Making Good Prints from Digital

The most difficult part of digital imaging is making a paper print that is as attractive and durable as a conventional photographic print. Late model ink jet printers from Epson and Hewlett Packard can handle the first part - the look - pretty well. Choose a printer that uses a special cartridge of photo color inks, which have more colors than conventional printers.

Choose a high-quality print paper such as Kodak Photo Paper. Some are as thick and glossy as real photo paper, and come in a variety of sizes.

In the printer control dialog box, you'll need to set your printer to a "premium paper" setting in the "Print Setup" dialog. That way it knows to use more ink and to distribute it in the ideal manner for a photograph. Print speed will probably be much slower than when you're printing text.

Photos looks better when you use your imaging software to properly prepare the file before you print it. If you resize the image as follows, Photoshop will produce the optimum number of pixels to make a print that doesn't look grainy.

In the image size dialog box, set the image size to the output size you want, with the resolution set at 300 dpi. Be sure that the "resample" option is selected.

You may also find that adjusting color and contrast improves your pictures.

No matter how good your printer, ink jet pictures will not last as long as good photographic prints. Epson recently developed two Sylus models, the 870 and the 1270, which were intended to give "archival" quality prints - to make prints which wouldn't fade or change for perhaps 50 years under ideal circumstances. In the real world, in areas with airborn pollution, noticeable color shifts have been seen in as little as four weeks! No doubt this situation will improve in time.

Of course, the best option if you really want a top quality print or enlargement, is to just bring it in to PhotoGarden. Just bring us your files on disk or camera memory card. Read More about our print products.

In general, a resolution of 135 pixels or more per inch is the absolute minimum for images to pass as photographs.