what software (free if poss) for printing photos at home ?

Anything reason for not just using the Windows printer dialogue?

colournoise
Full Member
Anything reason for not just using the Windows printer dialogue?

simple answer is , I've no idea how to do it like that ! ...was hoping for a few clicks here and there and then print the right size ! ... Its possibly that easy for some ? 🙂

It's always been that easy, at least for the last 20 years.
Select picture, select the print picture menu, fill in options, send to printer.

Even my mum can manage to do it from her phone, once it's connected the WiFi here.

mert
Free Member
It’s always been that easy, at least for the last 20 years.
Select picture, select the print picture menu, fill in options, send to printer.

Even my mum can manage to do it from her phone, once it’s connected the WiFi here.

Posted 13 minutes ago

cheers , didnt realise you could resize to photo size etc , so next question is , how do i get 2 x 7x5 on one sheet of paper before printing !

I'd just create one photo made up of the two original photos.
Or get photo paper of the right size in the first place.

Print one photo, then turn round the sheet and feed it back in when you print the next photo...

Even dirtier method is to throw the photos into PowerPoint, place and resize on a slide, and print from there.

If you want 2 photos on one sheet you can download "paint net" for free and there are plenty of tutorials on how to set up a template and import/resize the photos. This way you should get exactly the print out you want. Although if you do want 2 separate pictures, as said above, it would be easier to cut the paper to the right size and the Photos app will just fill the page. The results are very good. on our printer anyway.

Just to add to above suggestions in case its not obvious
- Crop your photo to a 7x5 (or whatever) ratio otherwise the Photos app will just crop it to fit
= Make sure you check the "more settings" in the printer dialogue to set print quality to photo (the default seems to be text)
- Also in more settings you may need to turn off the borderless printing if doing 2 photos at once. I've had to do this for printing collages as otherwise it just expanded the print to the edge of the photo.
- If you use PowerPoint to print both at once check you have the save option set to at least 300PPI. It may default to a lower resolution.

so next question is , how do i get 2 x 7×5 on one sheet of paper before printing !

Select both photos (control+click) then right click on one of them and choose 'Print' - you get the option for various layouts down the right hand side of the screen - 10 x 15cm and 13 x 18cm print at 2 per A4 sheet. (13 x 18cm ~ 7 x 5")

You can select a whole bunch of photos and it will lay them all out at your chosen size and print them all at the same time.

You might want to un-tick the 'fit to page' option as it can loose some of the photo (depending on the original format).

Slight hijack…but can anyone recommend a printer which is particularly good for photos but can also handle general duties

Slight hijack…but can anyone recommend a printer which is particularly good for photos but can also handle general duties

no. All printers are the spawn of Satan.

‘Particularly good at photos’ usually means having more than CMYK - if I remember correctly Epson did a good range of multi-ink machines. HP probably do similar. I had a, I think, 7 ‘color’ Epson. Printed a handful of photos, then next time I used it it refused to do much of anything.

My current HP Envy has CMY and K cartridges I think. Does OK on color printing and document duties. OK on photos, though not professional depth of color. Fairly cheap ‘never run out of ink’ subscription for my ‘up to 50 pages per month’.

There are some mini photo printers that do a reasonable job. But printing photos is all they do and the paper/cartridges are not cheap.

I have a Canon Pixma IP7200. It came with Easy Photo Print software. This software allows printing of multiple copies on 1 sheet.

Of course this is an older model of printer but I think some of the newer Pixma printers come with similar software (e.g.This one )

can anyone recommend a printer which is particularly good for photos but can also handle general duties

Whatever the equivalent is to my old HP Photosmart D5160. You can swap the black cartridge for a second colour one and it prints with 6 colours. Does nice photo prints, never seems to clog or dry up, and has the option for a straight paper path so you can print on heavy stock. Cartridges are getting difficult / expensive to find for it now though 🙁

Avoid Epson (IME) - lots of clogs, it uses all your ink trying to clear itself, then complains that it's too old and won't work anymore.