how to get photoes printed?

[aussiemummy]

i posted this in the portrait section but someone sugested that i put it here to..

ok i have just branched out into the big wide world of professional photography. Up until now i have bee developing and printing my own black and white photos. but since becoming professional i have been shooting in colour, and editing in PS 0.7. Now i have NO idea how to get the images printed.

what size do they have to be(do i look at actual pixels, image size or print size)? what dpi? where? average cost? i have no idea about any of these things :er:

thanks guys

 

[Digital Matt]

Are you going to be cropping? You can use the crop tool, and set the dimensions in its toolbar (make sure the dpi is 300), or you can create a new document, 300 dpi, and whatever dimensions you want, and then copy/paste your image into it, and free transform it (ctrl+t) to size it to fit.

Every printer is going to be different in terms of what they expect. Some want your images in RGB. Some will want you to convert them to CYMK. Some will have printer profiles so you can convert your colors before hand and make sure they stay consistent.

 

[aussiemummy]

thanks for that matt
re: cropping. it depends on the final picture. i try to do most of the cropping when taking the actual photo. ocassionally though, it doesn't come out exactlly as i want it, so then i crop it to my liking.

 

[Meysha]

Some will have printer profiles so you can convert your colors before hand and make sure they stay consistent.

How do we find that out? Just go up to the person at the lab and say "what's your printer profile?"

What are some likely answers? I mean, will they give us a disk with it on, or will it be a profile that's already in PS?

 

[usayit]

When printing at home, people generally have a workflow....

Make sure you get your monitor calibrated. Without proper calibration the rest of your workflow will not matter. This is also where a good quality monitor counts. Some people get the "spider" that measures and calibrates the monitor. I personally have heard great things about it but I have yet to try it. Adobe delivers an calibration wizard with Photoshop that should help out. My Mac came with its own utility to calibrate my cimena display.

Download the latest version of profiles for your specific printer. With the my epson 2200 and 825, the latest version made a world of difference. There is a specific profile for each type of paper. Getting the proper profiles for your specific printer is important.

Pictures should either have the embedded workspace or assigned one. I personally usually use the "Adobe RGB 1998".

Make the proper adjustments using the necessary "Adjustment layers".

Save the picture. At this point, this is the version I archive.

Crop the picture to the proper aspect. Use the cropping tool and set to the proper standard size ( 4x6, 5x7, 8x10 etc ). In general, I set the dpi between 300-400. This might be different depending on your printer and experience.

Apply the unsharpen mask filter. I do this on a case by case basis. Sometimes, its trial and error. I tend to be a bit more aggressive once I hit 8x10 or larger.

Send the print job to the printer. Read the recommended procedures for your specific printer. For Epsons, I select the proper target profile for the specific printer/media ( and in the case of the 2200 which type of black cartridge is loaded ) as well as other settings ( size/quality/etc.. ). These are all made within the photoshop dialogs. Once I hit "print", the epson driver takes over and pops up another set of dialogs. Here I set the printer ( again ), type of media ( again ), and at 1440 dpi. At that point, I let it go and wait for my print.

Again, this is specific to my setup and my experience ( mostly trial and error ). If the lab is making the print, ask them if there is a specific workspace they prefer and at what dpi. I do believe Adobe RGB 1998 is pretty common. If it is a competent photo lab, they'll have their own workflow for their specific printer. The best way is to simply ask and coordinate your efforts with their workflow.

Hope this helps....

 

[Digital Matt]

How do we find that out? Just go up to the person at the lab and say "what's your printer profile?"

What are some likely answers? I mean, will they give us a disk with it on, or will it be a profile that's already in PS?

If you ask them what they want, and it's a paper or printer specific profile, they will probably just give you a link to the manufacturer's website where you can download it. The local lab I use works with sRGB, while the online service I use uses a Fuji Crystal Archive profile, for the paper they use.

If you convert to the target color space as your last step, it gives you a preview of how your print will look, output from that machine, and if you see some drastic changes (which sometimes you will) you can make the neccessary changes and get better results.