I used to love printing a few years ago and the old Epson 900 was in its day a great leap. I replaced it with an R800 4 years ago and the cost of ink was high.  I stopped printing.  The cost of ink nowadays is even higher.

I am an occasional (at best) printer would you recommend sending out, buying CIS, a new printer or what?

I looked in to this a while ago, as my pc would not work well with the Canon IP6000D so after weeks and spending a fortune on inks, paper and cleaning gear, I managed to get it to work right so I stick to printing myself. The CIS is a good idea but the kit they mostly sell are water based ink ok we could wash it out and put pigment ink in but it about £20 per bottle and even more for photo ink! (This info is internet based) I'm still toying with the idea of the CIS for my printer but I'm also toying with replaceing it with an Epson A3 size printer but it still costs on ink so I dont think we will ever win tbh.

........JJ

I have 6 Epson printers some with CIS and others with refillable inks and wow do I love it, I get 280g A4 photopaper from Lidl and Aldi for £5 for 50 sheets.
I can print for peanuts.

Just my opinion!
After all what do I know?

"Heaven is a close reach!
Pulled along by a warm force 3/4
in flat water, with a firm horizon."

Quoting post from gdsandy
I used to love printing a few years ago and the old Epson 900 was in its day a great leap. I replaced it with an R800 4 years ago and the cost of ink was high.  I stopped printing.  The cost of ink nowadays is even higher.

I am an occasional (at best) printer would you recommend sending out, buying CIS, a new printer or what?

I have a Canon Pro9500 A3, which uses a row of 10 pigment inks - I get around 100 A4 prints per ink set, which works out about £1 per print plus paper. Whist this is similar to the cost of using a lab (for a run of 30-50) I print my own to keep control, and the "no waiting" advantage - plus I can experiment with different profiles on cheap 6x4's before producing the final print the larger size - scrapping an A3 print is real money!

However, if you are only printing occasionally, cost rise, as it seems that ink consumption goes up when the printer is little used - perhaps more frequent cleaning cycles? perhaps someone with more technical knowledge can enlighten us? It might therefore pay you to use a good quality lab to whom you can upload your pics for printing - much as many wedding togs do now, I believe.

I have used CSS on a previous printer, but I didn't find the quality to be consistent, and the prints have a shorter "life", as many (most? all?) of the inks are not UV resistant, and subject to fade.

I guess you pays your money and takes your choice . . . . .

Portfolios , Photographer  posted on 29/01/2010 20:53:27   Posted 22 times

Located:Bedford,Bedfordshire, UK
Member Since: 28/01/2010

I print my own pictures using a Canon i9950 and genuine paper / inks. The ever increasing cost is a nightmare and I really wish we 'little people' had a voice that the likes of Epson and Canon etc would hear in terms of pricing.

Multiplying the costs up, 1 litre of ink costs around £850 - and I thought a decent bottle of malt was expensive!!

I love the quality and control I have over printing my own pictures and the instant results. So long as the pictures are framed (or bagged) once dry there is no degradation of colour or sharpness and I have pics going back over 5 years now.

Being an amateur I don't print in huge volumes but my printer has always been 100% reliable and when the heads have clogged (twice so far) a strip out and wash in isopropyl alcohol gets things working again in no time.

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www.woodcote-photographics.co.uk




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Visit me at http://www.woodcote-photographics.co.uk

I barely use my printer now - i send out to proamimaging: very good quality and exceptional value!

I still print my own for basic prints but use a professional printing service for the top quality I need for prints I am selling, exhibiting or as part of a tfp shoot.

i know thats so funny i have my pics and i have to print them myself i think it makes more photographer more popular if you print images too ;)

I just feel that without a print, the process is unfinished and I used to enjoy it.  It is the relative cost and quality issues that are putting me off.

I do, i have the Epson PHOTO1400 A3+ and am well happy with it

www.martynrussellphotography.com

I do.

I have an Epson R1800 for upto A3+ and an Epson 7900 for upto A1

I get great results using genuine Epson Inks and fotospeed papers,my clients seem very happy, for anything larger I outsource..

Hope that helps

Thomas

Quoting post from martynrussell
I do, i have the Epson PHOTO1400 A3+ and am well happy with it

www.martynrussellphotography.com

Ha! I just bought one of them last night as I found that they sold the genuine inks with it at nearly £5 each CHEAPER! so I got the lot for less than £300 where if I had walked in to the same shop and bought it over the counter then I would be paying over £300 just for the printer and £14 each for ink! (good job that the local store had sold out!) it pays to do window shopping online saves my legs lol!

So I'm hoping to get good results from this as there where good reviews for it but again let down by the cost of ink. So I'm keeping my Canon for small prints and Epson for large prints that I will be offering to models and sale.

Rankin's Quote “There’s no point in dressing it up, I love women and I love taking photos. It’s more like a fantastic hobby than a job.”

I print with printing firms for cost and quality, but I'd like to update my basic printer at home so I can do some test copies first, but also to knock out the odd copy of the baby for family. Can anyone recommend a decent A4 printer, reasonably priced, for a Mac? I've seen a few reviewed in magazines but wondered if anyone had a personal recommendation. What colour management processes do you use - if any?
Cheers.