home printing costs

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Hi,
Looking for an example ink cost for printing your own images at home

so for example, how much approx is it going to cost for say an A4 or a3 Image to print in ink?
for say a canon pixma pro200 or an epson alternative

Thanks in advance
 
If you are working to a budget then forget it!

Printing at home is stupendously expensive and you will always find a small fault that makes you want to print again!

I love seeing the final print so I don't even care to think about the price.

If you are thinking about costs forget printing at home.
 
Jammy Dodger said:
If you are working to a budget then forget it!

Printing at home is stupendously expensive and you will always find a small fault that makes you want to print again!

I love seeing the final print so I don't even care to think about the price.

If you are thinking about costs forget printing at home.
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No, not a budget.

I spend a fortune getting prints done.

I want to start printing my own smaller images. For convenience and learning.

But I would like to know an approx cost per print.
 
I used to use a Canon Pixma Pro 100s but have just purchased an Epson SCP-700 which is absolutely fantastic.

It is only four prints until I'm happy which isn't a lot of waste TBH - when you do your own prints you will always find something that you think could be better!
 
Ok thanks

Well I'm paying £14 for 30x20cm prints
, so approx a4.
Then time to collect it + 2 days wait.

Which is why I'm considering printing my smaller prints myself.
 
The Epson eco tank range are expensive to buy but amazingly cheap to run - my 8550 is still on it's first ink bottles which cost about £80 a set. Think I've had it almost 18 months and I no longer worry about print costs - I know this is very vague, but they are so worth looking into if you want to buy a new printer.
Have a look at this thread where @Box Brownie has some very helpful input -
www.talkphotography.co.uk

Buying Printer, is it worth it?

Hey all, I was thinking of printing some of my landscapes(a4 max size), and some photos of my family (15x10cm). Does it come cheaper to just order prints or buy an printer(including ink and paper cost)? If it's cheaper could you suggest a printer? im clueless about printers and ink Thx Marino
www.talkphotography.co.uk www.talkphotography.co.uk
 
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I'm beginning to wonder about brushing up my darkroom printing skills for printing of my film images - it's probably cheaper and same amount of fart-arsing faffing about!
 
Geez some of the number quoted here are unbelievable. Either people are printing in gold or they are rubbish at printing and need to do multiple reprints.

I have no idea what a print costs me but an A3+ sheet of paper for me is approx £3 and then a few pence in ink. I run a nozzle pattern print from QImage once a week on plain paper to keep the print head from clogging and to avoid head cleans. That costs pennies.

With regards to keeping costs down.

1. If you don't print a lot then don't get the Canon Pro series. They will auto clean after x hours wasting loads of ink.

2. Get yourself an Epson SC+P700 or 900 and then buy a set of Marrutt refillable Inks. They are just as good as OEM Epson ink at a fifth of the price.

3. Make sure your screen is calibrated.

4. Make sure your screen isn't too bright.

5. Get proper custom paper profiles. Not off the shelf ones. Fotospeed and Marrut do them for free if you buy their paper. Others probably do too.

6. Learn about soft proofing. Learn about Relative and Perceptual rendering and how each changes the colours in an image for out of gamut colours.

7. Print Once.

8. Enjoy the process, it's part of photography. Yes at first you probably will waste some ink and paper but as you get better it you will waste less and less.
 
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if you want to just do small prints just get the canon selphy dye-sub printer like CP1500 which will do nice 6x4 prints, lasts forever and you have a roughly fixed costs.
I have one of these that my missus uses for making her family albums and such.

For my work I print up to A3+, sometimes have to go outside for getting pano's printed or canvas etc.
Its not cheap. I did initally do what you did and workout costs but its pointless basically. The amount of wastage and messing about is massive but you cannot put money on the satisfaction of doing everything yourself end-to-end i.e. from planning a picture to having the physical print in your hand.
If that's not really something you care about i.e. the satisfaction of doing everything yourself, then skip printing yourself also.
 
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lindsay said:
I'm beginning to wonder about brushing up my darkroom printing skills for printing of my film images - it's probably cheaper and same amount of fart-arsing faffing about!
Click to expand...
Reading these posts I think back to the 1980s when I worked on the basis of 50p per 10x8 print!

:tumbleweed:
 
benc98 said:
I needed some supplies the other week - two packs of A3 and a few cartridges and that set me back £250 ish. These hits when you need some suppliers can be a bit savage
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I have noted that Epson have yearly Spring consumables discounts on paper & inks. So planning ahead to top up needs can help?
 
benc98 said:
Nice - I had no idea. I'll keep an eye next year. I go with footspeed for paper - but prefer to use Epson ink over third party - so a discount would be great
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Not just Spring.....checking my emails......Black Friday deals. NB I have not drilled down to check dates

www.epson.co.uk

Store Promotions | Epson United Kingdom

www.epson.co.uk www.epson.co.uk

It is as they say on "selected products" so always worth checking out if what you need is applicable in the offer range :)
 
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benc98 said:
typical, don't think it applies to SC-900 ink
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Ah! drat........I surmise the 900 is not seen as in the more mass market category.

But maybe worth keeping an eye on their promos just in case, though they also do offers on papers?
 
It's a while since I looked at this but when I did I worked out that an A4 printed with my Epson R2880 cost about £1. That's with Epson ink and paper. Inflation may have nudge that upwards but hopefully not into the costs mentioned above.

I would advise doing a small thumbnail test print before printing larger just in case something is amiss.

The main thing for me is that I'm in control of quality. Years ago I resisted going digital and stuck with film until the quality of prints I was getting back nosedived and that was the deciding thing for me.
 
nandbytes said:
if you want to just do small prints just get the canon selphy dye-sub printer like CP1500 which will do nice 6x4 prints, lasts forever and you have a roughly fixed costs.
I have one of these that my missus uses for making her family albums and such.
Click to expand...
I got one of these for knocking off little test prints (when colour accuracy is not essential) to see if I liked the image as a print and to play with sequencing. It's a lovely little thing and cheap to run and perfect for little family memories, as you say. The black and white prints are also really, really good, although I think you can only get glossy paper which isn't my first choice for when I do serious prints but fine for what I use this for. It's also nice to give little prints to the family of our small human.
 
ecoleman said:
Geez some of the number quoted here are unbelievable. Either people are printing in gold or they are rubbish at printing and need to do multiple reprints.

I have no idea what a print costs me but an A3+ sheet of paper for me is approx £3 and then a few pence in ink. I run a nozzle pattern print from QImage once a week on plain paper to keep the print head from clogging and to avoid head cleans. That costs pennies.

With regards to keeping costs down.

1. If you don't print a lot then don't get the Canon Pro series. They will auto clean after x hours wasting loads of ink.

2. Get yourself an Epson SC+P700 or 900 and then buy a set of Marrutt refillable Inks. They are just as good as OEM Epson ink at a fifth of the price.

3. Make sure your screen is calibrated.

4. Make sure your screen isn't too bright.

5. Get proper custom paper profiles. Not off the shelf ones. Fotospeed and Marrut do them for free if you buy their paper. Others probably do too.

6. Learn about soft proofing. Learn about Relative and Perceptual rendering and how each changes the colours in an image for out of gamut colours.

7. Print Once.

8. Enjoy the process, it's part of photography. Yes at first you probably will waste some ink and paper but as you get better it you will waste less and less.
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Thanks, ideal info, appreciate the time in typing that out.
 
As I have said before I print smaller photos, which the wife sticks on kitchen cupboards or in small frames, and larger ones for framing which we keep on the wall for 6 months or so. I use cheapish A4 paper and cut it down to A5, A6 or whatever I need. I also use compatible inks, these normally fade after a year in the sun but they are usually replaced well before that.
If I want prints that will last I send off and get them done professionally.
 
I had the same question and looked it up on the internet. Don't remember where I found it but it said $.04 per sq inch. Sounds good to me. Recently been getting my ink from Ink Technologies and for my Pro 9000 MK II it's $5 a tank and the ink is working well in it and my iP 100 Canon. The Canon ink tanks I was getting for my 9000 were $17 so even if it's wrong, I feel better. When I was using Canon ink at $17 a tank I worried about ink all the time, now I think it's cheap! Oh three tanks of black on the way $19.95, includes shipping! Get my paper from Red River.
 
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ecoleman said:
Geez some of the number quoted here are unbelievable. Either people are printing in gold or they are rubbish at printing and need to do multiple reprints.

I have no idea what a print costs me but an A3+ sheet of paper for me is approx £3 and then a few pence in ink. I run a nozzle pattern print from QImage once a week on plain paper to keep the print head from clogging and to avoid head cleans. That costs pennies.

With regards to keeping costs down.

1. If you don't print a lot then don't get the Canon Pro series. They will auto clean after x hours wasting loads of ink.

2. Get yourself an Epson SC+P700 or 900 and then buy a set of Marrutt refillable Inks. They are just as good as OEM Epson ink at a fifth of the price.

3. Make sure your screen is calibrated.

4. Make sure your screen isn't too bright.

5. Get proper custom paper profiles. Not off the shelf ones. Fotospeed and Marrut do them for free if you buy their paper. Others probably do too.

6. Learn about soft proofing. Learn about Relative and Perceptual rendering and how each changes the colours in an image for out of gamut colours.

7. Print Once.

8. Enjoy the process, it's part of photography. Yes at first you probably will waste some ink and paper but as you get better it you will waste less and less.
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Elliot, I was looking just now at the Marrutt refillable cartridge system - so an initial cost of at least c£360 but I guess reduced ink costs thereafter. Do you have any advice regarding transferring the cartridge chips to the Marrutt ones, and any other potential gotchas?
 
ecoleman said:
Geez some of the number quoted here are unbelievable. Either people are printing in gold or they are rubbish at printing and need to do multiple reprints.

I have no idea what a print costs me but an A3+ sheet of paper for me is approx £3 and then a few pence in ink. I run a nozzle pattern print from QImage once a week on plain paper to keep the print head from clogging and to avoid head cleans. That costs pennies.

With regards to keeping costs down.

1. If you don't print a lot then don't get the Canon Pro series. They will auto clean after x hours wasting loads of ink.

2. Get yourself an Epson SC+P700 or 900 and then buy a set of Marrutt refillable Inks. They are just as good as OEM Epson ink at a fifth of the price.

3. Make sure your screen is calibrated.

4. Make sure your screen isn't too bright.

5. Get proper custom paper profiles. Not off the shelf ones. Fotospeed and Marrut do them for free if you buy their paper. Others probably do too.

6. Learn about soft proofing. Learn about Relative and Perceptual rendering and how each changes the colours in an image for out of gamut colours.

7. Print Once.

8. Enjoy the process, it's part of photography. Yes at first you probably will waste some ink and paper but as you get better it you will waste less and less.
Click to expand...
Great post
 
lindsay said:
Elliot, I was looking just now at the Marrutt refillable cartridge system - so an initial cost of at least c£360 but I guess reduced ink costs thereafter. Do you have any advice regarding transferring the cartridge chips to the Marrutt ones, and any other potential gotchas?
Click to expand...

Which printer is it for?

I've use Marrutt inks on the P600 and now the P900. The P600 and P700 there is no swapping of the chip as the chips are included.

On the P700 and P900 you need to swap the chips over and so far I've not had any issues on the two I've swapped so far (It's quite a new printer so still using up OEM ink). They provide excellent instructions and include a small tube of super glue to glue the chip on.

They recommend not allowing the OEM ink to drop below 10% before switching so I've been doing it at 11%. The only other gotcha is they say you then shouldn't let the cartridge drop below 25 or 30% before refilling again. Other than that I can't forsee any issues. I've been using Marrutt inks for years and never had a problem. The quality is no different to the OEM inks. They say the longevity is the same as OEM but I doubt I'll be around long enough to prove that. I have a few prints in my wall that have been up for 4-5 years now and they still look great.

For the P900 you pay £369 for the kit, including the chip resetter and 60ml ink in each colour, after that a full set of 60ml is £189.95 but also available in 125ml, 250 ml or 500ml (each getting cheaper per ml). You can also buy individual colours which start at 125ml for £29.95 which is about the same price as 50ml Epson OEM ink of the same colour.

Paul and Co at Marrutt are also excellent should you need any help or have any questions.
 
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Just to jump in here. I had a Epson R3000 that I was using with the Permajet continuous ink flow system which is similar to the Marrutt set up. When I sent them a print from the printer with the colour chart to print out they sent me, and they sent back the ICC profile to install, using the Epson software I could get great results. The issue for me was trying to print thumbnails made using Bridge that exported to a PDF. Any prints from Acrobat Reader, the image colours are well off. I had the printer turned off at the mains so it didn't undertake any routine head cleaning for a period of time and as a result, it knackered it, lesson learnt. Also, mid way through printing it would say X ink cartridge not recognized and it would stop so you could 'swap' it out for another cartridge which meant taking the cartridge out and putting it back in.

I'm now looking to buy the P900, I was debating the Pro 300 as I like the idea of having a print head you can swap out if it gets knackered but what put me off was the insane ink used when routine head cleaning. I'll also be paying up and using the Qimage software for weekly nozzle patterns to safe guard against the issue I had prior. It's when things go wrong do you then learn and understand more! I've also heard the Epson puts less ink down when printing and therefore, they last longer?
 
Costs depend entirely on the printer.

A quick look on Google tells me the Pixma Pro 200 has 8x14ml ink carts and a full set costs £137 which equates to about £1.22/ml
My P900 has 10x50ml cartridges with a full set costing £300 which is about 60p/ml. My old Epson (SP4800) had 8x220ml carts that ended up costing about 30p/ml!

Some people swear by OEM inks, and some people prefer to not use them, so your mileage may vary on that, but the simple fact that smaller printers with tiny ink carts will cost you far more in ink (perhaps twice as much!) should give you pause for thought. Refillable systems for those types of printers are definitely a more economical approach. Printers with larger ink tanks are more economical even though the up front printer cost is much higher.

I print a fair bit on my Epson. The inks that came with the printer lasted for quite a while (talked about it here) and I've never had to buy more than 2 carts at a time as some colours get used more than others.
 
If looking at the 'bare' cost of inks...

I bought my first replacement set for my Epson ET-8550 in spring this year when on promo for IIRC £88 NB I have yet to use them as my tanks are still approx 50% full having used the spare ink left in the original bottles that came with the printer in April 2022....bearing in mind that the first supplied full set is also used to fill the ink system.

There are 6 off inks with 70ml per bottle i.e. 350ml in total= £0.25/ml

So whether (on balance) EcoTank or large carts pro level (wide format?) printer the cost of ink is markedly lower per ml than small cart consumer/prosumer printers.
 
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ecoleman said:
Geez some of the number quoted here are unbelievable. Either people are printing in gold or they are rubbish at printing and need to do multiple reprints.
Click to expand...



ecoleman said:
. Yes at first you probably will waste some ink and paper but as you get better it you will waste less and less.
Click to expand...


Both describe me!!

I am not that new to printing but it is usually around the third print before I am totally happy.

Here is my process:

(1) I print the picture I like (on good Hanamuhle) paper A3 size then mount it on 40 x 50 cm board for the Camera club competition.

(2) I look at it for a few days and decide I want to change something so the process starts again!

(3) I decide to change something else so that's then 3 prints at around £10/print with the mounts!

HTH explain my costs.
 
Jammy Dodger said:
Both describe me!!

I am not that new to printing but it is usually around the third print before I am totally happy.

Here is my process:

(1) I print the picture I like (on good Hanamuhle) paper A3 size then mount it on 40 x 50 cm board for the Camera club competition.

(2) I look at it for a few days and decide I want to change something so the process starts again!

(3) I decide to change something else so that's then 3 prints at around £10/print with the mounts!

HTH explain my costs.
Click to expand...

Fair enough although that's not a fault of printing. I can only suggest sitting in the image for a couple of weeks before printing it.

I have a similar issue when I upload in image to Flickr. I can re-upload the image a number of times before I'm happy with it but at least that's free.
 
I rarely print a processed image straight away, and when I do, I’m confident in my ability to get a print that is a good representation of what I see on screen. What I sometimes do though before I commit to an A3 print, is do a test print at A4 or A5, or even 6x4 to ensure I’m happy with it. This has saved me a lot of paper and ink over the years, although given how temperamental the printer is, I’ve probably binned a good number of A3 prints that I’d just satisfactorily test printed……
 
I have a Mitsubishi dye sublimation printer which replaced my Epson inkjet printer which cost the earth in ink. Typically the print cost is about of 23p per 6x8, the largest size I can print, a claimed 160 6x8 prints per media set, £62 for two sets + delivery + VAT. So I'm just on the point of ordering two boxes which is four sets at £147.60 total. Obviously 6x4 prints are much cheaper to make. The printer, or rather the printer driver, I think, is optimised for 6x4 so say 12p per print on 6x4. It prints very nice 6x6 images.

The gloss colour prints are outstanding but, best of all for me, so is the black and white. Matt prints are also possible. The maximum size of 6x8 isn't a problem because I bought it to print stuff for my photo albums, rather than for display. I would really like a dye sub printer which could print 8 inch high panoramic pictures but that ain't gonna happen soon because of the cost.

This printer isn't manufactured any more but there is a more or less equivalent DNP DS-RX1 HS Printer, by the looks of the specification, and better specified to be honest, but still only capable of 6x8. But the outlay is about £690 + VAT for the printer. Luckily media is plentifully available for the Mitsubishi.


 
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