The Stylus Photo 2100 EPSON A3+ inkjet printer: A REVIEW

© G. Ramos-Poquí, London 30th of December 2002

Epson has devoted research into the permanence of colours and lightfast properties of their inks, and the coming of pigment inks (as opposed to dye inks) for the use of home printers, making photographers and digital artists' printmakers a step closer to a gallery or collectors' professional standards. The latest printer available in the UK is the long awaited Stylus Photo 2100 (a replacement of the 2000P A3+) which has had very good reviews.
However, it is important to be aware of a few things before investing in it.
For months, there has been a shortage of this machine, and its consumables, in this country. This means that you may need to wait two to three months to get it but, but more importantly, because of the short supply, if something were to go wrong once you bought it, and you contacted Epson Technical Support (which they delegate to a firm called Equinox in London) and most likely your machine needed replacing by the engineer when he comes, you may need to wait a few weeks for this to happen, because the engineers do not have replacements at hand. The shortage of consumables means that e.g. ink cartridges and papers may not be available in your local computer shops and you will need to order them in advance or pay more if you wish to shop in a hurry in expensive retailers (for e.g. paper, like Silverpoint in London).
The cheapest quote for this machine is £ 521.70 (incl. VAT) from e.g. www.savastore.com (but Jessops shops may match this price, if you show them a web printout from Savastore). The machine does not come with a USB port, so add another £ 5, does not come with the optional "mater black" cartridge (to replace the "photo black"), another £ 10.57 (or £ 12.99, depending on the supplier) and, although it has a 1 year warranty, if you want to add another 2 years you need to pay for the "extended warranty" from the purchase date (another £ 133 approx.).
The machine uses 7 separate cartridges: the Photo Black (or, instead, the Matt Black, but you cannot alternate those during an edition when changing papers), the Light Black, the Cyan, the Light Cyan, the Magenta, the Light Magenta, and the Yellow. When printing my photomontages, the consumption ratios of my work showed me that, in spite of the size of the cartridges, the ink does not last very long, and three of the cartridges got emptied at twice the rate of the other 4 and therefore needed replacements: the Light Black, the Light Cyan, and the Light Magenta. Therefore it may be a good idea to purchase these three replacements from the beginning.
The machine does not come with a manual, only with a basic sheet of instructions. The full instructions are to be found in the enclosed CD that comes with it, next to the software installation window. The CD instructions are somehow complicated and they do not seem to be clear about the most important thing: how to place the paper in the paper feeder in order to print. This I had to figure out for myself, out of despair, only to find that you must place the paper on a "balancing act", suspended from its bottom right corner, on the extreme right of the feeder. You then adjust the gray sliding paper clip to the left side of the paper.
It is a pity that Epson does not tell you about the settings in Adobe Photoshop, which is the programme that professionals are most likely to use. It is also not very clear, at least to me, how to print edge-to-edge, so what you see in the monitor is what you get, and therefore you waste time and money making experiments. The quality of the printing and colour, however (when set at high quality option) is really excellent.
This printer claims to have 75 light fast inks (with all sorts of conditions, including neon light and not direct daylight exposure) provided you also use 75 years archival paper. The papers of these quality are the "fine art matte paper" and the "watercolour" paper (for which you need to use the "Matte Black ink cartridge). However, these two types of papers are not available on the 32.9 cm x 10m roll (which is really what I wanted to use the printer for, because of the panoramic shape of my work! It was already too late when I discovered that!). The "Premium Semigloss Photo" paper, which is nice enough (and I much prefer it to the Gloss paper range) is only archival for 45 years (instead of 75!), when I realized this I wanted to return the matt black cartridge, which I had purchased directly form Epson, but they declined to make me a refund, since I had already opened the cartridge's cover, so that was a waste of money.
You need to know, as not to get confused as I was, that the "A3+" size paper, listed in the catalogues, comes as size "Super A3" (32.9 cm x 48.3 cm = 13" x 19").
So far I have printed on the Premium Semi gloss Photo Paper and the quality is really impressive. I have not been able to see if the same quality of colour can be achieved with the matte or watercolour papers. I tried printing on a matt paper from a different maker (since there was no sample included in the printer package) and the colour looked, disappointingly, very different. Because of my expensive purchase of a variety of Premium Semigloss Photo paper sizes, and having set the Photo Black cartridge in the machine, I now seem stuck with the standard Photo Black and one paper option.
Instructions which come with the paper tells you that you need to leave the prints to dry from a few hours, to thoroughly for 24 hours, and that you most not put your greasy thumbs on the paper before or after printing (of course!), but this means that, to further protect your prints, you will need to buy some acid free see-though "melonex" plastic jackets (or folders) and you may have difficulties to find them for A3+ size and, like all size A3+ paper, they will be expensive.
Because the printer only comes with one piece of paper sample, I was eager to buy some in a hurry, I went to Silverpoint in London (were retail prices are really expensive) and bought Semigloss Photo Paper of various sizes (A4, large 10m long roll, and A3 sizes), as well as 10 polyurethane plastic sleeves size A3 for £ 14.81 (incl. VAT). Silver point also sells plastic sleeves for size Super A3 prints. I do not know if these jackets are acid free like melonex, but I remember once buying the melonex type (recommended to me by a print conservator) and they were really expensive! It all adds up to the cost of making the prints! And considering that the "Super A3 or A3+" paper is almost half as much more expensive that the A3 size, is it worth it? (e.g. for 20 sheets, at Jessops: A3 pack = 25.99, and A3+ pack = £ 33.99).
For the inks, the cheapest prices are at www.dabs.com all cartridges at £ 10.57 (include. VAT) except for the Photo black, at £ 9.37 (with an extra £ 3 handling charge).
In conclusion, I think this is a good printer but very expensive to run, it is difficult to get hold of its consumables, let alone the printer itself (therefore do not count on an immediate replacement from the engineer if the printer does not work!). You need to shop around to find out the cheapest prices and, as usual, there are hidden expenses, the paper is expensive, prints will need extra protection with plastic jackets at extra cost, the large size paper roll is not available in fine art matt or watercolour quality, which is a great shame, and the inks do not seem to last very long. Maybe I should have purchased the cheaper Epson 1290 Stylus Photo A3+ instead (which are 40 years lightfast inks - not that different from the Epson 2100 lightfast Semigloss Photo 45 years archival paper!… ) but then, I have not yet seen the quality of the Epson 2100 prints on the matt or watercolour fine art papers (which, in any case, are not available on the large 10 m long roll size! which is really the greatest disappointment as far as I am concerned!).
And what about the Epson Stylus A3+ Pro 5500?, which Epson is advertising so eagerly, with a 200 year lightfast inks!? How many years we shall need to wait for it to come to the UK to see what it can do?

Printing on Epson 2100 using Epson Premium Semigloss A3 Photo paper using Adobe Photoshop, (to allow for a minimum size white margins around the image)
Let me say first of all that to find how to do it was not as simple as I would have wished! and that is a great pity that the manufacturer does not provide these instructions for Photoshop users!
1) Switch on your Epson 2100 printer
2) Go to the "control panel" and select Epson 2100 as your "default printer"
3) Go to Adobe Photoshop and open your file, then, before printing:
a) Go to File > Print Options and click on "Scale to Fit Media" (this option will allow for 1.3 cm, as the smallest white margin)
b) In File > Set Up select A3 and sheet feeder, then either portrait or landscape.
c) In File > Page set up > click on "Properties" and:
d) Under "Main" > select the paper (e.g. "Premium Semigloss" or another), click on "Colour", click on "Automatic" and move register to "Quality", also click on "Print Preview"
e) Under Paper> Paper source: Sheet Feeder, Copies: 1, Standard and Centred.
f) Under Layout > Click on Reduce/Enlarge and "Fit to Page".
4) Having done all these, click on "Print" and wait for the "Preview" to appear (this may take some time). If you like the way the image is layout on the paper in the "Preview" then click on "Print", if not, cancelled, something is not right.

5) Important notes:
a) Because you have selected "Scale to Fit Media" and "Quality"(see above) there is no need for you to change the size or resolution of your original image.
b) Because you have chosen "Print Preview" (see above) you will have a chance to approve or not of the layout before deciding to go ahead and print.
c) Under "Main" (see above) you will also be able to see the ink levels for each cartridge. When one has reached a very low level it will be highlighted by a triangle with an exclamation mark. These levels will also be shown whilst printing.
d) During printing, which is very, very, slow, do not attempt to use the computer using another programme or it will interefere and cause problems.

6) Troubleshooting
Epson does not give you any guidance on "trouble shooting" in the help file!
But take care to remember two things, learned (from hard worn experience):
a) If you have not used the printer for a few weeks, or maybe several days, make sure you go to Printer > Utility > Head Cleaning. This will un-clogged some of the colours nozzles (such as yellow), to prevent faulty colour printing (but, in the process, use extra ink). Alternative, make sure to take a small sample (cut a piece of A4 or A3 paper and print a band to test colour quality).
b) If you wanted to get the minimum white borders but in "Print Preview" (se 5b in these notes) the white borders are too wide, the fact is that, for some reason, the "Scale to Fit Media" has been un-clicked. So go to File > Print Options and click on "Scale to Fit Media" again and, if it does not work, switch of Photoshop and start again!

But how to print the image without margins?
This is an interesting option, which this printer provides, but no instructions on how to do it in Photoshop, this is what you need to do:
File > Print options: click (as before) on Scale to Fit to Media
File > Page Setup >: under "Source", select "Sheet (No Margins)"
File > Page Setup > Properties > "Main"
a) As before, click on "Print Preview", colour, and register moved to "Quality"
b) Sheet: Feeder, A3, 1 copy, click on "No margins"
c) Layout: nothing will show.
Then go to "print", it will show you the "preview" and you will be able to see the layout without margins (at least in one side of the image) and decide whether to go ahead with the printing or not.

Note: If you are going to display your print with a mount (and not "floating") you may decide you need a small white margin, in which case follow the first set of instructions given above.

And what about just buying an every-day use A4 inkjet printer with some colourfast inks?
After a lot of search, (since the description of Epson printers read almost all the same - you really have to consider the small print!…and these takes time, but life is too short!) I decided on the "Epson Stylus 925" (there is an Epson inkjet printer with longer lightfast inks but the cartridges are far too expensive!). The info on the Stylus 925 says that it can give you 25 years colour fast results (under certain conditions and provided you use the right paper, which is different from the Epson printer which I just reported on). I tested it and the quality seems to be OK, but the problem is that I will need to use both printers at least every 2 or 3 weeks, or else the nozzles may block!


© Guillem Ramos-Poquí 2002

FINE ART PRINTMAKING IN THE DIGITAL AGE

© Guillem Ramos-Poquí 1997

"Fine Art printmaking using computer technology has come of age and there is a new generation of computer printers which the artists can choose from. However, there are a series of considerations that the artist should bear in mind which emphasise the fact that the present commercial requirements of industry and those of artists have yet to reach a perfect bonding. It is for this reason that many artists still prefer to transfer their computer generated images using traditional printing methods such as hand printed photo lithography or photo-screen printing, both providing a richer layer of ink with light-fast properties. The draw back of this is that the artist will then need to plan and invest a whole edition, which is generally expensive if several colours are involved. Computer printing, in the other hand provides the artists with the advantage of only needing to print as few copies as may be required by the number of orders by clients.

Amongst the many different types of quality computer printing I want to first mention DySublimation and IRIS (giclée prints).

The quality of DySublimation is like that of a colour photograph, and therefore, for some, more difficult to identify with the tradition of Fine Art printing on hand-made paper.

A favourite printing method for many artists is IRIS , which enables you to print from Imperial size or bigger . One needs to transport the image to a bureau on a cartridge (e.g. a 135Mb "SyQuest EZ" 135 Mb portable cartridge, a Jaz-A Compact 1000 Mb or 2 Gig cartridge - which is by far the best, or an optical disk ). The effect of colour IRIS prints on hand made paper (such as Arches, Somerset or Fabriano) is the same as a colour lithograph, and one of course could create an image, partly printed using a digital printer, and partly printed by hand using screenprinting, litho, etching, collagraphy, monotype, or other traditional methods.

The Cibachrome Colour Prints from transparencies provide the artist with photographic printing quality, and images in a disk can be converted to transnparencies by a bureau.

Another colour printer, the Tektronix Phaser 300X ( http://www.tek.com/Color_Printers/ ) can print on 120 or 130 gr. hand made paper, the inks are wax based and claim to be permanent, but compared to DySublimation prints the colours seem to be cruder, and the image is somehow coarser and without the high definition.

For large format the NovaJet Pro colour EnCAD inkjet printer (equipped with a Rip software interface to provide good definition) can print up to AO or A1 sizes. These types of prints are used for display purposes since the ink, (depending on the manufacturer being used) may only be relatively light-fast (e.g. one year's guarantee); the inks are water-based and therefore the prints need to be laminated for protection. Colour limitations of this (and other printers) is caused by the necessary change from RGB to CMYK, which reduces the range of colours available.

By far the best technology for quality is the Durst Lambda Digichrome System of laser printing on large format photographic paper 50" x 50m, which not only prints on continuous tone (eliminating therefore the pixels) but enabling to print directly from RGB, therefore providing the full range of colours, and therefore overcoming the colour limitations of the CMYK mode. For highest definition, however, an artist or designer will need to work not at 72 dpi but at at least 300 dpi; this may prove to be too slow to work with for the ordinary home computer which would require to have a large amount of memory RAM, generating a huge file.
The possibilities of digital art using Durst are not only the high quality of these photographic laser method but in the fact that a) images can be enlarged to large scale to site specific dimensions, and b) they can also be reduced to small scale as to make them economically accessible to a broader public. The price of the each work can be determined by square centimetre. Several editions can be made, each adding up to the same total dimension. In this way editions and prices can be determined by logical means.
Although in theory one can enlarge images at any size, in practice the maximum size of the print is determined by its optimal definition, and this is directly related to the size and resolution of the image. This means that for very large size prints the file could be anywere between 120 Mb or 300 Mb, or more.
The Dust method exemplifies a "truth to materials" or "pure form" of "new media" digital technology with it's site specific dimension. This technical possibility, for  fine art creativity today, exists in direct contrast with that of interactive media.  But the problem with interactive media is that, generally speaking,  those who promote this so called "pure form" of digital art (and dismiss the possibilities of the static image) confuse pure technological gimmickry with creativity and innovation in form and content, when often all it does is to recycle exhausted and anachronistic formal idioms and ideas. The same could be said, of course, of digital printing. So the question remains of how are we to define perceptive and creative strategies within the fine art practice.

The colour range limitations of CMYK may be overcome in the near future by a new generation of inkjet printing machines not at four but at a six layer colour mode. But then, the software programmes (like Photoshop) will need to provide a six colour mode extension (which will prove to be expensive). And regarding the permanency of the inks it is a fact that the more permanent the inks, the slower the printing. More permanent inks have higher densities, requiring different heads on the printer, slowing the printing process. Therefore, manufactures of printing machines, in consultation with industry, have to compromise speed with long term permanency of inks, to satisfy the commercial requirements of the bureau, where a fast turnover of prints is required, and when the long term permanency of inks is not essential for the purpose of short term advertising. The type of permanency generally expected is for light-fast inks to be able to stand with outdoor sun exposure e.g. for about three months (or the length of an event when the print is being used as an advertisement, then thrown away). Lamination is now available with UV filters. Obviously, if the print is kept indoors and not exposed to direct sunlight (as will be the case of watercolours) that permanency may be of two or more years before one could detect any signs of fading or colour deterioration. But as technology advances, machines that combine permanent inks with high-speed printing will eventually be available.

For very large scale colour printing on different types of canvas, a variety of synthetic fabrics like vinyl substrates VCP, or paper, nothing surpasses the "Scanachrome" high definition printer with a print width of 106 cm but with a length of several metres.

Scanachorme machines (http://www.scanachrome.com) can print at 9m x 7m in a single piece; this enables the painter to print several images on a single canvas and then cut it and put each image on a separate wooden stretcher. But image sizes can be even bigger by joining pieces e.g. posters of 45m x 11.5 m, or 23m x 13.5m.

At a domestic level, and since the cost of DySublimation, IRIS, NovaJet, Digichrome or Lambda printers, are prohibitive, some artists use an Epsom Colour inkjet colour printer with size A3 , making their prints in sections, spray-mounting them neatly together on card, up to a large format.

The Epsom Stylus Photo 700, which is of excellent value (although the cartridges and the photo quality paper is expensive), is an ideal machine for either A4 or Panoramic prints. With the Epsom I prefer using RGB rather than CMYK mode, because the colour is truer to the original - and, in order not to loose the original image tonal value, I darken the image (using Photoshop) by adjusting the "curves" facility.  Epsom also makes A3 colour photo quality which is also ideal for home use. One of the advantages of Epsom is their excellent costomer support. The latest Epsom Colour A2 paper (720 dpi) has the quality and image definition comparing with that of A3 dye-sublimation. The only problem of course, as in the case of any other home printer, is the long-term permanency of the colour inks.

An extract from: "DIGITAL CREATIVITY AND FINE EDUCATION -

NEW FIELDS IN FINE ART RESEARCH AND PRACTICE FOR THE NEW MILLENIUM"
by Dr. Guillem Ramos-Poquí © 1997. Extracts from this paper were published in the Times Higher Education Supplement, London, on 14^th March 1997, under the title: "Digital print and the pursuit of a perfect image" Issue N.1271, Section: "Multimedia" (Issue34, pages II and III)

DIGITAL PRINTMAKING
Scanachrome printers   http://www.scanachrome.com
Tecktronicx printers      http://www.tek.com/Color_Printers/

BIBLIOGRAPHY: BOOKS & MAGAZINES (a selection)
 
 

• "How to Use the Internet". Heidi Steele. Ziff-Davies Press (an imprint of Macmillan Publishing USA) 1996 (U.K. £22.95)
• "HTML 3.2 Visual Quick Reference". Dean Scharf. The Que Corporation. 1997 ( U.K. £18.49)
• "The End of Print: the Graphic Design of David Carson". Lewis Blackwell. Laurence King Publishing. 1995 ( U.K. £18.95)
• "Design Graphics". Digital Publishing. Australia. http://www.designgraphics.com.au(U.K. price per issue £4.95)
• "Computer Arts: the Art, Design and Technology magazine for Mac and PC". Future Publishing , Bath, U.K. http://www.futurenet.co.uk (U.K. price £5 per issue)
• "OutLine" Computers in Teaching Initiative Art & Design: CTIAD (Published three times a year by CTI, Faculty of Art, Design & Humanities, University of Brighton, Grand Parade. Brighton, BN2 2JY U.K) CTI: http://cccw.adh.bton.ac.uk/ctiad/art.html

"Creative Technology". London.. (U.K. price per issue £2.75)
 
 

2. Digital Cameras

The Problem with Digital Still Cameras

© Guillem Ramos-Poquí 1999

I have used three digital still cameras:

1) the Sonny Mavica MVC-FDF
2)  the Polaroid PDC-2000/60 and
3) the Canon PowerShot Pro70

1) The Sonny Mavica in a nice toy. Unlike other low market digital cameras it records pictures in JPG format directly onto a floppy disk, this means that you do not need to use all those annoying cables and software to get the images onto your computer, just a floppy. A 1.4-Mb floppy can store 25 or 35 pictures, depending on optional jpg format size. It operates fine in different lighting conditions, it is nice and compacted end very easy to use.  It has a good viewfinder, an in-built flash, a good size rechargeable lithium battery, and a good macro facility for close-ups. It is ideal for making pictures for the Internet and for very small digital prints. The advantage of storing pictures on an ordinary floppy disk is that you can take as many floppies as you like when you travel or go on holiday, but of course, if these images are to be enlarged for the purpose of printing at any size bigger that about half of an A4 paper they will not be sharp and will soon reveal low definition and pixels.
 

2) The Polaroid PDC-2000/60 Digital still Camera is an excellent still digital camera. I have used this camera to do the pictures for the photomontages of my entire show “Recording the Environment: the Hermeneutical Maze”. It is a camera easy to use, and the only draw back for me, personally, is that it does not have a macro facility, but the quality of the pictures was excellent.
It stores the electronic 60 TIFF format pictures in its own large internal memory which means that you do not have to relay on expensive CF cards. When transferred to the computer and opened in PhotoShop Tiff images can be of 1.38 Mb (ideal size which just fits for transport onto a single floppy) or optional super high resolution of 5.49 Mb.
The PDC-2000 Camera is IBM PC or Macintosh compatible, to that effect it comes with the necessary plug-in software (TWAIN driver), and connects to the computer through a SCSI device (Small Computer Interface) port. Therefore you need to have a SCACI port in your computer to import the images.
Using the Polaroid PDC-2000 camera is similar to using a conventional 35mm point-and-shot camera, the camera has a 38mm-equivalent lens and, as said, does not have a macro facility.
The camera controls allow you to control the use of in-built flash, automatic focus, white balance (for either daylight, incandescent or fluorescent light conditions), backlight compensation indicator option, and other features. Sound indicators give warning when you have a low battery and when insufficient light and flash is not ready.
Unfortunately the camera does not have an image viewer. An album software facility to view images once stored in the computer would also be an advantage. The labelling and erasing facility when pictures are inside the camera is a bit difficult to use, but the Polaroid Technical Support team in the UK is excellent and ready to advise you, should you have any problems.
The PDC-2000 unfortunately does not have a lithium battery but uses four “AA” NiCab alkaline rechargeable batteries. You therefore need to buy a recharger and keep a set of spare alkaline batteries always ready, since the batteries need often recharging. Like most top-of-the-range digital cameras aiming a high quality pictures it is not suitable if these are to be capture low light conditions, preferably without flash.

3) The Canon PowerShot Pro70

This is the camera I am using at the moment. It offers a facility to save images in “raw” (but small) format ( a 1.950 Mb CRW file which cannot be opened in Photoshop bun only by using the camera own software) or JPG: in formats large or small (this means that the quality of the image can never achieve the level and definition of the Polaroid  5.49 Mb Tiff files).
It has a macro facility, and a lithium battery. Battery charger comes with the camera. It has a good LCD monitor that enables you to see pictures a second after you have taken them on the display panel or through display panel playback.

The camera has a facility to take a sequence of pictures, which can then be used e.g.  for a short low-resolution animated gift. Indeed this new facility is available in most so called “top of the range cameras” (including the new Mavica version). But one not be seduced by these gadgets, and software. What ultimately counts is the quality of one single image when taken to the highest possible resolution. In this sense, the Canon ProShot should not have been give the “Pro”, because unlike the Polaroid, and inspite of all the funfair of its advertising and claims (and misleading magazines reports) it is not capable of taking pictures even at a semi-professional quality level.

The camera stores images in two CF cards, only one comes with the camera, these are expensive.
The camera does not have an in-built flash, so therefore you need to buy one….and there are only two (expensive) choices: the Canon Speedlite 220EX and Speedlite 380EX. Therefore no other flashes can be used (e.g. a ring flash) and since the camera only focus in ideal daylight conditions it is difficult, living in England, it may be the case - particularly when taking pictures indoors – therefore when you will need to buy all the paraphernalia of professional studio spot lighting facilities (which do not fit my purpose of spontaneous picture-capturing indoor use). Unless the lighting conditions are day light equivalent, the colour will not be any good, so will need to use flash. But then again, it is no good to use flash when using macro if the camera cannot accept a flash ring. - See: Indoors Digital Photography:  Lighting,  below

The TWAIN facility, I feel, is rather slow, so I had to install a USB port in my computer and a SanDisk attachment to read the CF cards. All these little things add to the expense (the spiral of never-ending additional computer hardware and related hardware)., but once available it is OK.
For some reason this electronic digital camera does not have Canon Technical support from their ordinary camera department, it has been placed in the electronic equipment section, when people have little knowledge about cameras, this, I feel, is a draw back..

Conclusion

If you buy a digital camera think first about what you want to use it for: 1) for taking pictures to put in the Internet? 1) For professional photographic work? 3) For making pictures to use as part of your Digital Art work and if so, of what size and quality? These are all very different purposes.

Of the three cameras I have used the only one I got deeply attached for quality is the Polaroid, it did not have a macro and silly alkaline batteries, it did not have sophisticated gadgets, but the quality of super-high resolution pictures was excellent in the sense that it was perfectly adequate for my artistic needs. The Mavica price was on the region of  £470, the Polaroid on the region of £2500, the Canon on the region of £100 (but did not include flash).

Since I used these cameras, prices have come down considerably.  During the last two or three years, cheap digital cameras are practically given away for free if you buy a new computer or a piece of hardware.

Nothing has yet come on the market that matches the quality standards of professional photography, (unless you want to spend an absolute fortune, about three times the price of the cameras I have mentioned above). This may happen soon…but who will be able to afford it?. Also…as the TV advertisement goes: “It not the size that matters…it is what you do with it that counts!”…and, in any case, storing images of super-super high resolution will make high demands on you ordinary computer hard drive free space and Ram, and unless you have a super fast and super everything computer you will never able to use them.

Another thing to be considered is the quality of technical support available when you buy a product. In my experience I got excellent support from both Epson and Polaroid products. As long as firms treat their hardware computer products as disposable commodities, and do not give a damn about the problems which their clients will have to face when using them, we are in a situation where consumerism is rampant, manipulated by advertising, and we all become puppets in the capitalist hartless systems. I will therefore advise you not to be seduced by advertising and enquiry beforehand whether when buying a computer product, whether a camera, a motherboard or a hard drive, unless the manufacturer is going to give you adequate consumer support.

There are other options available: flat or colour transparency scanners – you can scan a photograph or a colour transparency today a very high resolutions….also you can have your photograph negatives or transparencies already scanned into a CD-ROM. These methods are not so fast or direct as I like when I am inspired and want to have instant results…but they are options.

© Guillem Ramos-Poquí 1999

See reviews at digital Camera Resource Page http://www.dcresource.com/
                                                                 http://www.dcresource.com/reviews/cameraList.php3
See reviews of digital cameras at Imaging Resource http://www.imaging-resource.com/
See reviews of digital cameras at http://photo.askey.net/reviews/


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Indoors Digital Photography:  Lighting



I use an expensive digital camera to photograph objects for my digital photomontages work as an artist.
Unfortunately digital cameras do not operate effectively in indoor conditions. They require full sunlight coming from a close vicinity window, an impossibility during the winter months or in the evenings. Flash lights attached to digital cameras are also inadequate for my purpose, since they can only be used frontally. This means that in the dull grey-sky of the winter months one needs additional lighting but ordinary bulbs are unsuitable and also the colour is affected.
For a long time I have been looking for an ideal solution: I did not want to use those expensive photographic spot lights on stands, or a complicated and unreliable flash system. All I wanted was a simple to use, portable table-top or wall mounted light which will give me the right colour temperature, with a diffuser. For a long time I had been making enquiries through my photographer friends, or in photography shops, but neither could come up with a suitable solution.
It was when I saw on TV a programme on the use of the Philips Bright Light HF3300  with dimmeras a therapeutical solution for the "Winter Blues" or SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder), that the penny dropped.
Indeed, in indoor conditions, the Bright Light is ideal for Digital Photography to illuminate at optimal conditions objects, and for portraiture. At close quarters the light gives you the closest to daylight equivalent source.
Philips light-weight portable Bright Light is an ideal solution: the opalescent diffuser provides an ideal solution for illuminating objects at a desired angle, without the need of cumbersome tripods and photographic lighting (which produce a hard light and therefore require additional diffusers, and uses expensive short-lasting bulbs).
The Bright Light could also be used in ordinary indoor photography, but at night, using a 100 ASA film the speed will need to be 30 instead of 60 to give sufficient depth of field. If the light is used in the evening one may need to use a Lastolite reflector, or simply a piece of white card to soften the shadows, and a baffle board to eliminate glare over the camera lens. If I take a digital photograph in the evening I use the Bright Light in conjunction to my ceiling Philips TLD 95 36W fluorescent tubes.
At their full capacity, the lifetime expectancy of the Bright Light special tube lamps is 10000 hours. They have a 110W power consumption.

http://freespace.virgin.net/g.ramos-poqui/brightlight/

Guillem Ramos-Poquí
London.  January  2000
 
 

3. Image and Sound HTML

Webpages with music or sounds  -   Introductory notes

© Guillem Ramos-Poqui  Oct 97

Needless to say (just in case) if your computer is not equipped with a sound card and speakers, or if these are not swinch on, all!. Sound cards, such as soundblaster, come not only with speakers but with a microphone for you to record music or sounds.

The speed of downloading a sound file not only depends on the speed of your modem but on whether your sound is a streamfile (which enables the sound to ber downloaded fast), that is to say, wether your internet server is equipped with streamworks software.

If it is not, a sound lasting more than 20 seconds may take too long to download. There are mainly three different types of servers: UNIX, NT and Mac, and you could ask your Internet provider whether is a streamserver type. If your server is not a streamserver you will need to use the most suitable sound type for each.

There are many types of sound format and for Internet purposes the files needs to be crossplatform, that is audible by both PC’s and Macs, otherwise to hear the sound you will needs to download plugins which may not be available in e.g. PC Netscape or Explorer browser. Therefore  *.au *.wav and *aif or *.aiff  audio files are the most commonly used.*.au  files (audio files format which originates in UNIX) are supported by most web browsers and java applets.

If you wish to record or copy a recording of your own sound or music you will need suitable software sound editing tool and save it to the format required. This will enable you to convert e.g. AIF or WAV files to AU files. However, free shareware sound editing tools in the Net is only  very basic. For a list of some shareware programmes available see: http://www.bestweb.com/crc/soundhelp.html lists
 

An audio file can of course heard in your Webside by embedding a hyperlink to another in your HTML . For example: http://www.kcc.ac.uk/ArtPages/Ramos

Again, when you wish to hear a sound in one of your pages you will make decisions as to whether you wish to create a "loop", so the sound is repeated indefinitely, and wether or not you wish the java "applet" (a piece of software consisting of a small screen which appears with the play and stop buttons) to be visible on top of your page, or hidden. The best thing is to look at the "Page Source" of other Website, and see how the HTML commands were given. For examples of Webpages with images and sound see:
http://www.kcc.ac.uk/ArtPages/Ramos/artists.html#ImageAndSoundsamples

Remember that Sounds and Music in Webpages have the copyright of their authors

© Guillem Ramos-Poqui  1997
 
 
 

4. Creative Strategies in Fine Art

Creative Strategies and the Critial Counter-Culture of the 90's

http://www.kcc.ac.uk/ArtPages/Ramos/private/Creative.html
 
 

5. Crisis Art

http://www.kcc.ac.uk/Artpages/Ramos/CrisisArt.html
 
 

6. Fine Art Research

http://www.kcc.ac.uk/ArtPages/FineArt/Topics/Topics.html
 

7.Preparing a PhD Proposal in Fine Art

http://freespace.virgin.net/g.ramos-poqui/Philosophy/PreparePhD.html
 

8. Philosophy Chart

http://www.kcc.ac.uk/artpages/ramos/private/PhD.htm
 

9. Signature File
How to create a signature at the end of your e-mails using Windows 95 and Netscape Communicator 4

It is longer and more complicate it to explain it that to actually do it. However, if you find better ways, please let me know. Thank you.
Imagine your name is J.Blobs.
You need to create a *.text file using the Notepad programme (go to Start, Programs, Accessories and here click in Notepad to open programme).
In the Notepad type the text you want to appear at the end of e-mails. Go to save, give the file a name, for instance signa.txt and save the file in directory in the J.Blobs directory to be found in:
c:\Program files\Nertscape\users\J.Blobs

Now go open the Netscape Communicator browser (you do not need to be connected to the internet for this). At the top click on Edit and then click on Preferences. In Preferences preferences window go to Mail and Newsgroups and then click on Identity. In the identity window, at the bottom, there is a white box. In this box type the entire address of the *.txt file, in this case:
c:\Program files\Nertscape\users\J.Blobs\signa.txt

Open the Inbox mail browser of Netscape Communicator, prepare for new message to be sent (e.g. to yourself) and you will see in the message your signature file as you wrote it in Notepad. If you do not like it all you have to do is comeback to Notepad, open the signa *.txt file and change it to your liking.

Incidently, in the Nescape\Users's directory which I have already mentioned is where all your e-mails are kept, so when you make a "back up" of your files, save also this file, somewhere, in your backup directory.

If you use Internet Explorer instead of Netscape Communicator, the way to add a signature hotlink is to go to the mail page, outlook express. Under the tools drop down menu, go to stationary. It should have a signature option, click this and type in the web site add. with http//www.etc../the e-mail add. and the program automatically turns it into a hotlink.This seems to have done the trick instead of creating a signature file.