You Have a Good Photo Printer, Now What?
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Loading ...A lot of people take their photo printers for granted and chances are, you have been doing that, too. Most of the time, your photo printer just sits on your desk doing anything but printing photos. You spend a lot of time (and money) printing text and presentations that you tend to forget that your color printer can do more than just print out black and white documents.
Put your photo printer to good use and explore the possibilities that it can offer. Create art, print digital photos, make your own business cards and calendars–there are endless projects you can do to make the most out of your digital photo printer. Below are some tips to help you maximize your printer’s potential and to create beautiful, colorful projects.
1. Explore your printer and its features. Rummage through your files for your printer’s manual and read up on the different features of your printer. You might not know that your photo printer makes it easy for you to print digital photos via a memory card slot or that you can connect your mobile phone to your printer easily by using Bluetooth. Some printers can even let you correct red eye and crop images straight on its LCD screen.
2. Play around with your printer’s settings. Go to your printer’s menu on your computer and click on “properties” or “options.” Here, you can change your printer’s different settings to be able to accommodate different image sizes, resolutions and even different types of printer paper. Always remember to check paper settings when you shift to a different-sized paper or when you use a new type of paper.
3. Use a good image editing software. Technology has made creating beautiful photos as easy as a mouse click away! Experiment with a good image editing software to enhance your digital photos. Try cropping your photos to different sizes and adjusting the contrast and brightness of your images. You can even go crazy with different effects included in the software such as solarize, emboss and halftone effects. It’s also good to research online for easy image manipulation tutorials.
4. Update your printer driver. The driver of your photo printer is what helps your computer communicate with your printer. The driver also allows you to change different printer settings. Choose “automatic update” from the update menu of your computer or printer so you’re sure you have the latest driver installed.
5. Use the proper ink and paper. More often than not, a bad-quality print out is caused by using the incorrect ink and paper for your color printer or for the project you’re printing. If you want sharp, realistic images, use glossy or matte photo paper and special photo ink. A good trick to make black and white photos pop is to print these using your “colored” setting. Don’t worry about spending too much on ink cartridges, because a lot of affordable third-party ink cartridges produce good-quality prints.
Your world shouldn’t be less colorful than others, and your color printer shouldn’t just be a machine for black and white prints. Express your creativity by using your imagination and your photo printer. You’ll definitely be surprised at the results.
This Article is written by John C Arkin, contributor of Office Supplies Information & Resources.
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March 11th, 2010 at 3:19 am
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