Printing Shoppers

Like any other task, printing digital images can be easy if you follow the correct procedures. Needless to say, using appropriate tools is also a big factor in the success of your print endeavor.

Printing your own photographs can be a personally rewarding experience. With sophisticated printers available, one can produce print outputs that would have been considered just a few years ago. Given the rate at which digital cameras is selling, the attraction for these fine printers is more promising.

The Basics

Fundamental to the success of your print job is your proper choice of the paper to use in the print process. Why? Because companies like Canon, Epson, and Hewlett-Packard formulate printer, ink, and paper as a complete system. Use Brand X paper with your Epson ink and printer, and you may not get the results you expect.

Familiarize yourself with the available software that you can use to maximize your chances of producing better outputs. Software like FotoFinish, PaintShop Pro and Adobe are available to suit your every printing need.

Here we will discuss how you can use Paint Shop Pro to print your digital image. In Paint Shop Pro, start by choosing File, Page Setup from the menu bar. Select the proper paper size from the drop-down menu at the top; you'll see a list of sizes supported by your printer. If you intend to make an 8-by-10-inch print, for instance, choose "Letter 8 1/2 x 11 inches," since that's the size of the paper you're using. In the position field in the middle of the dialog box, set the top and left margins to zero--they'll reset to the smallest supported margin (most printers don't support true edge-to-edge printing), and that's good enough. Then click either Portrait or Landscape so the picture fits on the page.

Now for a little experimenting. Click the Fit to Page option and you'll see that the picture may not properly fill the frame. If that's the case, uncheck that option and click the Scale control's up or down arrow until the image fits on the page. As you increase the scale, there will come a point at which some of image will "roll off" the right or bottom edge. Back off until you see the complete picture.

You can print the image like this, or you can do a little cropping. If the picture started to disappear off the bottom before it reached the right side, for instance, you can return to the image editor and crop some of the top or bottom away to make it fit the sides better. This is a trail-and-error process, so trim only a little. (See Help, Help Topics, Index, Cropping an Image if you don't know how to use the Crop Tool.)

Now you're ready to print; choose File, Print from the menu. When your photo comes out of the printer, let it dry for a few hours, then fine-tune it by trimming it down to the exact size you need with a razor blade or paper cutter.

at Printing Services Shoppers, we offer a wide range of printing services for your printing needs.