Normal inkjet printers use four colors – cyan, magenta, yellow, and black. Photo-quality inkjet printers use a minimum of six colors, usually including light cyan and light magenta inks that allow the printer to reproduce a larger range of colors – for example, to render skin colors better and with finer transitions. The wider the range of basic ink colors, the wider the range of tones a printer can reproduce, and the more each print costs. Some high-end printers use up to 12 different ink cartridges (e.g., the Canon iPF5000 or the HP 3200).

If you want the highest possible quality black-and-white prints, your printer should have at least two, and preferably three, black and gray inks. This helps to render fine monochrome gradations. If your printer only has one black ink, you can use a special monochrome-optimized RIP to improve print quality.^[158] This does, however, require a good deal of know-how that goes beyond the scope of this book. (The subject is covered in more detail in [16].)

Your printer should support using Photo Black and Matte Black inks if you want to print on both glossy and matte papers.

Because inkjet printers have inherent weaknesses when it comes to reproducing saturated red and blue tones, the latest versions of high-end printers use separate red and blue inks, further expanding the range of available colors.

There are two basic types of ink available for photo printers:

Most desktop printers use one of these inks, while some high-end, large-format printers support both (and even solvent-based inks).

More so than paper, ink is the single largest cost factor in printing, and the business models of printer manufacturers assume that they will earn much more on ink than on the printers themselves. It therefore seems to make sense to choose cheaper third-party inks. While they are suitable for office documents in which color accuracy and long print life are less important, we don’t generally recommend their use, especially if you are just starting out making your own prints.

ICC profiles and printer drivers provided by printer manufacturers are no longer accurate when used with third-party inks. Some printer manufacturers even threaten to withdraw their printers’ warranties if they are used with third-party inks.

This does not mean that there are no high-quality, third-party inks available, but using manufacturer’s inks is usually a safer approach. Once you have gained some experience and your printer’s warranty has expired, you can start to experiment with third-party inks. Magazine ink tests and user reports on the Internet can be useful during your search for appropriate materials.

This measurement is irrelevant for printers that fulfill all your other purchase criteria. Don’t be confused by values that are hyped up for marketing purposes. Resolutions of 2880 × 1440 (or similar) do not produce noticeably inferior results to machines with nominal resolutions of 5680 or more. We rarely use maximum resolution settings during our print workflow because they cause the print job to take longer and use more ink without significantly improving results. Small ink droplets can reproduce finer tonal gradations, especially in lighter image areas, and a typical 1–5 picoliter droplet size is usually sufficient for most printing purposes.

Many images only convey their full impact when they are printed at a particular size. Inkjet photo printers start at letter size. Larger, tabloid-size printers for making 11 × 17-inch prints are also available but cost more (usually between $600 and $900). If you want to make a lot of prints, large printers can make economic sense due to their larger (and therefore cheaper) ink cartridges.

Thicker, heavier paper is often appropriate for high-end, art-grade prints. Here, your printer should be able to support paper thicknesses greater than or equal to 0.4 mm (or 230 g/m²). A straight paper path is an advantage when you are using thicker paper, as some heavier papers cannot be bent sufficiently to fit past some rollers. For this reason, some high-end printers have a choice of paper paths.

Roll-paper support can be useful if you want to make multiple, unattended prints, although narrow roll paper usually has to be smoothed after printing. Roll paper can be cheaper than sheet paper, but printers with automatic paper cutters are usually only available in the more expensive 11-inch plus category.

Parallel ports have now been completely replaced by USB ports. The current USB 2.0 standard is much faster than the older USB 1.1 standard and supports cables up to 15 feet in length. Some printers also have IEEE 1394 (FireWire) ports. FireWire is roughly as fast as USB 2.0 and allows you to connect a printer to two computers simultaneously. FireWire will be replaced in the coming months by the new USB 3.0 standard.

A LAN interface is useful if you want to connect your printer to multiple computers in a network, but a small, cheap, USB-compatible print server can do the same job just as well.

Printer speed also plays a role when choosing a printer but is less significant for individual photographers than for commercial service providers. Larger, integrated print heads make the new generation of inkjet printers faster than their predecessors, and print times of two to three minutes for a high-quality, letter-sized photo print and four to 10 minutes for a full-page, tabloid-sized image are common. Such printers are even faster when used to print only text. Printer speed is also influenced by print resolution and quality settings, and on whether your machine prints unidirectionally (which usually results in better image quality) or bidirectionally (which is faster).

Inkjet paper coatings are of three basic types:

Microporous Coating •. These coatings consist of a thin layer of chemically neutral, ground ceramic powder. The ink is absorbed quickly into the porous material and bleeds only minimally into surrounding areas. The paper provides good water resistance but is porous to various gases that attack the color dyes and pigments, thus accelerating color fading. Microporous paper is not the best choice for use with dye-based inks if lightfastness is important to you.

Swellable Coating •. These coatings are made from polymers that swell when exposed to moisture – i.e., when ink is applied to the paper. The coating absorbs the ink through the top layer and deposits the pigments into the layer below. This lower layer literally encapsulates the pigments while drying and only a small portion of the ink remains on the surface. The second layer protects the ink molecules from deterioration due to gases such as ozone and hydrogen sulfide, and thus prevents the colors from fading.

These papers are intended primarily for use with dye-based inks and produce clear, rich colors that are more sensitive to moisture. Most swellable papers have a gloss or luster/satin finish.

RC Papers •. Resin-coated papers are usually used for making traditional, analog color prints for the consumer market, but are nowadays also used for making inkjet prints. RC paper is made of a base paper layer sandwiched between two plastic layers, or completely of plastic. It requires an additional microporous or swellable coating for use with inkjet printers.

There are many more paper surfaces available for inkjet printing than for traditional photographic applications, including:

High-gloss and semi-gloss papers generally yield brilliant, detailed results with a look similar to traditional photographs, but lose some of their shine if displayed behind glass. They can be used with the highest available print resolutions.

Satin, luster, matte, and watercolor papers make certain subjects appear more painterly and produce more muted colors. They are also very effective for making monochrome prints. Semi-gloss papers often combine the advantages of both high gloss and matte in a single surface.

Baryta-coated papers are more expensive and form a category of their own. They provide a look similar to that produced by traditional baryta photo paper and can be used to make rich color prints or monochrome prints with deep blacks and very fine gradations.

Other factors that can influence your choice of paper are thickness, weight (measured in grams per square meter, or g/m²), and acidity. High-end paper for art-grade printing should have a pH value between 7 and 9.

The basic material a paper is made of is also important. The three main types of paper available are rag, cellulose, and synthetic. Rag papers are the longest lasting and also have the classiest look. Cellulose papers (provided they are acid and lignin-free) also have a very long life. Cheaper papers are made with a higher proportion of synthetic materials, making them more resistant to moisture and creating a more traditional photo look. Paper surfaces range from completely smooth to highly grained.

There are various degrees of whiteness available (from bright white to chamois) in spite of the fact that most off-white tones appear white to the human eye. Bright white papers allow you to print a wide range of rich colors but are not appropriate for all subjects. Portraits, for example, are more pleasing when printed on natural-colored (slightly yellow) papers.

Some paper manufacturers use optical bleach to enhance the whiteness of their products and the brilliance of the resulting prints. However, such materials tend to fade fairly quickly, causing changes in the colors of photo prints. We try to avoid using bleached papers for our art prints.

Metamerism describes situations in which colors look different when lit differently. When little ambient light is present, most colors look gray, whereas in very bright light, some colors appear bleached because they reflect too much ambient light. Similarly, printed colors absorb some of the wavelengths reaching the paper and reflect others. When the composition of the ambient light changes, the color spectrum and the intensity of the different wavelengths of incoming light change, leading to a different pattern of absorbed and reflected light waves.

Metamerism can be problematic when two apparently identical colors (that are actually composed of different combinations of primary colors) appear different when viewed under different light sources. To provide a sound basis for color management systems, D50 (daylight with a color temperature of 5,000 Kelvin) has been defined as the standard light source for inspecting printed colors. Some printer profiling software and RIPs allow you to compensate for differences in target lighting.^[161]

The intensity of the metamerism of two colors depends on the type of ink used, the combination of primary inks making up the colors concerned, and the dithering method used by the printer driver or RIP. Some pigment inks are more prone to metamerism, as unfortunately shown by Epson’s second-generation UltraChrome inks; the third generation of the same product family has all but eliminated the problem.

Bronzing is a visually disruptive phenomenon that occurs with some (usually black) inks, and which produces a bronze appearance under certain lighting conditions. The effect is attributed to specific first-generation Epson, HP, and Canon pigment inks, and to a lesser extent to second-generation Epson inks. The second-generation HP and Canon inks, and the third-generation Epson UltraChrome ink formulas have almost completely eliminated the problem. Bronzing effects can also be reduced by mounting the affected prints under glass.