Getting files to an offsite printer

[Quickben]

My wife and I share a recently bought Canon Pro-310 A3+ printer (she has a small side business making personalised gifts and wedding stationary) which is located in her studio which is not at our house. My main PC where I do my PP is at our house, however, so my initial plan was to drop finished files onto a usb stick and print direct from the printer. My fault for not checking, but the printer does not have a usb port for this.

So my question is: What would be your suggestions for getting files to the printer ?

I have a laptop, but I'd rather not have to install duplicate software on it just for printing (I'll almost definitely never do any actual editing on this laptop). Which software for it would be your choice to allow me to size, colour manage etc before printing ?

 

[paddler4]

Great printer. More on that in a bit.

It would help if you described your printing routine, in particular, what software you use.

I think you can, but double check this. I print from Lightroom classic, which does have a print-to-file option. It outputs a JPEG. Assuming you shoot raw, you could capture some of the range of that printer that is outside sRGB by outputting an Adobe RGB JPEG. You would do all of the editing, including soft proofing, in Lightroom first, save the softproof as a virtual copy, and export or print that as an Adobe RGB JPEG.

Then use one of the freebie programs that Canon installs with the printer to print it from whatever computer it's attached to in your wife's office.

What you bought is a superb printer. I have used the larger version of the predecessor for quite a few years, the pro 1000. (They are very slightly different in terms of inks.) However, a warning: you are now in the world of pigment inks, which is great for durability but but a PITA in terms of potential clogs, and replacement heads are prohibitively expensive. So, don't let the printer sit idle for too long. I try to print at least once every few weeks now, just to avoid clogs, even though the printer uses up expensive ink cleaning itself each time. The stupid mistake I made is that I didn't think about the fact that Canon keeps both photo black and matte black inks installed at all times. I don't print on matte paper much, so I would do my preventive printing on inexpensive coated papers. Then one day, the matte black nozzles clogged, and it took me a lot of time and expensive ink to get it working again. It's still prone to clogs of the matte black nozzles. So my new preventive drill is that if I have nothing else I need to print, I print two small prints: one color photo on coated paper, and a B&W on matte paper.

People will disagree about how often you have to print to play it safe. I don't know the best answer. I now do it more frequently than I did because the matte black nozzles are still prone to clogging. (I think the reason is that Canon builds its heads with redundancy for each color, and I suspect I have managed to free up only some of the matte black nozzles. Just a guess.)

 

[Quickben]

Thanks for the concise reply ! I'm not running adobe software anymore since I abhor the subscription model. I use ON1 Photo Raw 2026 on my desktop with Affinity Photo.

My workflow is, in brief:

Develop raw file in ON1
Further processing in ON1 or Affinity or both
Save to TIFF locally and on WD cloud server

Do you have to save to jpeg for printing ? Could I then resize, manage colour etc using the free software Canon provide with the printer (Professional Print & Layout) on my laptop from a TIFF file ?

As for the printer itself, unfortunately I'm aware of the pitfalls with pigment having had an old HP Pro B9180 a while ago. However, like I said, it's a shared printer and my wife uses it also. She prints mostly on matte paper as well so fingers crossed we should avoid clogged printhead issues. Thanks for the warning, though.

 

[paddler4]

The only reason I mentioned JPEG is that LR doesn't allow the option of printing to a TIFF.

I don't save any files for printing. One of the nice things about printing from LR is that other than a virtual copy (which I save in case I want to print the same thing again), there is no reason to save anything at all. You can print directly from the edited and softproofed raw file.

My recollection--I only played with it briefly--is that Professional Print and Layout is a pretty powerful program, so I'm (only) guessing that it can work with TIFF files. Mitch Boyer, who used to be a professional printer and posted a bunch of videos about printing techniques, used that software, if I recall right.

If she prints only on matte paper, I would print something on coated paper every few weeks to avoid the opposite problem: clogs in the nozzles for photo black.

In any case, that line of printers produces superb prints. I've exhibited a fair number, and the only comments I have received about the prints (as opposed to the images) have been positive.

 

[Quickben]

The only reason I mentioned JPEG is that LR doesn't allow the option of printing to a TIFF.

I don't save any files for printing. One of the nice things about printing from LR is that other than a virtual copy (which I save in case I want to print the same thing again), there is no reason to save anything at all. You can print directly from the edited and softproofed raw file.

My recollection--I only played with it briefly--is that Professional Print and Layout is a pretty powerful program, so I'm (only) guessing that it can work with TIFF files. Mitch Boyer, who used to be a professional printer and posted a bunch of videos about printing techniques, used that software, if I recall right.

If she prints only on matte paper, I would print something on coated paper every few weeks to avoid the opposite problem: clogs in the nozzles for photo black.

In any case, that line of printers produces superb prints. I've exhibited a fair number, and the only comments I have received about the prints (as opposed to the images) have been positive.

I'll give PPL a try. I just watched a couple of Keith Cooper's videos on it, and it does seem to cover everything I need. Looking forward to seeing the results. There's no better end to the photographic process than a well processed print, I find. Seeing it on screen just doesn't cut it, in my opinion.

 

[Bobtographer]

Why not insert the USB into your wifes computer to print?

 

[Joeseph]

I'd ask what sort of network, if any is there at the studio - it may be possible to send the files directly from your computer to the printer.

 

[Quickben]

Why not insert the USB into your wifes computer to print?

Yeah it would be doable, but she doesn't use any photography software at all. Prints from Cricut, Canva, Sawgrass etc. Plus she's got a mac (euww..)

I'd rather just keep it separate as when we're both there she very busy and I'd just be holding her up.

 

[Quickben]

I'd ask what sort of network, if any is there at the studio - it may be possible to send the files directly from your computer to the printer.

We have wifi, but I've not set up any kind of cloud printing functionality. Also I'd rather be there as the print is coming out.

 

[paddler4]

The printer takes a while to start. If you have the same wireless network there, install the printer on wireless. It should automatically pick the closest access point, but you can change it if you want. You don't need more than that. The printer is not fast, so unless the studio is far away, you can just start the printing and walk over to it. Or, if you print from the rear tray, as I almost always do, the software will require you to start the printing itself, and one option is to start it from the printer.

 

[Quickben]

The studio is a short car journey from our house, so setting a print off from my desktop just isn't practical. I'm happy with using PPL on my laptop to be honest. Seems the most logical way to do it.

 

[paddler4]

Under those circumstances, that seems most sensible to me as well. Happy printing!

BTW, I don't know whether you are experienced as a printer, so this may be all old hat, but that printer is high-end enough that you should be able to find ICC profiles online from most if not all vendors of high-quality papers. The Canon installation routine will automatically install them for Canon papers, but I rarely use them. This can be a little overwhelming, as there are so many choices, but I really like having the choice. Some of the companies, like Canson and Hahnemuhle, sell sample packs. I use mostly a mix of Moab (for more casual stuff) and Canson (for more serious prints), with a few from other companies.

 

[Ecc233]

There is an even easier solution. Your printer has a USB Type-B port. You simply need an adaptor from this to the USB-C or USB-A of your stick.

Like this one

 

[Quickben]

Under those circumstances, that seems most sensible to me as well. Happy printing!

BTW, I don't know whether you are experienced as a printer, so this may be all old hat, but that printer is high-end enough that you should be able to find ICC profiles online from most if not all vendors of high-quality papers. The Canon installation routine will automatically install them for Canon papers, but I rarely use them. This can be a little overwhelming, as there are so many choices, but I really like having the choice. Some of the companies, like Canson and Hahnemuhle, sell sample packs. I use mostly a mix of Moab (for more casual stuff) and Canson (for more serious prints), with a few from other companies.

Yeah, I mostly use Ilford Gallery papers, Smooth Pearl, to be precise. They have a good website with profiles. For matte, I usually go for Canon's PM-101.

 

[Bobtographer]

Yeah it would be doable, but she doesn't use any photography software at all. Prints from Cricut, Canva, Sawgrass etc. Plus she's got a mac (euww..)

I'd rather just keep it separate as when we're both there she very busy and I'd just be holding her up.

Save JPEG to USB, open and print, simples

 

[flowrider]

Quickben​

If she's on a Mac, she has the Apple application "Preview". Preview can read JPG files. However, on your PC, be sure to format the USB stick as ExFAT; a Mac can read ExFAT-formatted discs. As for your negative comment on the Macintosh I hope you enjoy using Windoz

OR - You could simply add the JPG files to an email

Lou

 

[paddler4]

See post #3. The OP plans to use TIFF files. I would too. With a printer that good, I wouldn’t want to convert to 8 bit before printing.

Using PPL or some other software on the laptop preserves some degree of control. Personally, I would want that, particularly since the printer is in another location. No matter how careful you are, it’s hard to judge from a monitor (emissive light) what a print (reflected light) will look like. So often, the best option is to print a test print first, or be prepared to tweak and reprint.

On the other hand, putting a JPEG on a USB is similar to emailing a JPEG to a print lab, and often, that works just fine.

 

[flowrider]

TIFF also works in "Preview".

Lou

 

[Bobtographer]

See post #3. The OP plans to use TIFF files. I would too. With a printer that good, I wouldn’t want to convert to 8 bit before printing.

Using PPL or some other software on the laptop preserves some degree of control. Personally, I would want that, particularly since the printer is in another location. No matter how careful you are, it’s hard to judge from a monitor (emissive light) what a print (reflected light) will look like. So often, the best option is to print a test print first, or be prepared to tweak and reprint.

On the other hand, putting a JPEG on a USB is similar to emailing a JPEG to a print lab, and often, that works just fine.

Doubt you'll see any difference in print between TIFF and JPEG. Using TIFF files to print died in the late 90's. JPEG compression improved enough to print from. I've not used a TIFF file in print since 1998

 

[Quickben]

Doubt you'll see any difference in print between TIFF and JPEG. Using TIFF files to print died in the late 90's. JPEG compression improved enough to print from. I've not used a TIFF file in print since 1998

I find I can tell the difference if I print A4 or bigger, but only on a side-by-side comparison. However, this is just a hobby, I'm not dealing with thousands of images and I've got plenty of storage so I'm fine with the larger file size. I tend to avoid compressed formats unless I need to email.