Digital Prints

9
Finishing and
Displaying Your Prints
You’ve output one or more great digital prints. Now what? It’s time to finish them in a
way that protects and preserves them, and to show them off for the world to see.
Print Aesthetics
Because digital printing is a new art process, many wonder if the age-old rules of traditional
printmaking apply to it. Canadian photographer Alan Scharf introduced me to the
question of how to handle print aesthetics, and it’s a good one. Should a digitally printed
photograph look different from one printed in a darkroom? Is glossy paper or fine-art
paper more appropriate? Should prints have square-cut edges or deckled ones? Plain borders,
printed borders, or no borders? Equal borders all around or the traditional larger bottom
border? Over-matted or float-mounted when framed or no frame at all?
One advantage of the digital printing revolution is that there are now many different
looks available—everything from muted prints that evoke watercolors to glossy photographic
prints and beyond. Artist and printmaker JD Jarvis believes that digital printing
cries out for new approaches. “When it comes to printing or displaying digital art, think
in non-traditional terms. Explore new materials and ways of displaying the work. In the
long run, we stand to gain more credibility with the fine arts world by thinking outside
the box it has created.”
Finishing Prints
Finishing means anything after the print pops out of the printer, including drying, trimming,
signing, embellishing, and more.