Print Pricing

[Kevin J. Kolosky]

The other thread was closed because some people felt that other people were being discourteous. And of course soon thereafter the thread was closed along with a threat of being banned.

I think that there is a big difference between being discourteous to an idea and being discourteous to a person. It is far different to call an idea "B.S." than it is to say to another person that "YOU" are full of "B.S.". (You hear it all of the time in congress. They will step up to the mike and say "My very dear friend, the congressman from wherever, has just advanced the most idiotic and stupid bill I have ever heard of.)

Regardless, I still think that the print size discussion has merit, and I return to my original point: the idea of selling larger prints for unproportionately higher prices than the added effort and cost to produce them seems counterproductive if people who wish to purchase prints would prefer larger prints.

That does not mean that I personally think people shouldn't sell their prints for whatever they want to sell them for. Rather, although I cannot prove it, I think people would sell more prints if they offered their prints at the same price for all sizes and let the customer determine what size they need for their particular application.

[Ken Lee]

I think that there is a big difference between being discourteous to an idea and being discourteous to a person. It is far different to call an idea "B.S." than it is to say to another person that "YOU" are full of "B.S.". (You hear it all of the time in congress. They will step up to the mike and say "My very dear friend, the congressman from wherever, has just advanced the most idiotic and stupid bill I have ever heard of.)

On this forum, please be courteous at all times and in all ways. Otherwise you will be banned.

Also, please remember that this forum is international.

[Kevin J. Kolosky]

I think its discourteous to threaten to ban people for their ideas, and especially when "courteous" is subjectively determined.

[tgtaylor]

People expect to pay more for a larger version of anything: Doesn't the local fast food restaurant charge more to "supersize" its artery clogging meals? Do you pay more for the SUV...?

Thomas

[Ken Lee]

I think its discourteous to threaten to ban people for their ideas, and especially when "courteous" is subjectively determined.

The moderators are unpaid volunteers with limited time to police the forum guidelines. We try to be as impartial and objective as possible, but nobody is perfect.

That being said, the vast majority of forum members are able to share their photos and ideas within the limitations imposed by those guidelines. For those who find them too confining, there are roughly 1 billion other web sites available to us - or we can start our own.

[Greg Lockrey]

Actually you pay more for so called "healthy" diets like sugar and gluten free....

[rdenney]

The discussion can continue. But the atmosphere of the other thread was turning poisonous and that actually undermines a discussion of the subject. A thread closing is a way is pushing the reset button. Then, the subject can be attempted again without the poison. The mods are just people and have their own subjective opinion of what is poisonous. But that is how this forum is managed.

My own darkroom, when I had one, was six feet square. I had a 4' sink and room for an 11x14 washer. To make a 16x20, I had to use a tube, which took much more time because I couldn't work in parallel. So, by any objective measure, 11x14 cost incrementally more than 8x10, but 16x20 was a quantum leap. Larger than that was not possible.

In my current setup, making a print larger than 16x20 would require adding on to the house, and buying a vastly more expensive scanner and printer, if I want to make the prints myself. And I can't imagine not wanting to make the prints myself.

So, even if print prices were solely driven by costs (which they are not), there are thresholds for each photographer where costs increase dramatically.

11x14 is still my preferred size. And what large format has to offer is still visible at that size. But I don't sell prints.

My wife likes bigger stuff. I'd have to sell larger prints to make any money, I expect.

The statement that photographers would sell more prints if their prices for large sizes were lower seems to me obvious. But when large sizes have a more limited production capacity, and if a photographer sells that capacity at that higher price, then it would be commercially foolish to sell for less. Many photographers raise their prices as they get deeper into a limited run to reflect the relative scarcity of those that remain.

Rick "who apparently missed a lot since yesterday" Denney

[Bill Burk]

Are you talking about inkjet prints? That changes everything.

In the darkroom, it is very difficult for me to make 16x20 prints. Not because it's hard work, but because I don't have the trays or paper. So if I were to offer that size, it would need to be for a sure sale and at a price that would cover trays and paper and drying racks. Not a great cost, $750 would just about do it, so I only half-joking and half-seriously said you couldn't pay me enough but if you offer that much, it's enough.

I also worry that history might repeat itself, I once sold a 20x24 blue-toned copy print for $60 but it took me over a year to build the tray, perform the work and deliver the print. I finally did. I'm sure my customer has since passed on, it was a long time ago and they were an elderly couple. At the time I was more than a little worried it would happen before I delivered the print. I'd hate to take the money and not deliver the print.

My 11x14 can be had for a very fair price, because it's really no trouble for me. All it takes for me to make one is the turn of a faucet. OK I have to figure out where to put that Cake Tray that's sitting in my sink right now. But literally, I am setup and ready at any time to make an 11x14 print.

Smaller prints are hard for me too, but for different reasons, inconvenience, shorter printing times, having to prop up the easel. And my fingers would have to be the size of a rat to do the dodging. So my small prints don't have the quality. I don't dodge and burn them and I don't worry about getting print exposures within 1/3 f/stop like I do when I make my standard prints at 11x14.

So there's my logic for pricing: Smaller prints might be offered for a smaller price to reflect the fact that they are not my best, artistically valuable work. Seek my 11x14 prints if you want consistent quality that reflects my best work. And my 16x20 would have to be commissioned. It would be high quality, and it would also be rare, but it would carry a substantially higher price than my standard series 11x14.

Now I know a lot of us here can make 16x20 Silver Gelatin prints in the darkroom by traditional enlarging methods. So Kevin, if you really want a print, I am sure you can find what you are looking for from almost anyone here, for a lower price than I can possibly offer.

If you want one of my 11x14's, like I said a few times, can be had for a fair price (and I really mean fair... including possibly print trade).

[Jim Andrada]

I'm certainly no expert on the subject, but since I just finished a large show during which I sold a fair number of prints of various sizes, I thought I'd share some of my thoughts on the subject. And by the way, I use a hybrid film/scan/inkjet process.

I offered approximately Whole Plate size prints matted to 11 x 14, as well as some of the same prints completely framed at varying sizes up to approximately 16 x 22 (print size) and a couple at around 36 by 48 inches.

I found that the cost for producing the larger prints on my own printer was significantly more than the cost of smaller prints. Not only was ink consumption and paper cost higher, the number of times I had to remake a print was higher. What I found was that the larger the print area, the greater the odds that there would be a tiny (< 1/8 inch) print head strike on the paper, or some other defect that would force me to scrap the print - in one case it took six attempts to get a 16 by 22 print that I would be willing to offer for sale. In this case I was printing on roll fed paper on my 4880 and as I got closer to the end of the roll the curvature of the paper was more pronounced and the tendency for a head strike was greater near the start of the print. I finally got it to work by running a couple of extra feet of paper at the beginning of the print so the vacuum could flatten the paper sufficiently.

For 17 x 22 sheet feed, there were a couple of cases where the sheet wouldn't feed perfectly straight and had to be reprinted. I also had one or two cases where the large prints were damaged in handling, once by me and once by my framer.

Then of course there were the really large prints that I had to send out for printing on canvas. One 36 by 48 print was damaged in handling and had to be reprinted.

As in other disciplines (like semiconductor fab) the larger the surface, the greater the likelihood of a defect somewhere along the line.

And beyond all the "mechanical" issues, There were a couple of times when I just felt that the larger print wasn't as aesthetically pleasing as I felt it should be and spent a lot of time making small adjustments until I was happy with the way it looked.

So yes, larger prints should cost more IMHO! Even if they're done by inkjet.

[Kodachrome25]

I don't know how much more needs to be said on this that was *politely* said in the other thread which was indeed nasty, I avoided it for that reason. I print up to 16x20 from 120 and 4x5 negs in vertically stacked trays in my closet darkroom, 20x24 using a Jobo 3063 in the kitchen. We are talking a space that most would have a hard time even doing 8x10's with trays side by side because there is no room, the tray stacker is a custom made affair that has all but one side enclosed for exhaust fans, the developer tray on top with its own vent under LED safelights that are on a rheostat.

11x14's are by far the easiest for me to print regardless of format due the print times being easy to deal with versus smaller prints and the spotting is usually less than a 16x20 or larger....the bigger the print, the more the spots and scratches show up.

I am not one to question why larger prints are more expensive but they do cost me more per print, take more time to get right and definitely more time to spot, increased mounting and matting costs so of course I charge more, after all, I need to make a living at this and don't need to be a doormat in the process...