On the Spot Printer Recommendation

[DBlack]

A friend of mine once me to take photos at his even and print them out on 8x11 size quality (gloss) paper.

I have a laptop and planned to have small stand with laptop and quality printer to render these works of art. Without breaking the bank, what would be a great printer for printing phots?

He also suggested that we sell the prints to students and parents. I'm not looking to make a killing off of this, but wanted to know what would a fair price be? I'm not looking for an elaborate profit/loss analysis, just a quick opinion on what you think is fair.

I've never done this before, but he ensured the deman would be huge, because some people tried it before, but their equipment/skill was lacking as they had technical difficulties.

thx in advance.

 

[Snyder]

ya...I paid $600 for my printer and I still dont think the prints I get are the highest quality possible. I used a Noritsu 3200 during my formal photography education and wow it produced amazing images though it like a $200,000 printer I believe.

 

[Happy Hour]

I have been through 6 diiferent printers in the past 3 years and have yet to find one that can print the same quality for less cost than Ritz or wallgreens. I don't think it's worth the money buy the time you add up how much good paper cost with ink and the total amount of HQ pics you print $50.00 for 10-15 / 8x10 photo's is alot more expensive than $2.00 ea. at the store.

 

[usayit]

You get what you pay for also applies to printers... don't forget quality ink and paper as well. I like the Epson R2400 as well as my old 2200.

Also.. A successful print from a high end ink jet is going to involve the person (workflow technique) as much as the equipment. It isn't plug and play like many people seem to believe.


Spend your money on proper monitor calibration and submit to a good service. Get a good monitor. .laptop displays typically are not all that good.

 

[usayit]

Just curious... what 6 printers?

 

[Sw1tchFX]

I do my prints at costco, on printers similar to the Noritsu's snyder's talking about.

I think most costco's use fuji printers, but yeah, they're $500,000 printers that can crank out phenomenal glossy prints, granted everything is calibrated and you have profiled for everything.


99% of the time, costco will make better prints for a fraction of the cost. 17 cents for a 4x6!

 

[Helen B]

I think that it is well worth trying a printing service before deciding on getting your own printer for commercial work. As already mentioned, if you have a well-profiled system you can get very good results at a lower cost and with less effort than printing yourself.

I only print the good stuff myself, the rest gets sent out. Particularly with B&W I find that the cost of getting the quality I want from a lab is greater than doing it myself.

If you do want a printer, I'll go along with the recommendation for an Epson R2400. You can reduce ink costs without compromising on quality by using a continuous ink supply, and using ink from an Epson 4800.

Best,
Helen

 

[Happy Hour]

Just curious... what 6 printers?

4 of them just took a Sh*t on me with in a couple of months. and the 5th one my 5 year old could color better than it printed so I took it back and i'm on my 6th right now not the greatest for pictures but it's a all in one and has held up with the abuse I put it threw on a daily basis I print over a 1,000 things a week for my business and it's the first printer that has held up so far.

 

[usayit]

I was just curious of brand and model......

 

[Happy Hour]

I was just curious of brand and model......

I can't remember models off the top of my head. They were all higher end printers though first one was a canon/ 2 brothers/ 1 Epson/and currently a HP