Doug Aurand
Posts: 2591
Location: Albuquerque, NM, United States
Registered: 2 Jan 2008
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Panorama Printer Ordered
Posted: 4 Jul 2009 at 14:34 GMT
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I finally got the money together and found the right printer to do Panoramic Posters and ordered it from Staples
Its a HP Photosmart Pro B8850
It can print custom paper sizes up to 13" x 44" with up to 4800 x 1200 dpi
I already have paper I had cut to 11.75" x 36" that will fit the stock frames of the same size I have
Hopefully I can make a little money selling Albuquerque theme panoramic posters
I also want to print and sell some small posters, 13"x19", of scenes I shot with my Canon XTi/10-22mm Zoom lens. I have a great on from the top of Sandia Peak on the deck of High Finance Restaurant overlooking Albuquerque just after sunset. The sky is sill orange/yellow and lights of the city show of the grid pattern of the main streets.
I'm going to pitch selling the 13x19 poster, and 8.5x11 and a postard size of the image at High Finance and the Sandia Peak Tramway Gift Shop. (The Tramway is the only practical way to get to High Finance)
Only thing thats a bit daunting is that it uses 8 ink cartridges!!!
It will be here on the 9th. I let you guys know how it works
Doug Aurand
Albuquerque, NM
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Jorgen Poulsen
Posts: 228
Location: France
Registered: 30 Apr 2008
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Re: Panorama Printer Ordered
Posted: 4 Jul 2009 at 15:23 GMT
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Doug is branching out. Perhaps that's the next 'new' thing.
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Philip Warner
Posts: 89
Location: Round Rock, TX, United States
Registered: 14 Mar 2008
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Re: Panorama Printer Ordered
Posted: 4 Jul 2009 at 15:24 GMT
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Those 8 ink cartridges will get expensive. You can also get 12"x36" prints for $4.99 with Costco's 1 hour service.
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Doug Aurand
Posts: 2591
Location: Albuquerque, NM, United States
Registered: 2 Jan 2008
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Re: Panorama Printer Ordered
Posted: 4 Jul 2009 at 16:28 GMT
updated: 4 Jul 2009 at 16:28 GMT
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Philip
I'm estimating the 13x19 glossy photo paper at $1.75 a sheet ($34.95 divided by 20 sheets per pack) plus an estimate of dollar or two of ink per sheet, I'm still at less than $4 per poster
The paper for the 11.75 x 36 panoramic posters comes out to almost $6 each because I have to have them cut.
And I have more control over the printing instead of letting a minimum wage employee do it for me.
If I can sell the 13x19 Sunset posters to High Finance and the Sandia Peak Tramway Gift Shop for a wholesale price of $10 (retail of $20) I only need to sell 100 posters to pay for the printer. Mix that with 8.5x11 prints & postcards, I figure the printer will pay for itself in a year.
The Sandia Peak Tramway makes over 10,000 trips a year with tourists and locals, so I don't see 100 posters being a problem just from them. Then there are tourist gift shops at most of the major hotels as well as all around Old Town Plaza
I also will be selling the Sunset poster directly to a number of Realtors who share a Tram Pass for their out of town home buyer to use, at $20 each, so that alone would pay for the printer after just 38 posters.
Plus I have a couple of other posters planned; UNM Basketball Arena, UNM Football Stadium, Isotopes Park (Triple-A Baseball), an aerial view of the city with the Sandia Mountains in the background and maybe the 2 really nice high school football stadiums we have here and a couple of panoramic posters too
What I'm hoping is that a few of the posters will become popular enough that I can have them professionally printed, cutting the cost per unit even more
I'll sell them on VirtualAlbuquerque.com too. I already sell a poster from Panoramas.com of the Balloon Fiesta there
Then I'll work on a set of posters for Santa Fe, NM and, after that, Taos, NM
Like Jorgen said, its another business related to what I already do. Just needed that $600 printer to take the first step
Doug Aurand
Albuquerque, NM
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Thomas Krueger
Posts: 243
Location: Genoa, Italy
Registered: 3 Mar 2006
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Re: Panorama Printer Ordered
Posted: 4 Jul 2009 at 17:38 GMT
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I'm printing on a color calibrated HP Z3100 24" with Qimage, works like a charm with a superior quality and excellent lightfastness.
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Doug Aurand
Posts: 2591
Location: Albuquerque, NM, United States
Registered: 2 Jan 2008
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Re: Panorama Printer Ordered
Posted: 4 Jul 2009 at 18:00 GMT
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Thomas
24" Wide Paper Path!
I hope I can afford one someday 
What's Qimage?
Doug Aurand
Albuquerque, NM
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Doug Aurand
Posts: 2591
Location: Albuquerque, NM, United States
Registered: 2 Jan 2008
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Re: Panorama Printer Ordered
Posted: 4 Jul 2009 at 18:11 GMT
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The fun part is that I paid for most of the printer with the money I made selling a domain name.
I paid for $425 of the $600 cost of the printer and a 2 year warranty with the money I made selling AlbuquerqueDukes.com
That used to be the name of the Triple-A Baseball team that was here. They moved to Portland, OR to become the Portland Beavers. I registered the domain when the mayor was talking about bringing an Arena Football Team to the arena he wants to build downtown and calling them the Albuquerque Dukes.
I was curious if anybody had registered the domain and, guess what, nobody had. I've had it since 2004.
A local sports mechandise company has aquired the trademark and wanted to buy the domain, so now I have the printer that will print "banners" that I've wanted for a couple years.
Doug Aurand
Albuquerque, NM
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mediavets
Posts: 1508
Location: Isleham, Cambs., United Kingdom
Registered: 8 Feb 2008
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tturner
Posts: 184
Location: Dallas,TX, United States
Registered: 28 May 2006
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Re: Panorama Printer Ordered
Posted: 4 Jul 2009 at 19:32 GMT
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Hey Doug,
Don't knock the Costco prints. A friend of mine that shoots landscape panos (National Parks ect.) prints at Costco and the quality is very good. He just does it for his own enjoyment and has them mounted all around his home. Was very surprised to learn they were from a discount store.
TTurner
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Thomas Krueger
Posts: 243
Location: Genoa, Italy
Registered: 3 Mar 2006
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Re: Panorama Printer Ordered
Posted: 5 Jul 2009 at 7:05 GMT
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Doug, Qimage does automatic resampling and sharpening of images - way better as Photoshop. You can have a look at the tutorial for the setup of Qimage:
www.ddisoftware.com/qimage/tutorial/
To view and control the colors of the printed images I use a special lighttube from Philips, the Graphica Pro 950 eith 36W and a length of 120cm (circa 9 Euro in Germany), placed about 90 cm over the table.
Here is a thread about lighting prints for evaluation:
luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=...
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Mark Schuster
Posts: 1222
Location: Welwyn Garden City, United Kingdom
Registered: 25 Jan 2006
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Re: Panorama Printer Ordered
Posted: 5 Jul 2009 at 11:45 GMT
updated: 5 Jul 2009 at 11:54 GMT
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Doug,
I have been doing something similar lately. Taking a detail from some 360 x 180 panos, distortion and all which can make them look interesting. Size constraint of my Kodak cheap Photosmart printer is equal to 2 A4 sheets end to end. This averages about 8 x 22.5 inches. Why 8 inches wide? I mount them on flooring laminates left over from my daughters flat. Mind you they have to be cut to length, the tongs and grooves cut off, edges sanded smooth, adhesive sprayed on, print stuck on, then trimmed. Well it doesn't take for ever, but it seems like it. Now add to my time, paper and printer ink it has to have a high sale price to make it worth while. If I can get hold of an A2 printer I could print two at a time, like this.
Anyone in UK had any success? I thought touristicy scenes of London might sell if I can find the right retailer.
Mark
PS Anyone know where I can get cheap A2 size paper which I can cut in half or Epson Panorama paper which is exactly 2 x A4 long, which is of course the same size?
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Doug Aurand
Posts: 2591
Location: Albuquerque, NM, United States
Registered: 2 Jan 2008
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Re: Panorama Printer Ordered
Posted: 5 Jul 2009 at 13:27 GMT
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TTurner
Okay, may apologies to Costco
Doug Aurand
Albuquerque, NM
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Doug Aurand
Posts: 2591
Location: Albuquerque, NM, United States
Registered: 2 Jan 2008
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Re: Panorama Printer Ordered
Posted: 5 Jul 2009 at 13:31 GMT
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Thomas
Qimage looks interesting and its not too expensive
I've been using Photomatix to composite almost all my image and the process softens all the edges.
I've gotten better at using Unsharp Mask in Photoshop but Quimage looks like it can do even more
Thanx
Doug Aurand
Albuquerque, NM
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Doug Aurand
Posts: 2591
Location: Albuquerque, NM, United States
Registered: 2 Jan 2008
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Re: Panorama Printer Ordered
Posted: 5 Jul 2009 at 14:17 GMT
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Mark
I used the 8.3" x 23.4" Epson Panormaic Photo Paper for a while. I still have some, but I think Epson has discontinued it.
For what I want to do, its too small to charge $20-25 for.
I got my inspiration from Blakeway Worldwide Panoramas www.panoramas.com/
and
Rob Arra's panoramic posters of sports stadoums, parks & arenas www.robarracollection.com/
What I have in mind is to do some of what they do, but in a few nearby cities that are too small for them to include. Blakeway has an Albuquerque poster but its the balloon fiesta not a cityscape and Arra has nothing from New Mexico at all. So tourist centers like Albuquerque and Santa Fe, ski towns like Taos & Red River, and some other locations are wide open.
All it takes is good images.
What I'm doing for paper size for the panoramic prints is buy a roll of Epson 13" x 36' Photo Paper and have a local picture frame shop cut it to 11.75" x 36" posters that will fit a stock frame of the same size.
That was the resistance I ran into with the 8.3"x 23.4" Epson paper, it cost too much for the buyer to have even a cheap frame made to fit the paper. Three or 4 times the cost of the $15 poster
For the non-panormaic posters I'll just use 13"x 19" photo paper which also has inexpensive stock frames available
The other thing I've learned from the small attempts as selling the 8.3x23.4 posters is tourists aren't the only customers. Doing a lot of real estate photography I get to see what people put on their walls at home, and posters and art about Albuquerque and New Mexico are common. One local favorite are the official Balloon Fiesta posters. A new one is produced every year and many people collect them. But Albuquerqueans like to put images of the city and state on their walls
I doubt if I'll reach that level of popularity the Ballon Posters have, but if I could make $500 a month ($10 profit on 50 posters) it would make a difference in what I do. I could start moving away from real estate work and focus on work thats more fun.
See if you can start putting away dome money and move up to a printer with a 13" paper path and can do custom sizes 44" long. Big posters are what will make your work stand out
The HP B8850 I'm getting is US$549 but HP also makes the B8550 which is only US$299 and can print 13" x 44"....and it only has 4 or 5 ink cartridges
Good luck
Doug Aurand
Albuquerque, NM
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iam360Texas
Posts: 198
Location: Fort Worth, Texas, United States
Registered: 12 Jul 2006
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Re: Panorama Printer Ordered
Posted: 5 Jul 2009 at 15:04 GMT
updated: 5 Jul 2009 at 15:08 GMT
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B8550 $299 less rebate = $199 +S&H www.shopping.hp.com/webapp/shopping/product_detai...
I did notice the local Bestbuy does not have them in the store. Available Online Only
Which makes me wonder if this product is going out of production. If so be careful of Inks HP564 also going out of productions.
This is one BIG reason I dumped my perfectly good working order Epson printers (2) because they stopped making ink cartridges after 2 years.
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