Printing: From TIFF To Print

Printing is not the final purpose of every photo; that said, sometimes you may want to print some of your best photos to enjoy the color and the detail on paper. Of course, it is a subjective matters - I know some photographers that make hundreds of prints every month, and other photographers that never print their image. The purpose of this article is to describe in a concise and easy to understand way the steps of the printing process, that allow to make a great print from your digital files.

 

Printing is not the final purpose of every photo; that said, sometimes you may want to print some of your best photos to enjoy the color and the detail on paper. Of course, it is a subjective matters - I know some photographers that make hundreds of prints every month, and other photographers that never print their images. The purpose of this article is to describe in a concise and easy to understand way the steps of the printing process, that allow to make a great print from your digital files.  
 
As you may already know, I save all my post-processed photos as uncompressed TIFF, in 16 bit, Adobe RGB format. I never apply sharpening during post-processing, and I am very light-handed with noise reduction. When I decide to print a photo, I apply sharpening and NR depending by print size.  
 
If the photo has been taken at ISO 100 or 200, usually I don't need any noise reduction at all; for photos taken at ISO 400 or higher, I apply some noise reduction on the out of focus areas (more info in the noise reduction article). If the photo has been taken at more than 800 ISO I apply a small amount of noise reduction on the entire photo, other than the strong NR on the out of focus areas.  
 
The sharpening for print is quite easy. I always use the "Smart Sharpen" tool of Photoshop CS3 - in my opinion it is the finest sharpening tool currently available, both for full size and web sized photos. Depending by the photo, I set an amount between 120 and 200%, and radius between 0.3 and 0.5 (the values that I use most often are amount 150%, radius 0.4). If the photo has been taken at high ISO, usually I try to apply a minimum amount of sharpening, to avoid emphasizing the noise, while with photos taken at low ISO it is possible to use more sharpening. Remember that when you apply sharpening you must always look at the photo at 100% magnification, and you should not exceed with sharpening, otherwise you get halos and other artifacts.  
 
The third step is to convert the photo in 8 bit, sRGB mode - the majority of printers is not able to print in Adobe RGB and 16 bit, so you have to convert the photo before printing, otherwise you get "washed out" colors (unless the printer recognize and automatically converts Adobe RGB images).  
 
Another issue that you must not forgot is the exact sides ratio of the paper that you are going to use. The majority of photos have a 3:2 ratio, but sometimes the photo paper has a slightly different ratio. For example, an A4 print measures 210x297 millimeters - that is a 2.83:2 ratio instead of the traditional 3:2. So, if I want to make an A4 print, I have to crop the photo to 2.83:2 ratio: I select the Crop Tool and I set Width on 210 and Height on 297 (or vise versa); I leave the "Resolution" field blank, because I don't want to modify the resolution of the photo in this step. For other sizes instead, as 10x15cm, it is not necessary to crop the photo.  
 
Now, you have to choose in which format you want to print your photo. The majority of consumer and mid-range printers is able to make prints up to A4 (about 20x30 centimeters) or A3 (about 30x45 centimeters). Resizing the photo is necessary to fit the paper format that you have chosen; depending the file size and the paper size, you will either upsize or downsize the image. To resize the photo, click on Image>Image Size; be sure that all the three checkbox are selected, and set the combo box on "Bicubic". Set the "Resolution" box on 300 pixels/inch, if it is not already set on this value; this is the standard resolution from the majority of photo printers.

 

The intro photo of this article is a 3888x2592 pixels file taken with my 40D (10 mp), that allows to make a 33x22 centimeters print at 300 dpi. If you want, for example, to make a 12x18 centimeters print, set Width on 12 cm, Height on 18 cm and click on "OK" - the photo will be resized to the desired resolution. In this case, the photo has been downsized; sometimes if you downsize a lot the photo you can apply for a second time a little of sharpening, to improve the look of the detail.  
 
What does it happen if you want to make a print larger than 33x22 centimeters, the maximum size allowed by the native resolution of the camera in this example? Very simple - follow the same Image>Image Size procedure, and put the desired print size into the Width and Height fields. For example, if you want to make a 30x45cm print, the photo will be resized to 5315x3543 pixel - in this case, you have upsized the photo. Don't worry if the photo looks soft at 100% magnification - in print it will be much sharper! The upresizing does not add any detail to the photo, but it allows to make large prints without "pixelization".
 
 

The printing process

Now that your file is ready to print, you have to complete the latest steps through Photoshop and the printer's software. Rotate the photo in the same orientation of the paper - usually the paper is placed in vertical orientation, so if your photo is in horizontal you have to rotate it 90 degrees to make the print (Image>Rotate Canvas>90 CW).  
 
Click on File>Print to open the print window, and click on "Page Setup" to open the printer settings window. This window varies depending by the printer model; but the basic settings are always the same: select professional photo paper as support and set the print quality on the highest value. Select "borderless printing" and, if necessary, a moderate amount of extension, to avoid 2-3 millimeters of white border.  
 
That's all! :-) If you have post-processed well your photo and if your screen is correctly calibrated you shall get a sharp, colorful print, that matches the photo you see on your screen.
 
 

Calibration and Photo Paper

Sometimes, the colors and the brightness of the print are very different from the colors that you see on your screen. There may be two reasons: either you have a crappy screen or you have a good screen, but it is badly calibrated. Some cheap LCD screens are almost unusable for post-processing, because they have a very narrow angle of view - it is enough to move by few centimeters to see different colors and contrast. Other than that, the majority of laptops does not have "photo quality" screens; if you want to get good and consistent results, I'd recommend to get at least a mid-range screen, as the Eizo S2433w ($ 700).  
 
Even if you have a good screen, sometimes what you see may be different from the prints: in this case, you need to calibrate the screen, that means adjusting color temperature and brightness. You can do an extremely precise calibration with tools as the Pantone Huey or the professional ColorVision Spider, otherwise you can simply compare a print with the image on you screen, and adjust the color and the brightness until the image on the screen roughly matches the print.  
 
Which photo paper? Usually, it is better to use inks and paper produced by the same manufacturer of the printer - I have a Canon IP8500 so I use Canon paper. There are mainly two kinds of photo paper: glossy and matte; usually I prefer glossy paper, it gives more vivid colors and deeper blacks. Other than that, the paper is classified according to its weight; the highest quality papers weight 220-240 g/m2 or more.  
 
I use either the Photo Paper Pro or the slightly cheaper Photo Paper Plus Glossy for the majority of my prints; these papers are quite expensive, but for me it is not a problem since I make very few prints every month. If are not extremely picky about image quality and you print a lot, instead, I'd recommend the Glossy Photo Paper - it is not as good as the Photo Paper Pro, but the difference is not huge, and it is much cheaper.