Since I am printing my photographs regularly now and will soon show photographs of mine for the first time to a wider public (nine carcolor photographs will be shown at photo14), I think it may be appropriate to shortly describe my printing process. The decision to start printing my own photographs entailed many decisions that may not be apparent on first sight. What size do I print? What kind of framing shall I use? What about matting, signing and labeling? What follows here is only a summary of my printing, matting and framing choices, but if you would like to know more about my experiences, please do not hesitate to contact me.
Print size is an important issue with many
implications, but I think it
is also largely overrated. A good photograph is a pleasure to be looked
at, irrespective of its size. A larger print is not necessarily a better print and the
preference for small or large prints is, in my opinion, mainly a choice of personal
preference. Since I want to print myself (in contrast to using a commercial printing service), I am limited by my printer (my "maximum" is A3+ format). In addition, I mostly print for ourselves and want to decorate the walls of
our apartment with my photographs. I really prefer to have several smaller photographs on our
walls than one huge print. Most importantly, and often overlooked, are the practical aspects of the exact print size. Printing in defined sizes and
formats enables me to use the
same frames with many different photographs!
After much deliberation, I have come up with a process I am highly satisfied with and proud of. I print and process all my photographs with high quality, mostly archival materials (ink, paper, mat), all photographs are printed at a height of 19 cm (in the formats 1:1, 4:3, or 3:2), the mat opening has a height of 18 cm and a border of 3 cm, and the frames are silver aluminum picture frames (about 9 mm wide) with acrylic glass (much lighter and less fragile than normal glass). The frames and mats are custom-ordered according to my specifications. Since all photographs and frames have the same height, different prints can be easily combined and hung next to each other, and a particular print can be exchanged with any other print of the same format. The frames and matting make it easy to exchange one photograph with another. Although this is neither the cheapest solution nor the most sophisticated one, the final result is of high quality and yet highly flexible.
A word about print series and labeling: Usually, I only print one or two copies of a particular photograph at a time. Each print is labeled with the print date, the number of prints created at that time (e.g., 1/1, 1/2, 2/2, etc.), the file name of the printed photograph, the absolute print number of that particular file, and my signature - all on the back of the photograph.
