Wednesday, September 27, 2006

New Printing Methods?

I'm playing around with a new printing service, and I know the photos will look good, I'm just worried about the cropping and the final image size. I refuse to crop my images, so I'm experimenting with printing on different size papers from different services to see how big the images actually are. I can't give exact measurements for the image size, but I can tell you the paper size and tell you that the image will be full-frame and slightly smaller than the listed paper size. Don't get me wrong, I'm very loyal to my usual printing service, but for different sized prints, I just wanted to see what my options were.

So here's the skinny: because these are EXPERIMENTAL prints, and I'll be getting a lot of them, I thought I'd let people make requests for certain images to be printed, and then you have the choice in purchasing them at a significantly lower price than usual. If the pictures look good, congrats, you just bought a print of mine for a really good price. If they don't meet my standards, the only person who loses is me.

You can choose any picture you want on the site. Shipping is included in the price. Email samantha at his dot com if interested.

Here are the prices for the PAPER size:
(remember: the image itself will be slightly smaller)
5"x7": $15
8"x10": $20
11"x14": $30
16"x20": $50
20"x30": $100

3 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

will you post refernce to this new service if they are any good? some of us would like to know.

2:18 PM  
Blogger Samantha Wolov said...

in the end, i went with experimenting with a few different services. as i said, i'm quite loyal to my standard printer, but i know not everyone needs to go to a professional printer for custom prints. however, i'm testing size, paper quality, and ink quality/application. because i refuse to crop my images, they retain their 1:1.5 ratio. it's why film developers give you 4"x6" prints. it's also why i traditionally print 8"x12" prints on 11"x14" paper. but some services offer to not crop the image and just shrink it to fit the paper, and you're left with a white border. i'm fine with the border, i need someplace to sign, anyway. for paper, i traditionally print on chromira, which is subtly glossy and kinda velvety. however, i'd like to give these places the benefit of the doubt and see what they can do. the third issue, ink quality/application, is the most important to me. my color works often have a lot of contrast, sometimes, they're almost neon, and a traditional printer with only four colors (cmyk) may not be able to handle that, and the picture comes out splotchy. a professional printer often has 7 or 8 color printers, so you get a smoother print. for these test prints, i'm (attempting) to print color photos with high contrast, normal-looking color photos, and black and white photos. in the end, i will point out the strengths of each option, and let people decide for themselves--they have a better feel for their printing needs than i do.

2:33 PM  
Anonymous Toby said...

This wwas lovely to read

11:26 PM  

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