General Question

windex's avatar

What type of printer should I buy to print concept art/finshed renders?

Asked by windex (2932points) March 14th, 2011
5 responses
“Great Question” (0points)

Sorry, this is gonna be a bit long. If you’re not an art nerd, this will bore you. (it might bore you even if you are one)

I want to print my concept art, renders, certain shot breakdowns etc. for the projects I’m working on and tape them to my wall for inspiration and also to think about them and rework some stuff if they don’t look right. This is for some animations I’m doing.

The sizes are going to be anywhere between a 2” x 2” to 18” x 24” B&W and color. All the color calibration will be done on the monitor. (unless somehow I decide to make a book) so basically, although color is very important, it’s ok if it’s not 100% accurate on the printed pieces.

I have been told by a friend that I have asperger syndrome, although I deny it and laugh, unfortunately I do show some signs of it. When I look at something, it’s either the “best thing in the world” or the worst. So I was thinking of either getting a super cheap B&W printer and print all the big color pieces with someone like shortrunposters.com since it’s like 2–3 bux per 18×24 poster and I could just batch the smaller pieces up together.

Or, I was thinking of spending a lot of money and getting a wide format printer, one of those Epson ones 2k ish…

That’s clearly not a smart thing to do, I also thought about other people seeing my “original” characters if I print them online, but I don’t really care that much, I used to (a lot) in the past but not any more. (effects of adopting open software, if that makes sense)

But the downside would be that I’d have to wait like a week or more to get the prints in the mail.

Also as far as the prints being glossy, I don’t care (I actually prefer matte)

Thank you so much for reading this, I could’ve totally made this whole thing a lot shorter.

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Answers

ragingloli's avatar

Unless you are printing a lot of pictures a month, it does not make much sense to spend a lot of money on an expensive printer. It can become pretty wasteful, too, due to all the test prints.
You would be better of using a print shop.

Tropical_Willie's avatar

I’m with @ragingloli find a local printing source. Close to home and cheaper than buying a printer and putting ink cartridges in it. You have to do hundreds of prints to make a break even point.

windex's avatar

Thanks

zendielacson's avatar

buy a cheaper printer

anartist's avatar

Get the imaging done by a local vendor if you are in or near a big city.

Concentrate your money on the equipment you need to make the best art. Images can be printed using rgb [photographic] imaging on papers with a variety of finishes, and any size up to 60” wide by any length long and even bigger images can be made by combining several panels . Or they can be printed cmyk [laser, inkjet, even spray paint] on a wide variety of substrates including steel or canvas.
I have worked in exhibit design for many years and know that you can get many different output products—so why limit yourself to one too-expensive printer that gives you only one option?

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