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Useful Imaging Info... PhotoShop
Print DMA
Illustrated Archival
Prints Client
Page with downloads
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Portfolio
prints on stunning museum grade 'photo velvet' 100%
cotton rag paper Exhibition Quality Archival Photographic Prints: We use 250gsm heavyweight lustre, gloss and matte papers and 2,800dpi Epson K3 UltraChrome archival pigment printers for the most brilliant and finely detailed ‘Exhibition’ and ‘Museum Quality’ photographic prints. Giclee Fine Art Prints: We use a range of heavyweight smooth and finely textured acid free cotton rag art papers and print with 2,800dpi Epson K3 UltraChrome archival pigment printers. This service is ideal for ‘Limited Edition’ Fine Photography print sales and reproductions of watercolour, pastel, charcoal, pencil, ink and acrylic artworks.
Oil
Pigment Prints on Canvas: We use Premium Water Resistant
Artist's Canvas. It has a strong, traditional texture but is still
smooth enough toreproduce finely detailed images. The medium gloss white
coating combined with our colour management procedures provides high saturation
with good colour accuracy. The ideal application is for accurate reproductions
of oil and acrylic art but we can print photographic images with a range
of border and framing options for home and commercial 'decor'. We can make prints from... Scans & Digital Camera Shots: Ideally we need RGB (Red, Green & Blue) files of at least 12Mb (Before compression) - a 5 MegaPixel Digital Camera file. If your files are a little smaller we can use special software to increase the size of the image. Use the lowest ‘JPG’ compression setting on your camera or use TIF. If your camera produces ‘RAW’ files we can process them with increased resolution and tonality. With scans set up your scanner to enlarge the print or the film to the final print size at 150 to 300dpi (See the info below). Digital Art & Montages: If you are starting from scratch set up your digital ‘canvas’ at the actual final print size at the following ppi (pixels per inch): A4 and A3 prints need 300 down to 200ppi. A2 can be 200ppi down to 150ppi. A1 and larger can be 150ppi down to 100ppi or even 75ppi. The larger the print the longer the viewing distance. A one metre print on the wall viewed from across the room only appears as big and as detailed as a postcard size print viewed from a few cm away! Photographic Prints and Artworks: We can scan or ‘digitise’ any 2D media, photographs, mounted and unmounted art even prints in glass picture frames if they can’t be removed. We have built a Digital Reprography system using a huge copy stand, a $46,000.00 high resolution digital copy camera and diffuse daylight balance lighting. This unique system can be used to digitise reflective originals from postage stamp size up to A2. A larger system digitises mounted art & paintings up to 1m x 2m. Diffuse, daylight balance lighting ensures colour fidelity and reduces the texture of canvas and watercolour surfaces of the original art so that we don’t print a ‘picture’ of the texture on top of our textured art paper and canvas. Print scanners can not do this! Photographic
Film & Glass Plates: We have been scanning film on our
$400,000.00 Kodak Pro Photo CD system and other specialised scanners since
1992 and have now done over a million scans! If you have an original colour
or black & white negative, transparency, slide or old glass plate we
can get the most amazing detail compared to scanning a reduced quality print
made from it. We can scan or digitise any film format: 16mm, APS, 35mm; half
and full frame, panoramics, medium format roll films and sheet film up to
8” x 10”. We can digitise all lantern slides formats and glass
plates up to 11”x14”. Retouching Photographic Film: We have scanning systems that automatically remove or reduce dust and small scratches and this is included in the scanning fee. Badly scratched film can be retouched by quote. We NEVER use any oils or coatings on film to ‘fill-in’ scratches as it can damage old, fragile emulsions. We don’t use high speed drum scanners as old film is often warped and it can get destroyed when spinning at 10,000 rpm! Retouching Photographic Prints: Our scanning service fees includes basic contrast enhancement and dust reduction. Old photos, no matter how good they look at first glance, have tiny imperfections like creases, abrasions, stains, foxing and silver leeching. These become a real issue when enlarging 4x or more and usually require professional retouching and sometimes special lighting during digitisation. We inspect and quote. Retouching Artwork: It sounds odd to think of artwork needing retouching but artists often ask for their signature to be removed form the image so they can hand sign and number each limited edition print. We often remove borders and background colours back to pure white so that we can print on tinted art paper. Wide borders the same colour and texture as the background paper can be created to create space around art. IMPORTANT! All our digitisation and restoration process are ‘Non Destructive’: Copy lighting is heat free. Fragile emulsions and print surfaces are never touched or compressed under glass. All retouching is performed on the digital file by mature digital artists. Your original is always returned as we received it! We have been doing restorations since the pre-digital ‘60’s using photographic and airbrush techniques!
Image Optimisation: We have very expensive pre-press monitors on accurately calibrated Mac and Windows systems. When we open your file we ‘Soft Proof’ the image onscreen to show almost exactly how it will print. In a few minutes we can ‘optimise’ the contrast and density, remove any colour casts, fix up dark areas - even add a little density and saturation to washed out areas. Our clients rely on our skills and discretion to make their prints look the best. If major fix-ups are needed we will eMail a low resolution proof for approval. All optimised files can be supplied as ‘Digital Master Files’ on CDs or DVDs. Image Manipulation: We can replace or blur bad backgrounds, change colours, superimpose, remove double chins, wrinkles and age spots, whiten teeth and add a sparkle to the eyes etc. All work is quoted and is proofed and approved on-line. See how we fix and optimise your images: 'Image Makeover' proofs page: Click Here
Borderless Photo Prints: We can print your images right up to the edge of the paper if that is what you want. ‘Machine’ prints are supplied this way but have you ever noticed though how much the image is cropped? Borderless images HAVE to be printed bigger than the final paper size so that trimming does not leave any white edges behind. We produce borderless photographic prints at standard ‘A’ sizes for the standard price - just remember you will lose a little of the image edges and they can be hard to frame. Thin Photo Print Borders: We recommend a traditional thin white border (3-5mm) so that the entire image is displayed without cropping. We produce bordered photographic prints by default. Wide Art Borders: Watercolour art often works well with a wide border so that the image does not look ‘cramped’ in the frame or the matte overlay. The size of this border is an aesthetic decision made by you - the artist. It should, however, be the same colour and texture as the background paper in the image. If the original art has little or no border we can use retouching to extend the background as a seamless border so you don’t get an ugly white area around the image. We quote on adding wide borders to watercolour images as it may involve retouching work.
Canvas Borders for Traditional Framing: Canvas is unique as it needs to be ‘stretched’ over a wooden frame to remove wrinkles. If the image is an old painting, traditional art or a classic portrait it will probably look best with a traditional frame. If so all you need is a border wide enough to wrap around the edges of the ‘stretcher’ for side stapling - Say 50mm all (Adding 100mm total to your chosen image size). Bear in mind that the chosen frame may obscure up to 10 - 15mm of the image edges. 'Wrapped Canvas' Borders: for home and office Decor with the canvas and often the image itself appearing to be ‘Wrapped’ around a stretcher giving the appearance of a block. To do this we make a print that incorporates a 63.5mm border: 40mm runs down the side of the stretcher and 23.5mm wraps around the back for stapling. We
add an extra 63.5mm border to all canvas sizes for FREE:
To allow for frame stretcher 'wrapping' we add a 40mm 'side border' plus
a 23.5mm 'back stapling' border. You can choose to leave the 40mm side border
blank white, have it coloured to match the image or 'wrap' the image
around the sides. If the main subject is too close to the edge of the frame
we can retouch the background to extend it the required 40mm. This is how
it works... A.
We can leave the whole 65mm canvas border blank for 'white sides' wrapping...
B. We can print the image 40mm bigger on all sides so that it ‘wraps’
around the stretcher frame...
C.
We can print a matching colour 40mm on all sides of the image to add a classic
border...
E.
We design exhibition 'Templates' with 'Faux Matte' borders, logo, title,
signature even multiple images... Call David Myers on (02) 9949 6090 to discuss the various options
DMA has the longest history of digital photographic printing... 1987: The year of the Mac II computer with 16.8 million colours. As consultants to Village Roadshow we would image photo files from 'PixelPaint' (No PhotoShop then!) onto film using digital film recorders and make lab prints - very slow and expensive! 1990: We installed Australia’s first Kodak Dye Sublimation 'Photo Quality' printer The $40,000, 85kg, monster produced beautiful 10”x10” prints but only at 205dpi. Images faded in bright light after a year or so and the images sometimes ‘melted’ in PVC photo albums! 1993: Brought the $45,000 Fuji Pictrography thermal dye transfer printer with stunning 400dpi photo output. Fortunately digital files last forever because the Fuji prints lasted about 2 years. Beware there are still some labs using these machines! Good quality but not archival permanence. 1996: Saw the first Epson Stylus Photo Inkjet printers - Affordable A4 and A3 output but we had faded green prints after one to two WEEKS in bright light. The printers sold like hot cakes, regardless, and the technology progressed... Now:
We have now seen inkjet technology progress through, Long Life Dye, Outdoor
Signage Pigment and Photo Quality Pigment media. We now have 'Wide Gamut
Archival Pigment' printers that use microscopic droplets of oil paint encapsulated
in resin to print at true photo quality onto a wide range of photo papers
and art media. We use Epson's 'UltraChrome' Pigment printers
- the first to be approved by museums for Fine Art, 'Giclee' printing.
The UltraChrome process with acid free papers gives an indoor print
life of over 70 years for colour, 150+ years for black and
white. A bonus is that UltraChrome Pigment prints made on canvas
are real 'Oil Paintings'! Full Price List - PDF • 'BIG Canvas' Promotion • 'Gallery Prints' Promotion
Site design, imaging and creation © DIGITALMASTERS australasia by David Myers - Period 1995-2008
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