Pro printing or home printing?

I just sent an image off to get printed at 11X14 and including shipping it came to over $14, how easy is it to print at home and does it work out cheaper?.....i have read alot about setting up for colour matching being trial and error and after all the faffing about i think i may end up using more ink than sending out for a pro print?.... is it a complicated process to get set up for accurate colour reproduction and is it worth while?

I just sent an image off to get printed at 11X14 and including shipping it came to over $14, how easy is it to print at home and does it work out cheaper?.....i have read alot about setting up for colour matching being trial and error and after all the faffing about i think i may end up using more ink than sending out for a pro print?.... is it a complicated process to get set up for accurate colour reproduction and is it worth while?

Have a look at this site. Jose Rodriguez. He knows every thing about Printing, He has about 30 printers. He tells you how to set up and all about inks.

Have a look at this site. Jose Rodriguez. He knows every thing about Printing, He has about 30 printers. He tells you how to set up and
all about inks.

Printing at home is easy enough and I have no problem with colour accuracy. I only print once so no trial and error needed. I do have calibration though from camera to the printer. If you use a professional printer they will normally print what you send them so if the colours are not correct in your image nor will the print be. In other words the calibration and outputting the image correctly is the same for home printing and a pro lab. While there is little difference between colour prints from a pro lab and home printing with a high quality Photo printer, there is often a big difference for B&W where a home printer with multiple black ink is much better. One thing to note that if I spread the cost of buying my printer over 5 years the total cost of each near A3 print is around £3.50 (cost of ink, paper and amortised cost of printer). The cost for a pro printer will be about half this. So you may wonder why we print ourselves and spend more. but this has come up many times before. We like to be in control and produce high quality particularly B&W. If you are paying $14 for a single print that is way over the top. Dave

Printing at home is easy enough and I have no problem with colour accuracy. I only print once so no trial and error needed. I do have calibration though from camera to the printer. If you use a professional printer they will normally print what you send them so if the colours are not correct in your image nor will the print be. In other words the calibration and outputting the image correctly is the same for home printing and a pro lab. While there is little difference between colour prints from a pro lab and home printing with a high quality Photo printer, there is often a big difference for B&W where a home printer with multiple black ink is much better.

One thing to note that if I spread the cost of buying my printer over 5 years the total cost of each near A3 print is around £3.50 (cost of ink, paper and amortised cost of printer). The cost for a pro printer will be about half this. So you may wonder why we print ourselves and spend more. but this has come up many times before. We like to be in control and produce high quality particularly B&W. If you are paying $14 for a single print that is way over the top.

Dave

[quote]Have a look at this site. Jose Rodriguez. He knows every thing about Printing, He has about 30 printers. He tells you how to set up and all about inks.[/quote] You didn't supply the link?

Quote:Have a look at this site. Jose Rodriguez. He knows every thing about Printing, He has about 30 printers. He tells you how to set up and
all about inks.


You didn't supply the link?

I do not know how to do that. I just put that name in the search engine and it finds him.

I do not know how to do that. I just put that name in the search engine and it finds him.

These days a good home printer can match the results of a good pro lab. In general the running costs for printing at home are a lot cheaper than a pro lab - but of course you will have the high up front cost of purchasing the printer, plus quite a bit of ink & paper in learning to get the best out of it (it can be a steep learning curve). If you are planning to do a lot of printing, it can be worth it - and its also very rewarding

These days a good home printer can match the results of a good pro lab.

In general the running costs for printing at home are a lot cheaper than a pro lab - but of course you will have the high up front cost of purchasing the printer, plus quite a bit of ink & paper in learning to get the best out of it (it can be a steep learning curve). If you are planning to do a lot of printing, it can be worth it - and its also very rewarding

If printing at home, we need to use archival inks, and this generally means pigment, if we intend to sell the prints. When choosing a printer I'd urge folk to check out ink costs and this isn't necessarily the cost per ml. When we renewed our wide-format printer, we found that the HP Z3200PS cost us a lot less in ink than the Epson 7800 that it replaced.

If printing at home, we need to use archival inks, and this generally means pigment, if we intend to sell the prints.

When choosing a printer I'd urge folk to check out ink costs and this isn't necessarily the cost per ml. When we renewed our wide-format printer, we found that the HP Z3200PS cost us a lot less in ink than the Epson 7800 that it replaced.

[quote]If printing at home, we need to use archival inks, and this generally means pigment, if we intend to sell the prints. When choosing a printer I'd urge folk to check out ink costs and this isn't necessarily the cost per ml. When we renewed our wide-format printer, we found that the HP Z3200PS cost us a lot less in ink than the Epson 7800 that it replaced.[/quote] How are you finding the new printer? Is it a good one to consider?

Quote:If printing at home, we need to use archival inks, and this generally means pigment, if we intend to sell the prints.

When choosing a printer I'd urge folk to check out ink costs and this isn't necessarily the cost per ml. When we renewed our wide-format printer, we found that the HP Z3200PS cost us a lot less in ink than the Epson 7800 that it replaced.


How are you finding the new printer? Is it a good one to consider?

[quote] One thing to note that if I spread the cost of buying my printer over 5 years the total cost of each near A3 print is around £3.50 (cost of ink, paper and amortised cost of printer) [/quote] And how many prints are you basing that calculation on? And which paper are you using? Taking my A2 printer as a case example (Epson R3880) - Epson is rather cagey about the expected lifespan of the printer, but the general figure I have found seems to be around 12000 sheets of paper. With a price tag of a little under £1000, this would work out to about 80p per print to pay for the printer. For an A3 print, that is approx 2ml of ink -> anther 80p So the A3 print would be £1.60 + the cost of paper. This can vary massively, but my regular paper costs £1.20 for an A3 sheet, giving a total cost of £2.80 If you can find a pro lab which can beat that price, how much do they charge for the postage? Also remember, my price is based on using an expensive printer with genuine manufacture inks and high quality paper. There are plenty of ways to trim that price down if you want to.

Quote:
One thing to note that if I spread the cost of buying my printer over 5 years the total cost of each near A3 print is around £3.50 (cost of ink, paper and amortised cost of printer)



And how many prints are you basing that calculation on?
And which paper are you using?

Taking my A2 printer as a case example (Epson R3880) - Epson is rather cagey about the expected lifespan of the printer, but the general figure I have found seems to be around 12000 sheets of paper.

With a price tag of a little under £1000, this would work out to about 80p per print to pay for the printer.
For an A3 print, that is approx 2ml of ink -> anther 80p
So the A3 print would be £1.60 + the cost of paper. This can vary massively, but my regular paper costs £1.20 for an A3 sheet, giving a total cost of £2.80

If you can find a pro lab which can beat that price, how much do they charge for the postage?

Also remember, my price is based on using an expensive printer with genuine manufacture inks and high quality paper. There are plenty of ways to trim that price down if you want to.

[b]Matw[/b] I do not disagree with your figures and just found my original spreadsheet when I made the calculation. I actually found a total cost of running over 6 years comparing the R2800 and R3800. As I was only printing 70 A3 prints p.a. not what the printer is capable of. I discovered that after 6 years the total cost of running would be slightly higher for the R3800 with the added risk that, if the printer failed after 2 years it would be much higher (due the larger quantities of ink and the assumption I would not be able to use the remaining ink). Had I been printing say 100 prints p.a. then the balance would have tipped in favour of the R3800. I did a similar calculation for the R2800 v Continuous ink system but cannot locate this. The continuous ink system would have cost a lot more for 70 prints p.a. So I paid about £700 for my P600 which is £116.6 p.a. or £1.66 per print over 6 years. I agree that about 80p for ink is about right and £1.00 per sheet of paper. Thus this adds up to about £3.50 over 6 years use. In practice my R2800 was still working after eleven years but I replaced it with the P600 because I felt the quality of prints were deteriorating a little. At my club, I advice members new to printing to start by using SimLab and once they can produced consistent prints that way, then consider whether they wish to own a printer. Dave

Matw I do not disagree with your figures and just found my original spreadsheet when I made the calculation. I actually found a total cost of running over 6 years comparing the R2800 and R3800. As I was only printing 70 A3 prints p.a. not what the printer is capable of. I discovered that after 6 years the total cost of running would be slightly higher for the R3800 with the added risk that, if the printer failed after 2 years it would be much higher (due the larger quantities of ink and the assumption I would not be able to use the remaining ink). Had I been printing say 100 prints p.a. then the balance would have tipped in favour of the R3800. I did a similar calculation for the R2800 v Continuous ink system but cannot locate this. The continuous ink system would have cost a lot more for 70 prints p.a.

So I paid about £700 for my P600 which is £116.6 p.a. or £1.66 per print over 6 years. I agree that about 80p for ink is about right and £1.00 per sheet of paper. Thus this adds up to about £3.50 over 6 years use. In practice my R2800 was still working after eleven years but I replaced it with the P600 because I felt the quality of prints were deteriorating a little.

At my club, I advice members new to printing to start by using SimLab and once they can produced consistent prints that way, then consider whether they wish to own a printer.


Dave

[quote][quote]If printing at home, we need to use archival inks, and this generally means pigment, if we intend to sell the prints. When choosing a printer I'd urge folk to check out ink costs and this isn't necessarily the cost per ml. When we renewed our wide-format printer, we found that the HP Z3200PS cost us a lot less in ink than the Epson 7800 that it replaced.[/quote] How are you finding the new printer? Is it a good one to consider? [/quote] Like every printer, the Z3200 has its good and bad points. It has a built-in spectrophotometer so it'll make its own profiles and the printed output is superb as we'd expect from a 12 ink machine. Also, its frugal with ink. The downside is that it's too damn electronic so routine tasks like loading sheet paper take an age and small problems will stop it working. When removing a part-used roll of paper, it prints the paper type and roll identity on the edge of the paper in barcode and plain text so that it'll recognise the roll when we re-load it. My wife bought her own Epson 4880 for her sheet printing! The machine has probably been updated several times by HP.

Quote:
Quote:If printing at home, we need to use archival inks, and this generally means pigment, if we intend to sell the prints.

When choosing a printer I'd urge folk to check out ink costs and this isn't necessarily the cost per ml. When we renewed our wide-format printer, we found that the HP Z3200PS cost us a lot less in ink than the Epson 7800 that it replaced.


How are you finding the new printer? Is it a good one to consider?


Like every printer, the Z3200 has its good and bad points. It has a built-in spectrophotometer so it'll make its own profiles and the printed output is superb as we'd expect from a 12 ink machine. Also, its frugal with ink. The downside is that it's too damn electronic so routine tasks like loading sheet paper take an age and small problems will stop it working. When removing a part-used roll of paper, it prints the paper type and roll identity on the edge of the paper in barcode and plain text so that it'll recognise the roll when we re-load it. My wife bought her own Epson 4880 for her sheet printing!

The machine has probably been updated several times by HP.

[quote] the printed output is superb as we'd expect from a 12 ink machine[/quote] LoL and so it should for £5000 printer :P [quote]and this generally means pigment[/quote] Dye based inks have made some advances here. Printing at home can be as frustrating as it can be rewarding... the main thing is to understand the process and settings and the use of ICC profiles both in the softproofing stage and the output stage. You can be lucky and get good results by letting the printer and the driver manage colour but the use of ICC profiles specific to your printer/ink/paper combination with a well calibrated and profiled monitor can make a huge difference to waste... Like Dave I use a fully calibrated workflow and very rarely have a poor print (if I do it is always going to be my mistake).

Quote: the printed output is superb as we'd expect from a 12 ink machine

LoL and so it should for £5000 printer


Quote:and this generally means pigment

Dye based inks have made some advances here.

Printing at home can be as frustrating as it can be rewarding... the main thing is to understand the process and settings and the use of ICC profiles both in the softproofing stage and the output stage. You can be lucky and get good results by letting the printer and the driver manage colour but the use of ICC profiles specific to your printer/ink/paper combination with a well calibrated and profiled monitor can make a huge difference to waste... Like Dave I use a fully calibrated workflow and very rarely have a poor print (if I do it is always going to be my mistake).

For just a handful of prints it's better, costwise, to send away. A cheap printer is then only neeed if you need to print office documns for example. For anything larer than my A3+ printer can handle I send away, which is not often. You then need to consider control and convenience, so the need to have a print immediately rather than wait a day or two may swing your choice. I agree about the need for a colour manged workflow. If hat you see on screen can't be relied on, it doesn't matter where you print the image you won't be satisfied. My screen is calibrated, I use profiles for the paper and ink I use and have not had problems. Also consider the much wider range of paper available for home printing. Of course, that may or may not be an issue.

For just a handful of prints it's better, costwise, to send away. A cheap printer is then only neeed if you need to print office documns for example.
For anything larer than my A3+ printer can handle I send away, which is not often.

You then need to consider control and convenience, so the need to have a print immediately rather than wait a day or two may swing your choice.

I agree about the need for a colour manged workflow. If hat you see on screen can't be relied on, it doesn't matter where you print the image you won't be satisfied. My screen is calibrated, I use profiles for the paper and ink I use and have not had problems.

Also consider the much wider range of paper available for home printing. Of course, that may or may not be an issue.

One other consideration is that the unit price of ink tends to fall as the cartridges get larger. This means that it can actually be cheaper to buy and use a larger printer with its larger carts. With a reasonable throughput, ink can be the greatest of our costs. When I did the end-of-service costings for our 24 inch Epson 7800, the ink had cost us nearly 5 times as much as the machine.

One other consideration is that the unit price of ink tends to fall as the cartridges get larger.

This means that it can actually be cheaper to buy and use a larger printer with its larger carts. With a reasonable throughput, ink can be the greatest of our costs. When I did the end-of-service costings for our 24 inch Epson 7800, the ink had cost us nearly 5 times as much as the machine.

[quote]This means that it can actually be cheaper to buy and use a larger printer with its larger carts. With a reasonable throughput, ink can be the greatest of our costs. [/quote] Whilst I agree fully with this statement a larger format printer is often not a practical consideration. For many an A3+ printer will be the most economical as regards space and of course initial cost. To effectively use an A2 or wide format 44inch printer you need the space to house them, the footprint is quite large. Following our move to Devon I lost my dedicated garden office so have downsized to two A3+ printers which are stacked...

Quote:This means that it can actually be cheaper to buy and use a larger printer with its larger carts. With a reasonable throughput, ink can be the greatest of our costs.

Whilst I agree fully with this statement a larger format printer is often not a practical consideration. For many an A3+ printer will be the most economical as regards space and of course initial cost. To effectively use an A2 or wide format 44inch printer you need the space to house them, the footprint is quite large. Following our move to Devon I lost my dedicated garden office so have downsized to two A3+ printers which are stacked...