Canon G5 camera and Canon i860 printer?

I have seen some good reviews on the printer and I own the G5 now and
love it so far.

My question is how well does the combo work in the direct print mode. Is
it worth doing under any circumstances or will I be disappointed not
getting the image on a computer to edit or tweak.

Thanks
John

 

Anybody!!!

 

John,

you seem to have found an answer to your initial posting already.

However, I still feel motivated to put in an experience with prints,
based on my Canon G2.
I was surprised by the out of the box excellent quality of the pictures.
Generally, no post processing was neccessary except for cropping some
pictures. Now to the printing business.

My previous experiences with inkjet printers were not favourable. Though
these are laying back some years and a lot of progress seems to have
been achieved with printer technology and inks I went straight away to
get prints done by a professional print service (8x10") and have been
totally satisfied with the results.
Well, actually I was niot really truthful about the 'straight away'
because I was hanging around the printer department before deciding
against this option.

Try out a professional printer service before meddling around with some
inkjet-printer if you don't have compelling reasons for using one.

Well, just a thought.
Guenter

 

Ron,

what you say is true.
And I should have been a bit more specific to disclose the deeper rooted
layers of my prejudice against inkjet printing that is only partly based on
output quality. As you expected I was quite surprised by what I saw when
polling the market of '6 colour photo printers'. Therfore I didn't even
mention quality in my message but gave just the advice to test a professional
printing service before going for inkjet printing.
Well, now to my prejudice that has not been overcome by what I gathered about
inkjet technology in recent times. Actually, I can not even claim first hand
experiences because I just gave up on inkjet printing years ago when I got
used to color laser printing in my work environment. But I maintained a
passing interest in inkjets all the time.

Now let me spell out my prejudice in more detail:

- inkjet print quality can be quite good but it is not uniformly so. And
sometimes it needs tedious work by postprocessing the data file to avoid
unfortunate hues produced by mixing the inks.
- when viewing inkjet prints I sometimes get the impression that people have
adjusted their perception to the colour spectrum of the inks. Like people
where appraising a 'real time' sunset by its similarity to what they were
expecting from their education by Kodak prints in the old times. Well all this
is a bit exaggerated of course, but prejudices are that way.
- I have jet to see an inkjet printer that is in good working order when I
return from my more extended holidays. The printer head has some stuck jets,
red or green is finished, the paper is not up to the task......
- the overall cost of an inkjet print is quite pricey. Much money has to be
invested in high grade paper, in replacement cartridges, and into trial runs
when experimenting with manipulations of the colour spectrum of the image.
- It takes time to get the prints done, especially when not doing it
routinely.

With this prejudices in mind consider my elation when I sent my unprocessed
data files to a printing service (6 pm) and had a bulging envelope of prints
next morning (11 am). Prints in a quality better than anything I had hoped
for. After this shock therapy I have not spent another minute on considering
DIY inkjet printing. Using a professional service was coinciding with using my
new Canon G2 for the first time after years of not doing much digital
photography at all.

After all this musing on the progress of digital photography and your rightly
ventured criticism I should probably be more cautious because they (Canon) may
have got it right not only with their camera but with the their dedicated
printers, too. I will try to get some first hand experience and will try even
harder to keep an open mind on this matter.

Guenter

 

Hi Dr. Bob,

as to mail services one has to bear in mind that Germany is a lot smaller than
the US. And I may have to clarify 'material' has been moved only one way as the
files were uploaded by internet to the service provider. So by now one may
wonder why they took so long to deliver

Your assumption about my abstaining from post processing photos is correct.
I realize that it may be a lot of fun to edit images with modern software. But I
had an overdose of this when I had to colour correct every single image taken
with the early crop of digital cameras that I started with many years ago.
Therefore I am very pleased with the quality of images that I get from my Canon
G2. With a little care when taking the photos no post processing is neccessary
at all (except for some cropping or downsizing files, of course).
As for aiming at special effects by editing pictures I lack the time and skill
to get any noteworthy results. But if I were in that business I sure would like
to get a rapid feed back from instant prints. That would be a real advantage of
inkjet printers even when professional overnight services were available.

Guenter