Professional Quality Prints

One of the stops at this month’s Wedding & Portrait Photographers International Expo was the Epson booth.

For several years I’ve used the Epson R2880 to print mid-size photographs. I wanted to see the new Epson P600 which is the successor to the R2880. The two are similar in many respects: 9 ink cartridges; 3 levels of black for b&w images; accommodates paper sizes to 13″ x 19″; 13″ roll paper handling for 13″ wide panoramas.

The P600 uses Epson’s latest UltraChrome HD ink. The ink is packaged in higher capacity cartridges. According to the Epson representative, the black inks have been improved for richer b&w prints.

In addition to the excellent quality of the P2880, the print speed was relatively fast – 2 minutes for an 8″x10″. I watched several iterations at the Epson booth and the P600 produced equally high quality prints at about the same speed. The paper tray can accommodate 30 sheets of photo paper. For printing on fine art paper, there is a separate single sheet feeder.
Epson has a variety of excellent photo papers. Using roll paper, you can print panoramas 13″ high by 10 feet wide.

I’m a fan of many of Epson’s photo and fine art papers to creatively match your images. They include glossy, matte, metallic, textured, canvas, more. The P600 is on my short list of equipment to buy.

The suggested price is $799 and is available immediately. For more information about the P600, please visit Epson.

 
 
 
Written by Arnie Lee
 
 

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High Quality Desktop Printer

I’m an ardent believer that it’s better to get your photographs off of your hard drive and into print.

About ten years ago, we had a 13″ wide printer to handle some of our smaller photographs. However, after it died following a long and generous life, we chose not to replace it. Since then we’ve been using a variety of photofinishers to reproduce our photographs.

After strolling by the Epson booth and seeing some of their impressive photograph displays, I talked to one of their customer representatives and am now considering their new Surecolor P600.

The P600 is a replacement for their previous R3000 model. It connects to your computer setup via an Ethernet connection or via WiFi. You’ll need a desktop area of 24″x36″ for the printer. The top loader automatically feeds 13″x19″ paper for borderless printing. There’s a front loader for feeding single sheets of specialty fine art papers up to 1.3mm thickness. For panoramic prints up to 10 feet long, the P600 accepts the included roll feeder.

The P600 uses nine high capacity ink cartridges including three types of black ink for smooth toned black and white photographs. The many photographs on display at the Epson booth demonstrated excellent quality on a variety of papers including these panoramas. In the past, I’ve had positive experiences using many fine art papers from Epson’s wide selection.

 
 
I asked the Epson representative about my concern about clogged ink cartridges when the printer is sits unused for a short while and was told that the ink will remain usable for up to six months from installation.

The list price of the Epson Surecolor P600 is $795. For more information, see the Epson P600 webpage for details.

The P600 is now on my short list of equipment purchases. I’m anxious to print several panoramas that I’ve stored on my hard drive – again, the hard drive is not a good place to keep photographs.
 
 
Written by: Arnie Lee
 
 

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