Digital Camera World » printing

Jessops announces process for receiving outstanding print orders

jmeyer — Thu, 24 Jan 2013 11:03:27 +0000

Jessops has announced that all outstanding print orders made in Jessops stores or for collection at Jessops stores prior to its closure will all be fulfilled.

The Jessops Photo website, which remains fully operational despite the high street chain’s move into administration, has published instructions explaining the process for retrieving outstanding photo orders.

According to the statement, photo that are not normally processed in Jessops stores are processed on behalf of Jessops by CeWe.

Jessops’ Statement

If you have sent correspondence to the Joint Administrators / PwC via e-mail or letter enquiring about outstanding orders, they will endeavour to respond to you directly however in the meantime please follow the instructions below:

Orders placed online for Home Delivery

CeWe will complete all outstanding orders. There is no need to contact CeWe to receive your order but if you wish to, please contact CeWe on 01926 463117 with your order number.

Orders placed online for delivery back to a Jessops store, Analogue Orders (E6, 110, 120, roll film, B&W, video transfer, etc.), Online orders burnt to CD and deposited in store, or Photo Legacy

CeWe will complete all outstanding orders they have received and which are NOT normally processed in store. Please contact CeWe on 01926 463117 to ascertain the status of your order providing your order number.

If your order has been received by CeWe but not yet despatched back to the store, CeWe will complete the order and send it to your home. To enable CeWe to send your order to you, you will need to contact them and provide them with your address.

If your order was not received by CeWe prior to the Jessops stores closing or was already completed and sent back to the store (CeWe will advise you if this is the case), then you should contact the dedicated helpline at Jessops Head Office on 0116 232 6521 on or after Wednesday 23 January so that the Joint Administrators can send the order or the originals back to you.

You will need to provide your name, e-mail address, address to which you want your order sent and order number.

Please note the Joint Administrators will not be in a position to process any such requests before Wednesday 23 January as all orders located in stores are being couriered to the Jessops Head Office and may not be received until that date.

Orders due to be completed in store

If your order was due to be completed in store and you have not collected it, please contact Jessops Head Office on 0116 232 6521 on or after Wednesday 23 January so that the Joint Administrators can arrange to have your order sent to you if completed or the original source data if not completed. You will need to provide your name, e-mail address, address to which you want your order sent and order number.

Card Town at Jessops

CeWe will complete all outstanding orders. There is no need to contact CeWe to receive your order but if you wish to, please contact CeWe on 01926 463117 with your order number.

End of Jessops statement

For any other enquiries, customer are asked to ring the Jessops Photo Customer Care phone number – 01926 456 989.

Monitor calibration made easy: how to get the most accurate colours possible

jmeyer — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 11:30:01 +0000

It’s infuriating when the colour tone and brightness of your photo prints look vastly different from the image you see on your computer screen. The solution is monitor calibration – making sure that the colours your PC displays are as accurate as possible.

Proper monitor calibration helps you avoid misplaced adjustments and ensures you get the best possible results from your photographs. It’s also essential when printing or uploading to an online image gallery.

Getting monitor colour, brightness and contrast right sounds scary, but it’s quite easy. Once you know what you see on-screen is accurate you’ll find printing headaches will usually disappear.

Simple monitor calibration isn’t difficult, and with the in-built tools now available with Mac OS and Windows 7 (and Windows 8), it only takes a few minutes to get a good level of accuracy (if you do want to take it further a professional colorimeter is essential).

So don’t be frightened; give monitor calibration a go – you’ll be surprised at the difference.

Monitor calibration step by step

01 View in the right light
If your monitor is under strong light, this can influence its colour. Try calibrating your screen in a room lit with a daylight bulb. If you’re running XP or Vista, right-click on the desktop and choose Properties. Click on the Settings tab and set Colour Quality to the highest setting.

02 Adjust your monitor
Click your monitor’s menu and set Temperature to 6500k. Windows 7 (in the Control Panel) and Mac OS (in System Preferences) both contain basic monitor calibration software. For older Windows systems, download Quick Gamma.

03 Set up your printer
When it comes to printing, the easiest option is to use the same brand of printer and paper. In Photoshop’s Print window, select Printer Manages Colour and then select the paper. Most third-party paper manufacturers offer downloadable ICC colour profiles.

04 Use a colorimeter
A dedicated colorimeter like the ColorMunki tunes monitor and printer by checking the ambient light, monitor and printed colour. It then creates custom monitor and printer profiles and sets them up automatically. They’re not cheap, but are worth it.

Copy old slides and prints: a really easy way to digitize your archive
20 questions you need to ask about how to print photos
Colour management: fine tune your kit for the most accurate colours possible
The honest truth on what raw files can do for your photography

Colour management: fine tune your kit for the most accurate colours possible

dcworld — Sun, 21 Oct 2012 05:00:16 +0000

Our colour calibration tips explain how to get accurate colours in your photos by following a few simple rules of colour management.

Producing a colour print that closely matches what appears on your computer screen is something anyone can master if they understand the principles involved and have invested in the kit needed for producing accurate colour. Discover how easy it can be to turn out predictable and pleasing results.

Colour calibration: An Introduction

In our experience, the idea of a ‘colour space’ is what drives most people crazy as they begin in colour management.

Any colour can be represented as a point in space inside a sphere (see the diagram below). Somewhere within that colour sphere sits the position that describes your chosen colour. It can be represented mathematically as a point on three axes within the sphere. A colour space describes the size and shape of a 3D box that sits within the sphere.

If any of your colours are too strong for your chosen colour space then they’ll simply spill outside the box and that’s called ‘being out of gamut’. In digital photography there are two common colour spaces: sRGB and Adobe RGB.

The first is the default colour space used by most digital cameras and the default colour space of most computer monitors. Both sRGB and Adobe RGB use red, green and blue to reference colours.

However, colour inkjet printers use a combination of cyan, magenta, yellow and black inks. This is because if red, green and blue inks are mixed on paper the result is a horrible muddy brown mess.

In order to translate the colour that appears on your camera’s LCD or your computer screen, we need colour management. In practice, this is really just complex arithmetic that calculates instructions for a printer to place dots of yellow, magenta, cyan and black ink on paper in order to mimic the red, green and blue colours that you see on screen.

With the best will in the world, there’s no way that a series of ink droplets can exactly match the colour that appears on your computer screen, but we can get very close indeed – and we do this by
using colour management.

Once you’ve profiled your monitor and printer using the methods on the next pages, you can then make a test print of one of your photos to compare what appears on the screen and what comes out of the printer.

Before you do that it’s important to understand how light can wreck your colour perception. It’s no good trying to assess your colour prints under the light of a tungsten table lamp or by the flicker of a fluorescent tube. Use daylight to assess your images and you’ll see the real colours.

When you hold your test print up to your computer screen for comparison, it’s important to realise that you’re never going to see a perfect match.

A screen that uses red, green and blue dots of light to create an image can never exactly match the reflected light from a piece of off-white paper that’s covered in droplets of cyan, magenta, yellow and black ink. But with good colour management, you can get very close.

20 questions you need to ask about how to print photos

jmeyer — Tue, 10 Jul 2012 11:08:52 +0000

Digital imaging has given us all so much more creative freedom, and while it’s true that not every picture you take is worth making into a print, your favourite images deserve the print treatment. There’s nothing like producing a beautiful print – it makes all the time and money spent on your photography worthwhile. And you can do it at home easily. Professional lab-quality printing at home is one of the biggest benefits of digital photography. But printing photos isn’t as easy as just connecting cables and pressing a button. There are all sorts of things you need to consider. Below we’ve compiled what we believe are 19 essential questions most photographers forget to ask about how to print photos.

01 Which printer settings should  I use?

With your image ready to go, hit the print button – there are a few things to be selected first. Use the Best Photo setting for your portfolio prints or for prints to display.

However, for general use you’ll get reasonable quality with the Photo setting and it’s fine for snapshots. The Best Photo setting will consume more ink and is usually slower.

Take your time to check the options carefully when you’re working through the printer options. For example, it’s easy to forget to set the correct image orientation. Slip up and you waste paper and ink.

02 How do I resize photos ready for print?

The easy option is to leave the resizing issue to Photoshop’s print feature, which options its own automatic resizing ‘Scale to Fit Media’.

This is great if you want to print out a few snap shots, but if you’re looking for quality printing, then this quick-fix solution isn’t the best option as it can cause all types of framing, cropping and resizing issues.

To resize photos correctly you need to either use the Crop tool, or the Image and Canvas Size commands. Before you start, go to Photoshop> Preferences, then under the Image Interpolation menu make sure Bicubic is selected rather than the the Bicubic Smooth or Bicubic Sharpening options.

When you’re preparing an image for print sharpening should be the last enhancement applied.

Step 1 Find the image size
Start off by finding the image size by going to Image>Resize>Image Size. Make a note of the document size – in this case its 21mm x 29.7mm at 240ppi.

Step 2 Pick a crop preset
Select the Crop tool and, from the Preset drop-down menu, choose 5 x 7 inch at 240ppi, draw the crop and then move it into position before applying.

Step 3 Customise your crop
If you want to crop at a size not shown in the presets, enter the details in the fields in the Options bar, making sure you add px, mm, in or cm for the unit type.

03 Do I need to maintain my printer?

Leaving a printer for a long period with its inksets in place can lead to problems and the ink can dry up and clog the printer head. Several cleaning cycles using the printer utility may be needed to clear any blockage. Generally, a printer can be left for a couple of months with no problems.

If you’re concerned and you’re not a regular print maker, either make a point of turning on the printer once a week or fortnight, for example, or buy a weekly timer to do this for you automatically. This makes the printer go through its charging and head-cleaning cycle so you should avoid blockages.

However, this process will consume ink and this is why some photographers who print frequently leave their printers permanently switched on to avoid this wastage. For long term storage, take out the inks.

04 Which paper should I use for fine-art prints?

The brilliant thing about inkjet paper is the huge range of surfaces finishes, weights and brands that are available.

Fine-art photo papers are generally more expensive than general photo papers. This is because they are more substantial – they’re heavier, and many are manufactured to very high archival standards.

Therefore, used with the right inks and stored and/or displayed sympathetically they will outlive you. Most photo printers work fine with heavier papers, but if you’re not sure, check the instructions before buying a box.

Fine-art papers are usually finely textured and can even have a tactile, cloth-like surface. Obviously, when handling it you should be holding paper by its edges and fingers should be kept away from the printing area.

If you’re looking for fine-art material, some paper suppliers will offer a sampler pack.

05 Should I use gloss or matte papers?

Either! Both! This is up to your own tastes as well as the images you’re printing, but there are no hard-and-fast rules. The best thing is to choose a paper that gives an end result that you’re happy with.

Generally, if you want the most impact in terms of contrast, colour saturation and tonal range, go for gloss. There are various grades of gloss from high, mirror-like finishes to ‘unglazed gloss’ surfaces that are reminiscent of darkroom papers.

Matte finishes have a much more subtle look and suit portraits and delicate landscapes really well.

PAGE 1: Questions 1 to 5
PAGE 2: Questions 6 to 10
PAGE 3: Questions 11 to 15
PAGE 4: Questions 16 to 20

Ensure print-friendly colors with the Photoshop Gamut Warning

jmeyer — Thu, 21 Jun 2012 14:09:00 +0000

Before

After

Your computer mixes Red, Green and Blue (RGB) channels together to produce millions of different colours. Printers combine Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black (CMYK) inks to create a more limited colour palette. On-screen colours that can’t be reproduced in print are called ‘out of gamut’ (or out of range) colours.

Although Elements users can produce more print-friendly colours using the Adobe RGB colour space, you can still boost colour saturation to accurately reproduce them.

Photoshop CS users have tools to help them keep edited colours within a printable range, like the CMYK mode and an out-of-gamut warning. Here, we’ll show you how to use these more advanced CS tools.

Step 1: Choose a colour space
Photoshop CS users can follow steps 1 to 4 in the main walkthrough to tweak the start image in CS’s Camera Raw editor. Once you’ve clicked Open Image, go to Edit>Colour Settings. In Working Spaces, set the RGB menu to Adobe RGB (1998) to work in a printer-friendly colour space. Click OK.

Step 2: Gamut Warning
Add a Hue/Saturation Adjustment Layer, boost the Blues Saturation to +57 and set Hue to +20. Go to Window and tick Gamut Warning. Most of the sky will turn a patchy grey, indicating these colours are out of a printer’s range. Drop the Blues Saturation down to +35 to reduce the gamut warning patches.

Step 3: Edit the mask
Follow steps 7 to 9 to boost the colour saturation of the Cyans, Reds and Yellows. This will add more gamut warning patches to parts of the scene. You can reduce the intensity of the colour saturation by dropping the Adjustment Layer’s Opacity to 80%.

Step 4: Change mode
To force Photoshop CS to use printer-friendly colours go to Image>Mode>CMYK Colour. Click Flatten, then OK to choose a CMYK profile. The gamut warning patches will vanish, and the colours  on screen will be more similar to those in print.

10 tips for preparing and selling photo prints

jmeyer — Tue, 08 May 2012 06:00:36 +0000

Image copyright Andrew Ray

About 14 years ago, Andrew Ray owned a pet shop and had just taken up photography as a part-time hobby. However, in 2008 he became a full-time photographer, supplying his images as fine-art prints, cards and calendars to galleries and shops across the county, and selling direct at local events and through his website.

So how exactly does a pet-shop owner become a successful fine-art photographer in the space of ten years? He shares his top ten tips for selling photo prints, and afterwards we’ll show you step-by-step how to prepare your own photos for print.

Tip 1
A local gallery or craft fair is a good way of determining if people are interested in your work. A selection of 20 images produced as both mounted prints and cards is a good starting point.

Tip 2
Capture images at different times. Many of my customers prefer prints taken in the type  of conditions they would experience, rather than the ‘golden hours’ around sunrise and sunset.

Tip 3
Offer similar images in both horizontal and vertical formats where possible, and in a variety of sizes. Don’t worry about framing, though, as most people prefer to choose their own frames.

Tip 4
Print and mount the photographs yourself when orders are received. This helps keep costs under control and prevents over stocking – commercial printing requires quantity purchases to be cost effective, and dead (non-selling) stock just ties up your capital.

Tip 5
Invest in quality equipment, including a photo printer capable of producing archival professional prints to at least A3 size. A printer that can use a variety of media will broaden your range.

Tip 6
Presentation is important. Many shops/galleries require you to supply your own card racks and photo stands. When selling at craft events, lights are important to display your work to its potential.

Tip 7
Set up a website with the option to purchase via PayPal. There  are numerous cost-effective template style options available, such as Clikpic, which helps advertise your business and increases sales.

Tip 8
Mounted prints and cards  are best suited to postal distribution; only specialist carriers will accept framed prints under glass. Mounted prints can easily be shipped in a flat-packed box.

Tip 9
You’ll need to inform your  tax office if you start earning anything through self-employment, and will need to keep records for your tax return.

Tip 10
Don’t neglect your photography! It’s easy to get caught up in printing and selling, but people will expect a new selection of images to choose from on a regular basis.

How to prepare your images for selling photo prints

Step 1: Optimise
The first step with any print is to optimise the image. This means checking and adjusting the exposure as necessary, using Levels to ensure your black and white points are set, and perhaps adding (or removing) some contrast using Curves. Once the exposure is set you can accurately see and correct any colour casts.

Step 2: Resize
Some people like to resize their images so that they match the intended print size at a 300ppi resolution. Although this isn’t really necessary for small print sizes if you’re printing them yourself, it will speed up the time it takes to upload them to an online lab if you’re planning to have them commercially printed.

Step 3: Sharpen
The final step in your print preparation is to sharpen the image, which should always be done after the image has been resized because the print size has a direct impact on the amount of sharpening required. In Photoshop, use either the Unsharp Mask filter or the Smart Sharpen option, which offers greater control.

Image editing, printing & storing

crutter — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 10:44:23 +0000

Your digital darkroom, aka your PC or Mac, is where the magic happens – where you transform the images captured by your camera into the dynamic masterpieces you originally envisioned when you were behind the lens. Whether you’re just tweaking a raw image to get the perfect result, or going that little bit further to rescue a bad exposure, here’s all you need to get started.

Printing at home

These days, even the most humble home photo printers are capable of producing results that rival the output of any high-street printer. Pay a little more for a model that uses multiple shades of the four base ink colours, and you’ll achieve unrivalled quality. Of course, you pay a premium for this quality and convenience, but there are ways of keeping the costs down…

Printer

For the best quality prints, choose a dedicated photo printer rather than an ordinary colour printer. Many photo printers are now ‘all-in-one’ models, offering printing, scanning and copying in a single desktop unit. Prices start at £50 for an A4 printer. Some models have eight individual inks, which may mean higher costs.

Paper

For genuine photo quality, invest in high-quality photo paper. The main decision you have to make is which finish to go for. Canon, Epson and Fujifilm all make their own glossy and matt papers – you’ll usually get the best results with the same brand as your printer. For fine-art printing, there are plenty of third-party providers.

Ink

The biggest cost of running your photo printer is replacing used ink cartridges. One option is to shop around for compatible third-party inks. You could save as much as 50%, though you may not get the same guarantee of colour fidelity or light-fading resistance offered by the manufacturer’s own brand.

Image-editing and storage options

Laptop or desktop?

Laptops are more fragile and often less powerful than desktops. However, if you like the idea of editing your images on location, or just lounging on the sofa, a laptop’s the way to go. Prices are falling all the time, and you can now get a decent Windows 7-enabled laptop for around £300-400.

Card reader

Many PCs come with slots for SD and CompactFlash cards, but using a USB 2.0 card reader is still the preferred option for image transfer. They do tend to sap power from a laptop when downloading images, so it’s best to have your notebook on charge so you don’t suddenly lose power, or worse, your pictures.

Screen

Glossy screens look great, but they are highly reflective, which can result in unwanted glare. Matt screens produce much less glare, but care with positioning is needed to prevent images from looking flat. Whatever you opt for, calibrate it to ensure accurate colour reproduction.

Software

Most new SLRs come with raw-processing and photo-editing software, but it can be hard to use or rather basic. The most popular raw editor is Adobe Camera Raw, which is bundled with Photoshop Elements 10, Photoshop CS5 and Lightroom 3.

Storage

If you regularly shoot large volumes of raw files, storage can be a major concern. As an example, 300 16-bit 12Mb raw files require 8Gb of storage. Even if you only edit a third of these files and back them up once, you’re still looking at around 24Gb of storage. An external hard drive with a capacity of 500Gb – because drives can corrupt and laptops can get stolen – plus a DVD burner for backups is the best solution. This set-up would be enough for 30 8Gb memory cards, which would probably keep you going for a year.

Back to: Flash modes explained

Forward to: Essential accessories

Print photos from Photoshop Elements

dcworld — Thu, 12 May 2011 12:29:39 +0000

How to prepare your images ready for print using Photoshop Elements

Digital Camera’s 10-part series ‘Teach Yourself Photoshop’ builds into a complete video reference library. These easy-to-follow video guides will take you on a start-to-finish journey through perfecting your photos in the digital darkroom. In this video you’ll discover how to get better prints using Photoshop Elements. Find out how to use Colour Management, how to scale the shot for print and more to make sure you get great prints from your printer. Click the links to the right and build up the complete collection with each new issue of Digital Camera.

How to sell photos: selling prints to the public

dcworld — Tue, 12 Oct 2010 16:18:30 +0000

Quick photography tips: fine art landscape photographer Ed Collacott reveals the ins and outs of selling prints to the public to Ben Brain

Selling your photos can be hugely satisfying. However, being able to shoot what you want to shoot and still make cash is, for most people, just a dream. Many photographers end up drifting into a career taking pictures of subjects they’re not passionate about to simply pay the bills. There are, however, other possibilities, and selling beautifully crafted prints direct to the public is one way to artfully combine your passion and business skills, as well as get immediate feedback from your customers!

Sell your photos to the public – Ed’s top tips for success

Shoot what your passionate about

“I’m very fortunate to have found a niche for my work – it enables me to make a living and gives me an independence that I truly value. I only shoot what I have a passion for, which is the landscape, and I hope this passion is reﬂected in my work. I’m really not interested in portraiture, weddings or studio work and believe that if you stick with what you’re good at you’re far more likely to succeed.”

Start at craft fairs

“I have a stall in Bath from which I sell my work on Saturdays during the year and every day for the ﬁve weeks leading up to Christmas. The stall has consent from the council, which isn’t cheap, so it’s a good idea to try art or craft fairs ﬁrst to assess people’s reaction to your work – the public can be a ﬁckle lot.”

Always think about the presentation

“People will not buy your work if it’s not presented well, and you need to spend a lot of time and effort on getting it right. You also need to think about your pricing – you’ve got to cover all your costs and make a proﬁt.”

Find a printer you can trust

“Modern printing technologies produce superb archival prints on a variety of surfaces, such as ﬁne-art papers and canvases, so give the public a choice. Never show work you’re not happy with. You’re only as good as your weakest link, so if you’re not printing your own images, ﬁnd a good printer and build a strong working relationship.”

Avoid large retail shows at the start

“In addition to the street stall, I have a range of greeting cards that I wholesale around the country and a few galleries hold my work. I’ve exhibited at large retail shows, such as Grand Designs and Country Living, but the outlays are huge and I don’t recommend this for a beginner. Online sales are also important but this area is very competitive – there are some ﬁne photographers out there and thousands of web galleries.

Give the public what they want

“My best-selling image is Winter Wood, which is very simple but very effective. My favourite image is Misty Pines, sadly not one of my best sellers but it’s one that gives me great pleasure.”

To see more of Ed’s photographs visit www.ﬁneartphotographs.co.uk

Teach yourself Photoshop: Part 1, Video 5 – Saving and printing out your images

dcworld — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 12:54:07 +0000

Learn the basics of photo-editing with our introduction to Adobe’s image editing software.

Digital Camera’s new 10-part series ‘Teach Yourself Photoshop’ builds into a complete video reference library. These easy-to-follow video guides will take you on a start-to-finish journey through perfecting your photos in the digital darkroom. The first instalment, covers getting started with Photoshop Elements. In part 5 of the first instalment you’ll master saving and printing out your images. See the related links for both the previous and next parts.