Finished, Printed, and displayed ArtRage Artwork

[dali]

Wow, these are all great. I have had so much trouble with printers. I used to print them out on my own home printer, but the colors were always horrid. I was always tweaking, using up ink, paper, and still never getting it right.

I tried a local printer in town, and had 100 postcards made of two different pictures. One had a lot of green in it, one had a lot of pink in it. When I went back to get them it was awful. The pinks looked neon as did the greens. I told him I just couldn't send out postcards to editors and art directors looking like that and he began to explain that he was going to stop taking orders from artists because they were just too color picky. Well duh! I'd like it to actually look like what I had intended for it. I decided I would never go back to him.

Another time I had some printed at a FedEx printing place. I needed some portfolio pics for a conference. I was careful to print out on a thick paper and then picked two pics from the batch I was having trouble adjusting on my home printer. I then waited there while they printed out the samples. Way, way too dark. He lightened by 15% and printed out again, and it was near perfect. So now I know that most of them will need to be lightened to look like what I have on my monitor. (I had even transferred them all to CMYK before taking them to FedEx.)
(I was printing out 8 x 10 at 300 dpi.)

Another question, what is this spider thingy you all speak of, and where can I get one.

[Silentman]

Great, thanks for the details Shatzy

[Sketchism71]

Shatzy, that turned out beautiful! ! I love the look of the canvas prints but they seem a bit pricey especially to have done at that size. Regardless, your painting turned out marvelous.

[Rick]

Dali, I just went to your gallery.. If I could paint like that I would want to make doubly sure prints were exactly perfect, just as I have painted and viewed on my monitor..
You do such very nice work..

[dali]

Thanks Rick, your gallery is equally impressive.

But yes, I wish the colors would turn out right when the files head off to the printer. I had a dummybook printed out on lulu for one of the children's books that I wrote, and it came back a little less than what I was hoping for. On the whole, it wasn't bad, price was okay as well. ($11 for a 32 page full colored book) You can't tweak colors after you send them though. You just have to hope that it will look right when you get it back. As it is, I am going to have to redo and reprint if I want to send them out to any editors. I actually did print out a 'photo' book with lulu using some of my art, a little more expensive (about $50 for 30 pages) but the colors turned out a lot better for some reason.

[Sketchism71]

I totally agree with Rick, Dali. To answere your question about the monitor spyder here is a link to a photo of it ... http://spyder.datacolor.com/images/photo_s2e1_500.jpg

Im sure there are many different products out there but this will give you an idea of what we are talking about.

[Aged P]

Hi Sketch,

As I entered the Forum, with this still sizzling on the Clip Board, i read your post. Prices and a review here too.

http://www.warehouseexpress.com/buy-...%202%20express

Phil

[Aged P]

My new Epson printer was not living up to expectations, fantastic photos but lousy paintings.

I got a considerable improvement when I found the "Automatic Photo Enhance" button and turned it off.

It stopped Sharpening my deliberately hazy areas, stopped winding the Contrast up or down and left the Colour Levels alone.

Phil

[Aged P]

Hi,

I've spoken with Costco UK, because they come up so many times on this thread.

They were really helpful.

The people who do their printing are actually.....

http://www2.catchincolour.co.uk/

If you sign up with Costco, as a Business, there is a 25% discount on Catchincolour's prices. But you have to pay £20+ a year to join Costco.

Phil

[Sketchism71]

Thanks Phil for checking that out about Costco. The Costco here in the U.S. uses a different company for the prints and it doesn't look like you can do any individual business with this company. It seems as though you have to buy through Costco. That's O.K. though, where else can you buy 150 roles of toilet paper all at once and nobody looks at you funny....LOL!