Why do people absolutely want color *prints* ?

  • Thread starter Thread starter GP
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G

GP

It's just as if people can't see if they don't hold a print in their hands:
they absolutely want to materialize the picture. What for?

I find pictures look much better on my monitor. The dynamic range seems much
wider to me onscreen, color saturation is optimal, pictures can be enlarged at
will to see details. If I want to send them, I attach them to an email. It's
so convenient and it doesn't cost a cent.

To have some impact, pictures on walls must be somewhere around 16 x 20" and
personal printers can't produce those prints. That's why specialized shops are
there for, I suppose. And, please, don't tell me it's for sending pictures to
grandma who doesn't own a computer.

When slide shows became popular around 1970, I and many people thought the
paper support would disappear. Now that pictures are even more immaterial, but
so much easier to store... and find, dammit! people still insist on paper support.

Are people just trying to find a way to keep busy or to spend their money?

GP
 
This sounds like a troll but would you pass your computer around a
construction job site so everyone could see the pictures?

Chris
 
Chris said:
This sounds like a troll but would you pass your computer around a
construction job site so everyone could see the pictures?
Click to expand...

Oh, it's not grandma, it's construction sites! That's why people are printing
so much. Hadn't thought about that. Thanks!

GP
 
GP said:
Oh, it's not grandma, it's construction sites! That's why people are printing
so much. Hadn't thought about that. Thanks!

GP
Click to expand...

But it IS to show them to others who are not at a computer, or copies
for friends/families, and finally for framing.

I must say that my pics from the period since I got my digi camera and
which remain on the hard drive get looked at and used more than any of
the pics I took on film, and even the ones my wife takes now only get
looked at once or twice before being placed in a cardboard box.

Eventually they'll give us a screen about the size of an old print
which will be cheap enough to carry around then we can just slap our
cards or whatever into it and take that to show to folks.
 
It's just as if people can't see if they don't hold a print in their hands:
they absolutely want to materialize the picture. What for?

I find pictures look much better on my monitor. The dynamic range seems much
wider to me onscreen, color saturation is optimal, pictures can be enlarged at
will to see details. If I want to send them, I attach them to an email. It's
so convenient and it doesn't cost a cent.

To have some impact, pictures on walls must be somewhere around 16 x 20" and
personal printers can't produce those prints. That's why specialized shops are
there for, I suppose. And, please, don't tell me it's for sending pictures to
grandma who doesn't own a computer.

When slide shows became popular around 1970, I and many people thought the
paper support would disappear. Now that pictures are even more immaterial, but
so much easier to store... and find, dammit! people still insist on paper support.

Are people just trying to find a way to keep busy or to spend their money?

GP
Click to expand...


I tend to agree with you. Since I first purchased a colour ink jet,
I've printed less than 20 pictures and they are all 8 X 10's which
I've framed. At present, I have about 2000 pictures on my HD and
every once in a while run a slideshow for entertainment. I have a
friend who takes a lot of pictures with his digital camera and then
docks the camera with his photo printer (a one use printer, a waste of
money), prints out everything, looks at them and then sticks them in a
drawer, never to be seen again.
 
I tend to agree with you. Since I first purchased a colour ink jet,
I've printed less than 20 pictures and they are all 8 X 10's which
I've framed. At present, I have about 2000 pictures on my HD and
every once in a while run a slideshow for entertainment.
Click to expand...

Another thing you can do is select the 500 best, put them in 10 directories
and use each directory in turn as a screen saver. Set the screensaver to show
the pictures randomly so you don't always see the same pictures at the
beginning and relax while you've got a few minutes off.
I have a
friend who takes a lot of pictures with his digital camera and then
docks the camera with his photo printer (a one use printer, a waste of
money), prints out everything, looks at them and then sticks them in a
drawer, never to be seen again.
Click to expand...

I have a brother who shoots tons of pictures on every occasion, just as to
prove the event happened. Same during his vacations. He also has videos, all
unedited, of course. If he was to watch all he's shot in the last 30 years,
he'd have to sit there 8 hours a day for at least a month or two. Of course,
even if he wanted, he'd never have time to do this. And, since the advent of
digital cameras, the problem is even worst.

What's the point of having that many pictures? Remember the pictures of your
grand-parents. They shot one rool a year. It's nice to see how people lived,
dressed, played in the good old times, but would you really be interested to a
million of those pictures?

So what's the purpose of photography, mainly these days, where you may just
provide an honest testimony of the era bringing a small digital camera with
you everywhere you go or manipulate pictures with a wider palette than any
artist before? And there's no need for enlargers, no chemical mess, no
printer, no ink mess. Just the pure essence of photography!

This is it, right here:

http://photo.net/gallery/photocritique/filter

Play with filters over a one year period. Photo of the week will most probably
provide the most interesting pictures, Aesthetics, pictures with sometimes a
lot of research, and Ratings, err... well, the nude pictures, of course, but
it's quite different from the porn we see on the net.

As a former UPI photographer, this site blows my mind. The number of great
pictures on this site is just amazing. I only regret they're not all 2000 x
3000 , as Philip Greenspun, the originator of the side, used to provide them.
But the servers must be under heavy load as it is.

A few years ago, I reframed a few of Mr Greenspun's pictures for use as
wallpapers here:

http://www.enter-net.com/~gpelleti/fonds/

To me, that's what photography today is all about.

Don't forget the GIMP is available free for manipulating pictures. It's
available for Windows, but I read about a year ago that there were a few bugs.
If such is still the case, you may use it with Linux with Knoppix, a Live-CD,
without installing Linux. Of course, for image manipulation, you'll need a lot
of RAM. 512 MB should suffice.

GP
 
Paul said:
But it IS to show them to others who are not at a computer, or copies
for friends/families, and finally for framing.
Click to expand...

Pretty much everybody in my family has a computer. An uncle of mine bought his
first computer at age 80 fuve years ago. 2 of my aunts don't have a computer,
but all of their sons and daughters have one. I believe that's generally the
case in America these days.

When some people tell me they can communicate with me because they don't have
a computer, I tell them to get one. Gee! You can get a decent for the price of
a TV these days and there's so much more you can do wuth a computer!
I must say that my pics from the period since I got my digi camera and
which remain on the hard drive get looked at and used more than any of
the pics I took on film, and even the ones my wife takes now only get
looked at once or twice before being placed in a cardboard box.
Click to expand...

What a suprise :)
Eventually they'll give us a screen about the size of an old print
which will be cheap enough to carry around then we can just slap our
cards or whatever into it and take that to show to folks.
Click to expand...

That's called a laptop. You can get one for about $1000 and, for about the
same price, of you have any other use for it, you can get a projector:

http://www.infocus.com/eng/amer/home.asp?site_lang=1&site_region=1&permanent=false

GP
 
GP said:
Pretty much everybody in my family has a computer. An uncle of mine bought his
first computer at age 80 fuve years ago. 2 of my aunts don't have a computer,
but all of their sons and daughters have one. I believe that's generally the
case in America these days.
Click to expand...

My mother refuses to have them in the house and my daughter (who's
kids make up a lot of my pics) doesn't like having them around just
yet, she's happy for them to wreck mine instead :O)
When some people tell me they can communicate with me because they don't have
a computer, I tell them to get one. Gee! You can get a decent for the price of
a TV these days and there's so much more you can do wuth a computer!
Click to expand...
Getting connected to the net can be a pain for some in England. Some
places it's easy. My daughter lives at the other end of our very short
street, I can get broadband and she can't.
What a suprise :)


That's called a laptop. You can get one for about $1000 and, for about the
same price, of you have any other use for it, you can get a projector:

http://www.infocus.com/eng/amer/home.asp?site_lang=1&site_region=1&permanent=false

GP
Click to expand...

No no, I said print size, what is it, 5x4? and then nothing else, no
fancy extras that cost hundreds of pounds, just a simple slot you can
pop your card in, or at most a downloadable usb or such. We're getting
there with these little systems which run MP3s, video etc but still a
little pricey. They don't call it 'Rip-off britain' for nothing. On
average we pay at least the same in pounds as you do in dollars, and
that is quite a price hike.
 
GP said:
It's just as if people can't see if they don't hold a print in their
hands: they absolutely want to materialize the picture. What for?

I find pictures look much better on my monitor. The dynamic range seems
much wider to me onscreen, color saturation is optimal, pictures can be
enlarged at will to see details. If I want to send them, I attach them
to an email. It's so convenient and it doesn't cost a cent.

To have some impact, pictures on walls must be somewhere around 16 x 20"
and personal printers can't produce those prints. That's why specialized
shops are there for, I suppose. And, please, don't tell me it's for
sending pictures to grandma who doesn't own a computer.

When slide shows became popular around 1970, I and many people thought
the paper support would disappear. Now that pictures are even more
immaterial, but so much easier to store... and find, dammit! people
still insist on paper support.

Are people just trying to find a way to keep busy or to spend their money?

GP
Click to expand...

For christmas I bought my in-laws a 11"x11" photo album and put 14 8x10 photos
of my baby daughter in it (1 photo per month of her life). I will give them an
8x10 every month until the album is full. She'll be 7 years old by then.

It's nice to have an album on a coffee table that you can just flick through to
reminisce every-so-often. It's a lot easier to pick up an album than choose a
video CD from your collection and put it in the DVD player and turn on the TV.
And if that coffee table is in a more formal lounge room with no TV, it's the
only option/

--
--
Ben Thomas - Software Engineer - Melbourne, Australia

My Digital World:
Kodak DX6490, Canon i9950, Pioneer A05;
Hitachi 37" HD plasma display, DGTEC 2000A,
Denon 2800, H/K AVR4500, Whatmough Encore;
Sony Ericsson K700i, Palm Tungsten T.

Disclaimer:
Opinions, conclusions, and other information in this message that do not
relate to the official business of my employer shall be understood as neither
given nor endorsed by it.
 
Paul said:
My mother refuses to have them in the house and my daughter (who's
kids make up a lot of my pics) doesn't like having them around just
yet, she's happy for them to wreck mine instead :O)


Getting connected to the net can be a pain for some in England. Some
places it's easy. My daughter lives at the other end of our very short
street, I can get broadband and she can't.




No no, I said print size, what is it, 5x4? and then nothing else, no
fancy extras that cost hundreds of pounds, just a simple slot you can
pop your card in, or at most a downloadable usb or such. We're getting
there with these little systems which run MP3s, video etc but still a
little pricey. They don't call it 'Rip-off britain' for nothing. On
average we pay at least the same in pounds as you do in dollars, and
that is quite a price hike.
Click to expand...

Now I know why the color printer indistry is thriving... un England. But, what
about printers... and consumables? Don't they also sell at twice the price?

GP
 
GP said:
Now I know why the color printer indistry is thriving... un England. But, what
about printers... and consumables? Don't they also sell at twice the price?

GP
Click to expand...

Recently they've come to a reasonable price, and if you shop around
you can find ink cheaper too, so some will take the jump. To be
honest, as I said, apart from special reasons I don't print up
photographs.

Then again digital cameras are still way overpriced (except cheap
crap)
 
Ben said:
For christmas I bought my in-laws a 11"x11" photo album and put 14 8x10photos
of my baby daughter in it (1 photo per month of her life). I will give them an
8x10 every month until the album is full. She'll be 7 years old by then.

It's nice to have an album on a coffee table that you can just flick through to
reminisce every-so-often. It's a lot easier to pick up an album than choose a
video CD from your collection and put it in the DVD player and turn on the TV.
And if that coffee table is in a more formal lounge room with no TV, it's the
only option/

--
Click to expand...
I thought, as my dad is getting on a bit and is not too good with
stuff anymore I would save him time by transferring a load of pics to
a VHS tape and then he could just shove it in the video player and let
it run. Apparently he watched about five minutes and turned it off as
there wasn't any sound!
 
Paul said:
I thought, as my dad is getting on a bit and is not too good with
stuff anymore I would save him time by transferring a load of pics to
a VHS tape and then he could just shove it in the video player and let
it run. Apparently he watched about five minutes and turned it off as
there wasn't any sound!
Click to expand...

I agree with your father. You should have added a music track.

GP
 
For christmas I bought my in-laws a 11"x11" photo album and put 14 8x10 photos
of my baby daughter in it (1 photo per month of her life). I will give them an
8x10 every month until the album is full. She'll be 7 years old by then.

It's nice to have an album on a coffee table that you can just flick through to
reminisce every-so-often. It's a lot easier to pick up an album than choose a
video CD from your collection and put it in the DVD player and turn on the TV.
And if that coffee table is in a more formal lounge room with no TV, it's the
only option/

--
Click to expand...
This sort of argument has been around for years, like the "paperless"
office. The fact is that paper and it's derivatives are far more
transportable than any computer, far easier to look at, not at all
likely to break down. And a printed image will still be around when
the computer you have your images on has died so long ago examples of
it are in a museum.
 
Hecate said:
This sort of argument has been around for years, like the "paperless"
office. The fact is that paper and it's derivatives are far more
transportable than any computer, far easier to look at, not at all
likely to break down.
Click to expand...

The fact is I always prefer to send a text attached to an email than print it,
pay for a stamp and go to the mail box.

And, believe me, those who don't already have this attitude will have to
change. Your morning paper on paper is on it's last miles. Quebec, this is
were I live, has been a very important paper producer and now, we're felling
trees hardly wider than a hand in the boreal forest.

If we continue doing this in Brazil and everywhere, rest assured that, we'll
pay the price. We already are. Forest are an ecologic system. You just don't
fell it with heavy machinery to then plant the only species you're interested
in. Forests are not your back yard garden, and even there, monoculture has
heavy drawbacks.
And a printed image will still be around when
the computer you have your images on has died so long ago examples of
it are in a museum.
Click to expand...

Anything printed on acid paper, which is what is mostly used because acid-free
paper is costly(1), in good condition for more than 50 years. In ten years
from now, you might have to take an afternoon to copy your archives on CDs to
the latest kind of DVD but colors won't have faded at all.

(1) Weirdly, O'Reilly manages to publish its books, which are outdated the day
they are printed, on acid-free recycled paper. Because it's recycled paper,
the quality is not optimum, but still, it's not so bad. Go figure!

GP
 
Hecate said:
This sort of argument has been around for years, like the "paperless"
office. The fact is that paper and it's derivatives are far more
transportable than any computer, far easier to look at, not at all
likely to break down. And a printed image will still be around when
the computer you have your images on has died so long ago examples of
it are in a museum.
Click to expand...

I printed the photos on Canon Photo Paper Pro with Canon ink in my Canon i9950.
We'll see if they actually outlast the computer.

--
--
Ben Thomas - Software Engineer - Melbourne, Australia

My Digital World:
Kodak DX6490, Canon i9950, Pioneer A05;
Hitachi 37" HD plasma display, DGTEC 2000A,
Denon 2800, H/K AVR4500, Whatmough Encore;
Sony Ericsson K700i, Palm Tungsten T.

Disclaimer:
Opinions, conclusions, and other information in this message that do not
relate to the official business of my employer shall be understood as neither
given nor endorsed by it.
 
GP said:
I agree with your father. You should have added a music track.

GP
Click to expand...

Hey, I can't think of everything. I would have had to hook up the hifi
which doesn't have an output bar headphones and speakers... anyways, I
don't think at 70 odd he would appreciate Nine Inch Nails :O)
 
Yeah, that's it, people just want to spend their money.

The truth is, the industry is suffering because a lot of picture that
used to get printed aren't being made to hard copy anymore. Hence,
there is a big push all the way around toward hardcopy again.

There are many good reasons for making prints. My posting on permanence
of media is just one (earlier this morning), but for one thing, your
monitor is working at no more than 130 dpi, and the prints I make are
over double that (real resolution). Monitor and electronic images are
great, but both have their place. When electronic "paper" (more likely
reflective LED screens) become more popular, perhaps people will no
desire prints, since they will have these screen on the wall and can
place images that look as good as prints on them, but we are a way off
still.

Art
 
The truth is, GP, it is Grandma, and Uncle, and friends who do not own
computers, or who would rather have prints, or the sender who would
rather give prints, or the construction site, or ...

Obviously, people have their reasons for wishing to use prints rather
than pass around a computer monitor. Today, prints do tend to be just a
bit more resilient and convenient than computer systems. What is more
of interest to me is that you are assuming that people's decisions and
actions are somehow either unfathomable, or just plain irrational
because they don't represent the way you would do things.

A little hint, you are neither the purveyor nor necessarily a good judge
(from some of your comments) of what is necessarily logical, healthy,
intelligent, or typical. Snapshot sized prints, in particular, at about
20 cents each, seem to me a perfectly good way to share images.

Art
 
One thing some people might not be aware of, which is a great double use
for their technology.

Almost all DVD players today can show JPEGs, some, even relatively
inexpensive ones (mine was $50 CAN) offer about 10 transition options
(even dissolve) that can be used when showing images, offer zoom, speed
of image on screen, pause, etc.

To take advantage of this, you need to burn or DVD a CD with your JPEG
camera images on it. The better the quality, the better, so you can use
the higher JPEG qualities and higher (3-5 megapixel) range (I don't know
if over that you will see any difference in the quality on the screen).
Most DVD players will automatically scale the image to fill the screen.

If your camera doesn't detect camera position so that vertical images
show up correctly on your computer, you will need to rotate them before
burning your CD/DVD or they will be shown at the wrong orientation and
you will have to flip each image via the DVD player, which is a pain.

Some DVD players will read the images within the subfolders, some will
only read them once you drill down to the open folder, so you may wish
to place all the images in one folder or in the root of the disk.

Obviously, you can put together "slide shows", by placing the images in
a certain order before burning the final file set. You may wish to see
at what JPEG and megapixel size the results no longer show up on your
DVD [layer and TV with any improvements, and use that size to make the
disk, to save space, and to speed up retrieval on the DVD player.
Depending upon the file size you end up using, you can fit thousands of
images on one 650 meg CD. Since the jpeg format is relatively
universal, most DVD players will play them, so you can bring a disk
along and if a person has a DVD player and TV, you can show them what
you've been shooting without needing to use a computer. And it you or
they have a large screen TV, it can be almost as nice as a slide show.

Art
 
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