Photo printer - good quality?

[Guest]

Hi! I have been using a Canon PowerShot A60 digital camera (2.0 megapixels),
and I love it. I take a lot of pictures, but just for personal use
(vacations, parties, etc.). I just purchased an HP Photosmart 245 photo
printer and tested out a few sample pictures, printing directly from my
camera's memory card. The pictures came out ok, but there is definitely a
loss in quality compared to the same picture that I had devloped from an
online service.
My question is: Should this printer give me pictures that are
indistinguishable from regularly depeloped pictures, and if not, are there
any reasonably-priced printers (under $150) that do?

Thanks!
Ilan

 

[Len]

Ilan

The HP245 is a fine printer for printing photos. Keep in
mind that a good phot depends on alot of factors,
including:

1. Resolution of image - the higher the better - rule of
thumb is 300 pixels per printed inch, i.e. to print a good
8 x 10, you would want a file at least 3000 x 2400 pixels.
You can 'get by' with 200 pixels per inch if your camera
is low res / megapixels, i.e. a good 4 x 6 should be at
least 800 x 1200 pixels.

2. The format the file is in - tif's print better because
they have more pixels, jpegs 'lose' pixels/quality

3. type of printer paper - use a good quality 'photo'
paper, not standard paper

4. printer settings - read your manual, make sure you
select the right paper, quality ( photo vs draft, etc),
and size settings.

hope this helps

 

[Guest]

Hi Len,

Thanks for the advice. When I tested out my printer, I was printing 4x6s,
printing straight off of my memory card, using "premium" photo paper, and on
the "best" quality setting. Yet the picture still came out slightly granier
than it had with regular development. There's no point on spending a couple
of hundred dollars just to be unhappy with quality, so I decided to return it
and will look for something else (or just continue having them developed for
me).

Sincerely,
Ilan

 

[Chuck]

The 2MP camera is a bit low in resolution for high quality pictures of any
size. 3.2MP or more is better. Next the basic resolution of the printer is
enough to get a very good quality print. It may be that the commercial
photoprinting you use runs the image thru some sort of optimizer program
prior to making the print. Next as you mentioned, you are using different
paper than the commercial operation. I believ you can do a bit better for
the price on a differnt model printer. There are several that will allow you
to plug in the memory card, and print from it. In high quality printing
modes, it's difficult to find individual dots on a photo quality printer.
I'd print a few pictures and have the commercially printed ones, as well as
the memory card, and then go to my local printer store. Also bring a few
sheets of the photo paper of your choice.

My 4 color printers currently in service
HP 512C (Poor photo quality, slow)
Canon S760 very good photo quality, tanks can be refilled.
Epson R300 very good photo quality, Tanks are not easily refillable
(chipped)
Brother MFC 420cn Good to very good photo quality, a bit slow, don't know
if tanks are refillable.

 

[Guest]

Hi Chuck,

I've had pix taken by my 2MP camera developed by an online photo service,
and the quality is excellent, so if the printer is good, I would hope to
acheive the same results. Are you saying that I should take the sample
pictures I printed, the picture I had previously developed, my memory card,
and photo paper, and bring them to the store to test their printers there,
before I buy? Will they allow that? If so, that's certainly not a bad idea
- thanks!

Ilan

 

[Chuck]

In short, yes they should allow you to test printers.
After all, what are the display demo printers for?

For years, National Geographic's pictures were thought to be some of the
highest quality pictures. Actually, the printed resolution of those
impressive pictures is less than what a good current model photo quality
printer is capable of.

Besides the resolution, paper and ink can play a big part in the visual
quality of a printers photo quality. The ink droplet size can also make a
visible difference.

If I watch the printing process on my R300, one of the big differences
between it and my other printers has to do with the width of the printing
band. It's quite wide in high quality modes, with plenty of overlap between
each pass of the printing head. This seems to allow much finer control of
color shade and ink bleed. (needed to reduce or prevent individual dots from
showing in very light color shades.)

Interestingly enough, my S750 can produce a print that will be of
compareable quality using two less ink colors.

Another curious fact is that optimizing a printers output on a given paper
type, using a test target that has color shades and densities from about 10%
to 100% may not be optimum for photo printing.

It seems that lighting, ink and paper effects, plus the subjective eye &
brain opinion have a great influnce on what is considered to be correct for
a given picture. Technically correct settings may produce a somewhat washed
out photo, or an overly dark photo.

 

[Barry]

Ilan....

A 2 MP camera is usually only adequate for photos you want to send via
email. If you plan on printing photos of any size, then you'll need a
camera with higher resolution. I now use a 4.0 MP camera and I've found
that to be inadequate for printing larger photos. I'm in the market for a
6.0 MP or higher. If you are serious about printing photos, think about
going to a higher MP camera. If you got "excellent quality" when having
prints made from you 2 MP camera, then you must be printing smaller photos.
Enlargements would be impossible. The other advantage to a higher MP camera
is that you can crop and enlarge if you want to and still have a high
quality print.

Barry

 

[Guest]

Barry,

Thanks for the reply. I'm really only interested in 4x6 pix, and the online
quality was great for those. I went out and purchased a Canon Pixmar 5000 -
if I'm not mistaken, it had 9600 x 2400 dpi, which may have been enough to
get excellent 4x6 prints, even with my 2 MP camera. Plus, you only need to
change the ink for the specific colors that run out, saving on ink costs.
Only, I retruned it before I even opened the box, because I did some
calculations, and between the high quality paper and all the ink, it worked
out to cost about 35 cents/print vs about 25 cents/professionally developed
pic. So, the more pictures I printed, the more costly it would be! I'll
continue to have my pix developed by someone else until the technology is
cheap enough to do it myself and get the same results.

Thanks,
Ilan

 

[Guest]

i have a picture that has a water mark on it does anyone have any
suggestion's of how i can fix it with out cropping that part. thank's,
missy

 

[Paul Ballou]

You might be able to fix it with an image editor but it will depend on the
program. I wouldn't guarantee a fix but some of the latest versions of image
editors can do some great things with damage photos. What image editor do
you have such as Photoshop, Paintshop Pro, Digital Image Pro, or Photoplus?


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