there may be a few things you don’t realize you’re doing to limit the quality of your photo printouts-and your equipment definitely makes a difference. Follow these tips when buying cameras, printers and consumables-as well as printing out photos-and you should be able to get high-quality photo printouts every time.

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How to Choose the Right Printer for Graphic Design

by Rich on September 15, 2009

Planning to print out your own business cards and brochures? If you’re not doing huge print runs, printing on your home or office printer may be your only option. But not every printer is equipped to handle the demands of graphic design printing. Here are a few things to look for when choosing a printer to print your marketing collateral.

Colour printing capabilities. You’ll need excellent colour printing capabilities if you want to use your printer for business graphics. Look for a printer with a high DPI number. The acronym “DPI” means “dots per inch,” and it refers to the amount of coverage per square inch that the printer is capable of. The higher the DPI number, the richer and more vibrant the colours.

Photo printing capabilities. Will you be printing photographs as part of your brochures? If so, look for a photo inkjet printer—while laser printers can print decent-quality photo images, they don’t look as good as an inkjet’s photos. In addition, consider the type of camera you’ll be using and the method it requires for connecting to a printer. Is your printer compatible, or will you have to download your images to your computer first?

The per-page cost. Manufacturers and your office supply store should be able to tell you how much the printer you’re considering would cost to print per page. Bear in mind, however, that manufacturers often estimate the per-page cost by assuming an ink-on-paper coverage of about 5%. If you’re printing graphic design documents, you’ll probably be printing on a higher quality setting and using thicker coverage—so your per page costs will likely be higher than the manufacturers’ estimates.

Margin printing capability. Some inkjet printers won’t print all the way to the edge of a document. This may be a problem for you if you’re printing business cards, brochures, direct mail postcards and so on. You’ll either have to take that design limitation into account when creating your documents, or you’ll have to find a printer that can print all the way to the edge. Make sure you ask your office supply store staff before buying a printer.

Print speed. Because you’re going to be printing higher-quality documents than the usual, most printers’ fast print speeds will probably be much faster than you’ll actually experience with the printer. If you can, find out how long the printer takes to print photo-quality or best-quality documents, including processing time—more complex files require additional time to process, and some printers are faster at this than others.

Bear in mind that Laserjet printers are often much faster than inkjet, but they have their own drawbacks as graphic design printers. Print speed may be important to you—especially if you’re printing several hundred documents at once on a regular basis—but you may have to make sacrifices in terms of quality to get a faster printer.

Multifunctionality. How do you plan to use your printer? If you could see the usefulness of a printer that also scans and copies documents, you may need a multifunctional printer. These printers often function as scanners, copy machines, and sometimes even fax machines.

Print mediums. Not every printer can print on every medium. Some printers—particularly Laserjet printers—can only print on paper with a weight of 105 gsm (grams per square metre) or lower. Others have the capability to handle a wide range of mediums and heavy papers, from card stock to menu paper. Look for a printer that can handle the mediums you plan to print on.

Graphic design printing demands a lot from printers, and not all machines are designed to handle these demands. Still, there are some printers out there that can deliver the print quality you need to print business marketing collateral. Look for a printer that doesn’t compromise on quality, but also doesn’t break your budget—and bear in mind that your per-page costs will likely matter more than the initial cost outlay for the printer. Test the printer before you buy to judge its print quality, speed, and the way it handles the mediums you want to print on—and you should be able to find the right printer for your needs.

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