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My suggestion would be to go to some type of convention where these type of machines were displayed and talk to the reps about what you want them to do for you. You could actually LOOK at the output quality, ease of operation, materials cost, etc. and then make your decision. We love our VersaCamm and we have planned to use it for artwork too, but it's too busy pumping out truck doors and signs!!
-------------------- Jane Diaz Diaz Sign Art 628 W. Lincoln Ave. Pontiac, Il. 61764 815-844-7024 www.diazsignart.com Posts: 4102 | From: Pontiac, IL USA | Registered: Feb 1999
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Epson makes beautiful printers for your purpose, in many widths from 8.5" to 44".
Lexjet is a good Epson dealer and they can answer any questions you have on a choice of printer.
Scanning is something else again. Wide format scanners cost as much as printers. Some fine art printers use small format scans and "stitch" the files together (tile), but this looks really hard to do well.
-------------------- Paul Luszcz Zebra Visuals 27 Water Street Plymouth, MA 02360 508 746-9200 paul@zebravisuals.com Posts: 483 | From: 27 Water Street, Plymouth, MA 02360 | Registered: Jul 2003
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If it's just for art prints you can go with a smaller machine, 24" is good. I do art prints for my wife on my HP5000 they look pretty good. I had the originals professionally photographed by a studio that is familar with art reproduction. They were too large for scanning
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Hi Bart, There are so many variables and options here that it's staggering. What is the size of your originals?
If you just want to print for interior use, the Epsons Stylus series printers offer excellent quality, the 7800 is the 24" model. Be careful if you are looking at an older model printer, Epsons had an awful ... uh ... "feature" whereby the printer would consume an ENTIRE set of inks to prime and calibrate the machine when it was first installed.
Truly the best thing for you would be to try and get to a show, many times the folks demo-ing the printers will even print out your file for you so you can see the output. Be sure to ask lots of questions about things like maintenance, additional expenses (will you need a RIP?) ink consumption, and print costs.
For a ton of information of fine art printing, printers, color calibration, scanners, etc. I recommend the FLAAR website: FLAAR Site, Click here Their free reports have a ton of valuable info in them.
Good luck!
-------------------- Jon Androsky Posts: 438 | From: Williamsport, PA | Registered: Mar 2002
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Epson 4800 would probably do what you need.
-------------------- Steve Eisenreich Dezine Signs PO BOX 6052 Stn Forces Cold Lake, Alberta T9M 2C5 Posts: 774 | From: Cold Lake | Registered: Mar 2000
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-------------------- AirbrushBobby.com Clearwater, FL The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing.1Cor1:18 “The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord”Rom6:23 Posts: 505 | From: Clearwater Florida USA | Registered: Feb 1999
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