Mike Chaney's Tech Corner

I am printing using Qimage Pro V 2010.102 to an Epson R1800; 4 images per sheet,
borderless, sheets filled to the sides & top.  This produces Four 4.25 X 5.50 prints
on a sheet; which suits my frugality by saving paper over the standard 4 X 6 size,
 AND I don't have to make more cuts than need when extricating each print.

On each print I place small font file name - which is set to a photo date & time,
on the lower right; so I can quickly find reprints when required.

I just finished printing a substantial part of my 2009 photos - some 75 pages.

Upon examination, I discovered that the Qimage Info Stamp was missing from all
pages on the right hand side of the portrait loaded paper.  Further, it appears that
 the very bottom of the print - which includes the info stamp - has been shaved
of a small amount of image.  Further, the left hand side appears to have also been
 shaved; i.e., the top of the 2 left hand side prints on the page.

All print pages show all image data and Info Stamps in place in Qimage just fine prior
 to printing.  But somewhere between Qimage & the printer, the sides have been shaved !

I saw the comment about there perhaps being a quality loss when printing borderless,
but did not expect an actual image data loss!

Is there any way I can ensure that all Qimage proofed data actually makes it all the
way onto my print page - right to the edges?  Or am I asking too much of either the
printer or Qimage? 

 ???

Art,
I have to go more slowly with you.
If you have completely covered the 8.5 x 11 page, using borderless, you have a printable area of 10.998 x 8.499
You put 4 4.25 x 5.50 prints on the page, (which I can only do by cheating 5/1000s of an inch), there's no room for text!!!
If I add text, two images jump to page two.

So I need a step by step rundown on what you are doing.

1)set driver for borderless on 8.5 x 11 paper.
2) Set print size to 4.25 x 5.495.
3) Add 4 images.
4) Go to full page editor to check space on page.
5) one side shows me .01 space.
Certainly no room for text.

Where do we differ??

Fred

I just tried an alternate method of Custom, Make 2 x 2 prints to the page =4
Placement will go to Template
The print size when adding 4 images is still 4.25 x 5.50
I get exactly the same results....  and should I click on info, immediately, the screen templates will go to two images even before I add images.
So I need to see what you are doing.
Fred

Fred, excuse me coming in on this  ;)
Art said:
He also said he was using Info Stamp, which is text ON the image near an edge.

The problem is the borderless setting and expansion/overspray.
Art, I'm afraid you do lose some of the image when using borderless printing. The driver expands the image to something a little larger than the paper size.
However, all is not lost, so to speak  ;D
Qimage can disable the expansion/overspray from the Page Formatting menu such that Q prints the image the exactly the same size as the paper. You may get some white slivers on some edges due to imperfect paper alignment but that can be tweaked using the margin settings. See Help-Contents-Q Functions-Borderless Overspray/Size Expansion.
Terry

Thanks, Terry.
I was thinking that he was using INFO check mark.
The Info stamp is in the batch screen.
I think his best bet is Floating text while keeping his print sizes and placement.
After all frugality was the key word. :-)

Yes, Fred, I am using 'Info Stamp' to put the file names on EACH picture.
And frugality of paper is a consideration but the key concern is how to minimize
cutting effort when finished.

Thanks for the tip Terry re the Epson driver expanding prints a little to make borderless. 
That key point never occurred to me.

So I guess the answer is to undo the borderless tick box and live with the slivers of
white around the edges; and the extra cutting involved!  Wah!  Is nothing ever easy
in digital imaging !!

Thanks for the replies.

Hi Art,

" Is nothing ever easy in digital imaging !!"

 I know you meant it as a rhetorical question, but could you even think of doing this with film/darkroom processing?

If you can align your paper spot on, and have a printer with suitable paper guide mechanism, you will be able to print without the white edges. It may be better to use a Qimage white border on each image and you may not notice the slight skew/width differences between them.

Best wishes,

Ray

I still think you should have a look at the Floating text. Then you can have the borderless and the text, and it even offers EXIF input where it will print the filename etc for each image. You can position the text inside the print enough to where it's unaffected by the borderless expansion.

Fred

Thnx Fred - will check Floating Text out further.

Unless I misunderstood, the suggestion was to leave the borderless item checked in the print driver setup, but disable the overspray (Page Formatting -> Borderless Overspray/Expansion -> Disable Overspray and Size Expansion).  This should give you the complete image without cutting off the edge, but possibly may leave a sliver of white since the paper alignment is sometimes imprecise.

Migla9 - Thats IT !!  Thank you.  Its not perfect as to the very small page side white slivers - but I can live with that; if it means easier picture slicing and still keeping my 4 X 4 per page - AND the WHOLE image INCLUDING the 'Info Stamp' on each picture.  Great!  Thank you again!

- Art
 :D