Bill_de Loc: US

Why buy extra work for yourself?

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Cdouthitt Loc: Traverse City, MI

Similar question can be asked...Why limit yourself?

Gene51 Loc: Yonkers, NY, now in LSD (LowerSlowerDelaware)

I use an Epson 4880. It makes great looking prints but you need to be printing all the time to keep the heads from clogging. It is a pain. I am pretty sure you can set up remote printing, but printing is a hands-on experience. Anything can go wrong - if you get a clogged head and print 20 prints, you have to toss them, clean the print heads and reprint - as an example of things that can go wrong. Some others - if you use a roll paper feed, sometimes the blade gets jammed and tears rather than cuts the paper. Sometimes the paper misfeeds when using sheets. etc etc etc.

HP is junk.

I much prefer Canon printers. The ImagePROGRAF iPF5100 is a 12 color 17" roll feed printer (can print sheets too), that lists for $2100, and I am sure you can find deals for less (try Greentoe.com). It has a wider gamut than the P800, which is essentially an 8 color printer.

At the end of the day, though, it is far cheaper to provide C prints from any of the big national labs like Bay Photo, MPix, White House Custom Color, etc - and you don't have to babysit your printer. You are not going to want to print pictures for 200-250 students on a small printer like either of these.

charles tabb Loc: Richmond VA.

My suggestion is to look into the Canon Pro 100.
Call B&H in NY. and talk with them, they can explain it all to you.
For Ink for it, I use ink from LD : look for that from LD on the Web.

I absolutely love mine.

jeep_daddy Loc: Prescott AZ

I agree with this. The Canon Pixma Pro-100 is very inexpensive and it's dye ink lasts a long time on Canon paper. It will print up to 17x13 inch prints. It will only cost about $100 after rebates.

I don't really think Epson printers are that great if you don't use them ALL the time because their printheads get dried up ink stuck in them and render them useless. Canon printers park the heads so that the ink doesn't dry up and plug up the printhead.

Any of the Canon Pixma Pro level printers are great. The next model up is the Pro-10 which used pigment ink which is supposed to be better and last even longer. They make a Pro-100, Pro-10 and a Pro-1000. I have the Pro-1000 now as I have sold my Pro-100 because I wanted to be able to print 25x17 prints. It uses 12 LUCIA PRO Pigment-Based Inks that hold 80ml of ink that lasts a long time, is wireless, has an accounting system so that you can see exactly how much each print or each print job costs you for accounting purposes and is a fine piece of professional equipment. It's costs about $1300

https://shop.usa.canon.com/shop/en/catalog/printers-all-in-ones/professional-inkjet-printers

amfoto1 Loc: San Jose, Calif. USA

All I can say is... it depends.

It depends on a lot of things.

Do you want to try to fulfill orders on site, during the event? If so, you will need an assistant to handle the printing (so you won't have to stop shooting to do it) and probably will want a dye sublimation printer for the speed it offers. Dye subs are limited in the sizes they can print and those that can do larger prints (6x9, 8x10) are expensive. Working with a friend, we used to offer on-site printing with very limited sizes (4x6, 5x7 and 8x10) and only glossy paper. Her husband works at a pro lab and volunteered to assist us with the printing... which was a good deal, all things considered! If we had to hire someone with the necessary skills, it would probably cost at least $15 or $20 per hour! On-site printing also presents problems getting accurate prints, due to highly variable lighting conditions and other factors. Even the color of the tent we used had some effect. We used a slower inkjet printer in order to be able to offer those few different sizes of prints. If we'd continued to offer on-site printing, we might have invested in several dye subs eventually, but there were just too many drawbacks to trying to do the work at the event, so we started discouraging it and focused on selling online instead.

The alternative is to display your images online as thumbnails/proofs and let people order there. You only need to do complete post-processing of images that are actually ordered. There are several possible ways to do this, but at a minimum you'll need a site to host your galleries, with a shopping cart.

You can then try to fulfill your orders yourself, printing at home... but good luck if you really expect to sell 100's of prints! You will be working a lot of late nights! If you go that route, I'd recommend a Canon Pro-100 as a fairly affordable 13" wide printer. Pro-100 can often be found on sale for roughly $150 or less, with a sample pack of paper and half-filled "starter" inks. But a set of inks for it (8 colors) costs $116 to $124. Depending upon the type of paper you print on (matte papers take more ink than some glossy, for example), I would guess you'd get around 40 or 50 8x10s with a set of inks. By the time you add the cost of paper and the wear and tear on the printer, you'll probably be looking at a cost around $3 per print. It will be pretty similar with other inkjets. Maybe a little less and more controllable with dye subs, though you'll have fewer size options with them.

The dye based inks that the Pro-100 uses are rated for 100+ years life span. Much better than dye inks in the past. Canon's Pro-10 uses more colors and pigment based inks that have even longer duration... expected to be around 200 years. Personally I prefer dye inks on luster and glossy papers... pigment on matte papers.

But I don't use those inkjets for the high volume event photography work, such as you're asking about.

Instead I am using a website that not only hosts my thumbnail/proof galleries and provides a shopping cart for customers' use.... And also handles all the aspects of the fulfillment after I do the final image optimization. With them I'm able to offer about 200 different sizes and types of prints, as well as printing on a wide variety of gift items. Immediately after a shoot I use Lightroom to quickly edit my images and VERY lightly tweak them... a few seconds work per image typically... then upload watermarked, lower resolution files to the website. Customers can then visit and order from there. Once an order is placed, I go back to Lightroom to locate the image, make any changes needed there (such as changing the crop) and then pass the image off to Photoshop where I do any finalization that's needed. Finally I upload the larger file for the printing service to fulfill the order.

I have two 13" wide printers at home, but wouldn't try to fulfill orders with them. The cost per print is too high and it's not fast enough.... Plus there are all the hassles of packaging, shipping, handling payments, collecting sales tax, yada, yada. Instead I pay an annual fee and a percentage of each sale to a site that does all that for me.... then collect my profits periodically. I use my printers sparingly, mostly for fine art/museum quality prints.

I was using Exposure Manager for this service the last couple years, but they closed operations effective March 1. I've just set up and am getting started with Zenfolio.com... so far, seems like a good setup, though I'm still learning my way around. For some years in the past I was using Printroom, which was nice because their offices were local to me and I got to know some of the folks there. But they are also out of business.

I had an event on May 5 & 6 were I took almost 9000 images.... After several days editing, I've uploaded about 2500 low rez/thumbnail/proofs of those into a bunch of galleries for customers to view (I require a signed model/property release before I'll display any images online... not everyone signs one, which is why not all the images I took are uploaded.) I've been working on a number of sales to the particpants, ever since.

I've also got an off-line archive of images dating back around 10 or 12 years, which I can upload selectively for people to see and shop, if they wish. I just had call to do so with a gallery from an even a year ago.

There are various support for online sales and gallery hosts built into some software. For example, for a few $ there are a couple different Publish Service Zenfolio uploaders available for Lightroom. I've gotten one from Geoffrey Friedl, but haven't had time to set it up and try it yet (I used his Lightroom uploader/organizer for Exposure Manager, and it worked well). These are also available for SmugMug and possibly others.

There are other gallery and print fulfillment services out there, besides Zenfolio... I'm not trying to sell you on using them. But my point is that you really can't do the work at home as efficiently and cost-effectively or offer anywhere near the selection of sizes, types and products that some of the better online providers do. I'd suggest you think twice about it.

Speaking of which, I just got an other order to fulfill, so I'd better stop chattin' about the work here and get busy actually doin' it!

olsonsview

Canon Prograf pro-2000 is perhaps the latest and greatest. I had Epson 17inch roll printers and some experience with larger ones too. This 24 inch Canon is a super bargain at about $2500 and uses half the ink compared to Epson. Easy for user to replace the head too! No clogging either reported from users that have experience with them. Maybe more than you plan to spend but look into this gem. This is my next printer!

Goldyrock

The OP is looking for a Pro grade printer. He will be printing large quantities, so that the smaller ink carts of the Pro 100 would have to be frequently changed. Since these prints are being sold, only OEM inks should be used. LD dye inks would
not give the longevity needed.

charles tabb Loc: Richmond VA.

I don't think that I will live past the "Longevity" you talk about.

lcfarms

Thank you for the replies.

For more clarification....

The school shoots will probably generate 100 package orders at a time ie. 1-8x10, or 1-5x7 and 2-4x8, etc. One or twice a year. If things work out it could increase to 4 times a year.

The event photos will be shot at events then printed at home. These are outdoor events. I shy away from weddings.... I don’t know why, I just do.

It would be nice to print larger photos for clients to put above the fireplace.

Roll paper sounds good but seems to be expensive to stock different sizes.

And it sounds like when printing it is best to be close to the printer.

Based upon your information I may be better served at least in the near term to use a service.

Using a service seems to have several advantages...


When using a service, how do I ensure the printed photo is the same as displayed in my screen.

I tune my screen with a spyder 5 and use color checker to manage my color profile in Lightroom.

Please, those using services if you would let me know who you are using and your workflow, I would appreciate the info.


I am going to look into the printer suggestions as I would like a better printer than I currently have to print my work for my display and small infrequent jobs. Sounds like cannon may be better because of nozzle and ink drying issues.

Pgphoto Loc: Brooklyn, NY

Epson P800 hand down. I've had it since it came out and its a top quality professional photo printer. Another BIG reason to consider this printer it uses large 80ML cartridges for around $55 per unit. the smaller P600 uses
26ML Cartridges for around $32 per unit. Do the math, much cheaper ink in the long run plus the p800 is a 17 inch wide printer but prints very well from 4 x 6 on up. If you like panoramas thats another plus it will print 4 foot prints, the max I have not tested it. I'm telling you great bang for your buck and another thing because it uses pigmented ink the prints are waterproof from the start.