Archive for the 'Printers' category

Canada’s National Archive experts are worried that we don’t have enough knowledge about how inkjet prints age. They fear that most of them will die early because the dried ink is much more exposed to external stresses than the pigments of traditional photo paper.

So, they turn to Henry Wilhelm of Wilhelm Research to get some additonal information.

Source: New York Times.

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Do you happen to know that 5% of all male population is actually affected by some form of color-blindness (females are much less prone to it). It means that plenty of activities that tend to rely on color identification by the user is significantly flawed for about 2-3% of the user population. This can become a real issue for companies willing to support equal employment opportunities for all.

In software, if this was not reason enough to think seriously about it, we should also think about the impact of printing onto black & white printers (they are color-blind too and this affect 100% of B&W printer users). Most of the problems could be alleviated by following some simple rules that should be part of any software requirements.

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Choosing a photographic inkjet printer able to produce high-end A3+ printsis not an easy task even though the list of candidates is much more limited than for A4+ sizes. Nevertheless, as prices are steep, it’s worth avoiding errors. This makes the comparison done by our firends at photo-i the more interesting.

They oppose three impressive printing machines:

• Epson Stylus Photo R2400
• HP Photosmart pro B9180
• Canon Pixma pro 9500

I will not hide the conclusion, the HP B 9180 runs ahead for its excellent price, its auto-calibration, its ability to keep heads unclogged by auto-cleaning every 6 hours, its Ethernet connectivity (on top of the USB) and its photo quality very similar to the others (the differences really became small at this level).

Link: Comparison of 3 A+ pigment inkjet printers.

I previously wrote about the various techniques used for inkjet printing, but a good reader (thanks Daniel!) made me notice that there is a technique less common than the usual dye-based or pigment inks. I admit easily that I did not know it before. But it is a slightly older technique that was used by Epson for desktop printers and that includes both a solvant and a heat-sensitive dye.

To use it, you absolutely need a paper whose special surface has been prepared taking that ink into account and making the surface relatively sensitive itself to heat (polyester cover) in order to open to heat (creating micropore allowing the ink to enter the paper, then closing behind it) or a very hard surface (metal or ceramics, for example, where the ink will be cooked on the surface). This is specifically the technology used in giclées (printing solutions using a surface that looks a lot like a painter canvas: sublimed ink on a canvas heavily coated with polyester).

Rather uncommon today on the desktop (both at home and in the office), this technique must be rather difficult to handle photo-quality colors (the importance of good ICC profiles cannot be stressed too much), forces to adapt to prepared papers (special surfaces like cotton are not usable) and must have a rather good shelf life (the ink is preserved at the bottom of the closed micropores).

Sources:

• Dye Sublimation information.
• Info sur la sublimation de colorant (giclée)

Complementary information about the possible use of such an ink on an Epson R800/R1800: These inks are supposed to be used with printers that never were designed for them (far from it!), UltraChrome ink Epson printers (R800/R1800). There, it smells really funny; The more because these good printers normally use a rather complex combination of inks including a varnish or “gloss optimizer” transparent ink used to manage correctly the bronzing effect so common on pigment inks. I would stay far from this odd combination (I would be afraid to damage my printer…)

Essentially, Wallhogs is accepting your picture files to prepare special prints of large size:

• Decals, that would be nice to stick on a wall or on your fridge
• Posters (you know that don’t you?)
• Canvas prints, that would mimic a canvas paint

Currently, I am wandering a lot around the the web sites for OEM suppliers to manufacturers of micro-computers. This leads me to observe some apparent trends (at least in the opinions of the experts) that could be of interest if you intend to buy PC hardware in the coming months.

• DRAM memory: All the observers announce plumetting prices, they only discuss the speed of fall. Prices in September will be much lower than today and Vista is not yet ready to push the demand up.
• NAND Flash memory: The market is strangled by demand, SAMSUNG announced that they will increase their production capacity of 90% by year’s end, but in the mean timen prices should climb steeply.
• CPU: The price war between Intel and AMD is not supposed to stop any time soon. Intel seems to be trying to strangle AMD (and they could well succeed if AMD marketing plans are late this year). Double core and Quad core CPUs are driving the market.
• LCD display screens: Prices are oriented downward, but only slightly and for small sizes (including laptop screens) the demand is such that we can expect a slight price climb in the coming months.
• B&W laser printers: In the US, HP started a amazing price fall (entry point going far under 100$) even if nobody really knows why (new laser products coming? upcoming low cost color lasers? entirely something else?)

Print on Demand (POD) has become a very affordable solution for people willing to publish their own books. Previously, you had to convince a publisher to invest in printing hundreds if not thousands of copies of your book; then, you hoped for success and -usually- failed.

With Print of Demand, the cost becomes so low that you can actually print one copy for you and one for your mother. Then, you print whenever you find a customer. This is still affordable and it works.

In this context, I wanted to help a friend interested in this and I started looking for a good solution. So, here are my rants and raves about publishing solutions I could find.

Best Print-on-Demand solutions

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Ultra-specialized, the web sites below will allow you to build or create easily enormously personnalized images:

• Clapper board: As if you were clapping for your own motion picture
• Cigarette pack
• Warning label 100% tailor-made
• Official-looking seals

Alan Taylor created a nice representation of the largest bodies of the Solar System (it takes into account the new classification used since last Summer). A really good job of Photoshopping many images together in order to produce what could easily become a landscape poster if somebody decided to print it.

The 27th of March should be launch day for the newest Adobe Photoshop graphics product line: Creative Suite 3 or CS3. Be prepared for more details from Adobe, but the products will not be shipping before the second trimester (and Q2 may mean just before Summer).

There will be new features and the important support of both Vista and PPC+Intel Apple Mac (Universal Binary). The news come with the information that CS2 (and quite a number of other Adobe products) will NOT be upgraded to support Vista. Either it seemed too complicated or not compelling enough for Adobe. You will have to pay full price to go to the new product.

Speaking of new, the official prices start to be known:

• Standard Design suite: 1269€ for InDesign, Photoshop, Illustrator and Acrobat 8 pro
• Premium Design suite: 1999€ for InDesign, Photoshop-Extended, Illustrator, Acrobat 8 pro, Flash professional and DreamWeaver
• Standard web suite: 999€ for Flash pro, DreamWeaver, FireWorks and Contribute
• Premium web suite: 1699€ for Photoshop-Extended, Illustrator, Acrobat 8 pro, Flash pro, DreamWeaver, FireWorks and Contribute
• Production Premium suite: 1999€ for Photoshop-Extended, Illustrator, Flash pro, DreamWeaver, AfterEffects pro, Premiere Pro, SoundBooth and Encore
• Master Collection: 2799€ for ALL (InDesign, Photoshop-Extended, Illustrator, Acrobat 8 pro, Flash pro, DreamWeaver, AfterEffects pro, Premiere Pro, SoundBooth, Encore, FireWorks and Contribute

Software programs to do anything you want with your PC if you are a bit more geeky than most but do not want to pay much. Freeware & shareware.

I recently installed on my main Windows-PC computer a (rather old) LCD display from Hyundai: ImageQuest Q17. I wanted to improve significantly the correct color calibration. Fortunately, I could get a Pantone ColorVision SpyderPro for the weekend.

It was only a matter of minutes to setup the sensor and run the calibration process. Everything goes smoothly since it is a completely automated process (you only have to wait while test colors change on your screen until the correct calibration is reached).

The result is impressive. Before doing it, I knew that my colors were slightly off. After, the white and greys are so much better that it was immediately perceptible.

Great product that exists both for Apple and Windows.

I had been advising to use PDF Creator to produce PDF files from any program under Windows. It appears that the product does not work with Vista. Even worse, sometimes, it seems that its mere installation is breaking havoc in all Vista printing and when it happens, it may be difficult to uninstall.

Just wait for a future new version that would solve the issue.

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Adobe has been observing the desktop application market and specifically seen Google challenging Microsoft with its online Google desktop suite (spreadsheet, text processor, agenda, etc.). They determined that they want to go the same way in order to ensure a bright future for the Photoshop line.

Currently, Adobe has already split its market niche between entry-level Photoshop Elements and high-level PhotoShop CS suite. From what has been told this week, they wish to go one step further by introducing online version of their image editing tools. It should be free even if limited to a subset of functions.

It is definitely interesting. Do not expect that to translate into free professional-level tools (no free CS4 suite). However it means that, depending on your needs, you will be able to choose from the widest possible spectrum:

• Free online
• Low cost (PS Elements)
• Pro-grade (PS CS suite)

The user (you and me) get maximum choice, the software company (Adobe) covers all bases and reduces the risk of being out-sold from the lower level and provides a consistent upgrade path from $0 to $1000 products. This is the way technology innovation should be used by companies willing to protect their market while serving user needs.

Others, please, take notice.

PS: You should also notice that Adobe is already ben starting this kind of move in relation with video edition announcing Remix, an online video mixing/remixing tool.

PPS: According to Monkey Bites, it would be launched within 6 months and supported by ads.

Again, I come back to the issue of free fonts of great quality. DaFont holds links to hundreds of character fonts readily downlodable for both Mac and PC. Usually, this leads to a bunch of crap fonts. Here, the top 100 list is really of impressive quality. Waltograph is copying Walt Disney’s signature, Evanescence is both sophisticated and elegant, Loki Cola will remind you of some cola brand, Shanghai is the archetypical Chinese font, and all the others are really pleasant.

Now, what is often left aside in most font libraries is the presence (or lack) of accented letters. DaFont tells you clearly which ones have those internationally-needed letters and adds also the Euro sign to it.

It’s pleasant to merely go sight-seeing.

Yes! If you want to get top photo quality, an inkjet printer is the best solution. But the cost is high. To reduce it, look at the color laser solution. Most entry-level printers are sold under 300$ and the operating costs are tremendously lower than those of an inkjet (toners are more expensive than liquid ink cartridges, but they routinely print several thousand pages). Moreover, they are FAST (several pages per minute instead of several minutes per page).

However, the market is maturing a lot and new models are arriving. The proof? Look at the latest color laser printers comparison from Tom’s Hardware and check the list of tested printers.

• HP Color LaserJet 2600n (already tested in November 2005 here)
• HP Color LaserJet 3600
• Magicolor 5430DL
• Lexmark C522n

It is nice to see that one-pass color laser printers become more and more affordable leading to even faster (more silent) printers than was available a year ago.

The conclusion has nothing new for the observer: Lexmark is disappointing, Minolta is bulky (despite or because it is very complete), old HP 2600n has printing cost too high for a large use. The newest HP Color LaserJet 3600 printer is -not surprisingly- the best offer: An excellent compromise like HP has always been providing for blak and white laser printers.

After posting previously about 25 top quality fonts, I also got a link to an interesting web site providing a LOT of free fonts. It does not mean that they are all useful, interesting or good-looking, but you have some impressive choice: 13,000+ fonts in one search engine.

SearchFreeFonts