Start PRINTING your photos today | ESSENTIAL Tips and Tricks

Everything you need to know to start printing your photographs perfectly today! Whether you’re using a lab or you’re own printer I’ve got some tips to really help you out.

Fotospeed offer no longer applies. Sorry.

I absolutely love printing my pictures. It is the final step in creating an image and it just brings the work to life. I genuinely believe that photography is an art and when you print out a picture and hold it in your hand it is difficult to argue with that. You can see and feel the amount of work that has gone into creating the image and it takes on a new life once you can physically hold it in your hand.

I’m going to assume you are using Lightroom to edit your images but if you’re not the same applies to other software. I really recommend Lightroom though so I’ll put a link above where you can get a free trial. Once you have finished your edit and it’s time to print, the first thing to do is create a virtual copy of the image. This is going to be our print file. When we look at our image on a screen it is backlit by the monitor and once you print your image you obviously do not have that. So to compensate for this I always increase my exposure just a touch. Somewhere between a quarter and half a stop and it avoids the image printing out dull and disappointing. I then just pop that virtual copy into a collection so I have it for future reference.

Lab Vs DIY

So let’s just talk briefly about using a lab vs DIY.

Having your own good photo printer is a very nice thing. I have this Canon Pro 10s which prints up to A3+. It produces prints that are equal to the quality of a lab and I absolutely love it. It is expensive though and you need to work out whether it will be worth it for you.

A lab can often work out cheaper if you are not printing very often. They are also more versatile in terms of the size of print, the material you can print on and you can easily try out different papers. The downside is you’re not in control and the results can often be disappointing and colour not accurate.

Colour Accuracy

Accurate colour is important because we want our images to print out to match how we have edited them on the screen. You don’t your beautiful orange and pink sunset to print out green. There’s a lot going on to go from screen to paper so we use ICC profiles to make it easy. ICC profiles are based on the type of printer being used and the type of paper. Once installed we can go into Lightroom and enable soft proofing in the develop module, select the paper you want to use and get a good idea of how your print will look on paper.

Good labs should all provide ICC profiles for you to download for free and if you are printing yourself, paper companies should provide them for your printer model.

So once you have applied the profile and made an adjustments you are now ready to print.

Next we need to decide what type of paper we’re going to use. Generally there are three kinds

Glossy
Semi Gloss
Matt

The type and quality of the paper you use can massively affect the final print. It is very much a personal thing and something you will need to experiment with. As a general rule though I use a glossy finish for images that are heavily saturated and colourful.

The glossy finish really helps the colours to pop and it works perfectly for my water drop images and they just look brilliant.

Semi Gloss - I think is my favourite. I have been using Canson Baryta for years and it’s just a magnificent paper. It feels and looks extremely professional and high quality and works a really wide range of images. The majority of landscape prints I sell are printed on this.

Matt or Rag paper - Good cotton rag paper is the best bet for a matt finish. Good rag papers will have a high DMax rating which mean they hold the blacks very very well. Rag papers are perfect for black and white images although are also great for certain landscapes and colour portraits when a more muted fine art feel is required.

My video photography blogs are designed to entertain and document how I go about capturing my work. If it provides landscape photography tips and inspiration along the way then please share it with your friends so more people can benefit from the content. If you enjoyed this photography vlog I would really appreciate it if you subscribed to the channel so you can come along for the journey.

[ColorEnthusiast]

I'm actually a scrapbooker, and this video is super helpful for learning how to print photos for scrapbooking. For some reason, I never thought of increasing the exposure level in editing to compensate for the lack of backlighting in the printed photo. Great video! Thanks!

[neoasura]

A lot of people in the comments don't realize, you aren't printing at home to "save money". You do it for the control and the instant access. I don't like waiting days to even weeks to get copies back from the lab just to find out it doesn't look correct. Not to mention, the cost saving is negligible (after factoring in shipping, unless I order a "minimum" amount of prints) if you are good about printing on a regular basis, keeping them from drying out, etc.

[guillandanthony]

I do exactly the contrary. I use semi-gloss for colour prints, as the reflections of glossy paper sometimes make it really hard to concentrate on the colours or details. And I use glossy paper for black and white, as the details are sharp and different tones can clearly be seen and it reminds me of the dark-room developed photos. But nice tips though. I will try matte paper for black and white. Good idea!

[stephenelliott]

I always say a photograph comes alive in print...Your enthusiasm in your videos is inspiring, good work.

[michealbay]

So
1. Increase brightness of picture because since screens are backlit printed photos turn out duller. So increase brightness of actual picture by 10 percent.

2. use TIFF file format for no-loss of quality

3. Use photolab websites where they print if you want high quality(emphasis for highest quality possible in print)

4. Glossy for colourful, detailed images || semi gloss for landscape || matte(cotton rag) for black and white, muted colors, gives fine art feeling, d-max number for how much black it holds, feels nice to the touch.
Panorama perspective papers are available, check printer supports or not.

5. Borderless is better especially when putting in picture portraits, adds real estate to pictures printed.

[joe_a_photo]

That first image that you printed was INSANE. So awesome

[pgVeritas]

Thank you for explaining such a complicated process in simple layman terms. I’m awaiting my first photo printer, though it needs to still be able to do business printing too. I opted for the Epson Eco-tank ET7750 purely because I couldn’t, at this point in time, justify two dedicated printers. I realise that compromise means it’ll be equally bad at business docs and photos, but for my needs the attraction of cheap printing outweighs the purchase of a dedicated printer. You’re explanation of the different types has really helped me, as well as explaining about the profiles too. I’m guessing this is why you see so many bad reviews of printers and papers by amateurs who have no knowledge of ICC profiles. I would have been one of those had I not happened upon your site. Thank you!

[Sinegav]

As someone who is new to the hobby I must say this video is pretty awesome, thanks for all the great tips, and that panorama paper looks sick! Would love to try that haha.

[DiegoMcCartney]

This is the second printing related video I’ve watched today, and man it’s got my very inspired to finally purchase a printer of my own. I’ve been outsourcing my printing so far, but there’s such a beautiful process to doing it yourself. Cheers Adam. Thanks for sharing buddy.

[jongrall]

Great information, Adam! One other interesting thing to consider are the different print technologies e.g. inkjet vs. pigment-based inkjet vs. c-print vs. digital c-print. They can look pretty different. C-prints are out of reach for home users because of size and cost, but good labs will offer that method for interested customers. Not sure many people understand that there are different print technologies available, and what the pros/cons of each are.

[robgardner]

This may be one of your older vlogs, but it is still very relevant. Great content.

[scotty]

Can understand the feeling of seeing your work in print and enjoyed hearing your thoughts on this. Loved the glimpse of your lighthouse picture from Flamborough as that episode and image was the reason when staying with friends last year in North Yorkshire, I headed over one morning.

[thedrone_explorer]

Great video. Very informative as I have been trying to figure out the best way to print my drone photos and was having issues with lack of brightness when printed. I will try using the light room icd and proofing tools you mentioned. Thanks so much for putting together this information!

[DavidDixon]

Between you and Nigel this week there has been some great tips and information about printing. Right at the time I'm getting back into printing! Thanks Adam!

[pinkukusa]

Thanks for the info Adam, I will attempt my first panorama print and hope for the best, keep up the great work!

[tornadoswe]

Nice video. Might I add the importance of calibrating your screens? We started using a colormunki to calibrate our screens and it fixed a lot of frustration from prints turning out "not quite right" and needing reprints.

[Adiera]

I joined a local camera club and asked two questions so far: Why does my printed photo turn out darker than what I see on my computer and about the ICC profiles you spoke of. Both times they looked at me like I had grown another head! Not very helpful so I stopped asking. Thank you so much for explaining this so well! Now I have to figure out why my computer (windows 10 and lightroom classic) won't open raw files anymore. New subscriber, thanks for the in depth information!

[lisapalzer]

Great video! I've recently gotten into printing my own prints and i can tell you, there is no greater satisfaction. Thanks !

[Stone]

Wow, I do enjoy your videos, I learn a great deal, it’s as if we, the viewers and your YouTube Follows, are in this with you, kind of in your class at school (even if it sometimes feels like your telling us off too!!). I’d like to thank for guiding us on our photographic journey and sharing your journey. On the subject of printing I’ve just invested in my first photo printer, raised the bar so to speak. Your video is a really big help, it’s so rewarding to see your images in print and even though it’s a challenge to get it right it’s so worth it and I’d even go so far as to say it is helping my photography move to the next level by looking at the print and not the screen and backward thing the image taking and editing process and re-engineering my workflow. A great big thank you. 👍👏

[paulsimpson]

Adam loved the video and tried theprintspace after watching quite a few of your vlogs. Very impressed with the wow factor of seeing our hard work well produced on paper. You are right seeing and holding a print in your hands improves self worth, determination and the enjoyment of being outdoors and capturing that moment in time. Thank you.