Photographer and blogger Carrie Z of Carrie’s Fist Full of Arrows helps diagnose a few problems I’m having with hunting related photos.
In Photographing Your Hunting Trophies I shared one of my favorite quotes, “Take care of all your memories for you can never relive them,” Bob Dylan. As memories of my first deer, first arrowed fishes and a black bear fade into the sedimentary deposits of my cranium I rely upon photo albums to bring back those happy, heart-filling, sun-shiny (no matter the weather) moments in time.
The photos are like my own mental fountain of happiness. It’s not just the kill-shots, either. It’s the vividly colored photo of the swan in the park near some public hunting ground in Montello, WI, the dining area at Fair Chase, Ltd in Indio, TX (say hello to my little 12 gazillion calories), the exposed flint on the trails at Shiloh Ranch Hunting Camps in Ada, OK and more. With that in mind I attempted to get caught up on my hunting photo albums a few months ago, but when I ran into some problems I decided to consult an expert.
Probably meaningless to most people this photo reminds me of ranch-cooked beans, mesquite grilled t-bones and cheese enchiladas. Happy times indeed!
Carrie is owner/operator of Zylka Photography and author of the blog Carrie’s Fist Full of Arrows. Below, she addresses some of the problems I’m having.
dv – I am very careful with picture composition and often fill the viewfinder to the max to get the best photo. However, I’ve noticed when the photos are printed in 4 x 6 (my favorite size) that heads and bottoms are cut off. The photo isn’t like that, just the print. Why is that? Something to do with the ratio? What do I do about it?
My 2007 Wisconsin whitetail picture as taken.
My 2007 Wisconsin whitetail picture as it printed.
Carrie – Check the settings in your camera; it may be set to automatically format the photo to an 8X10 or 5X7.
-Resolution settings are actually more important than megapixels when it comes to printing. The easiest way around this is to leave some negative space around the subject.
-A very good rule of thumb is to “shoot wide, crop later”. Once you have downloaded the photo file to your computer you will be able to crop it before uploading it to a website for printing. If you are taking the memory card directly to a retail store take advantage of the cropping features available at the kiosk before printing.
-If you have photos you have already taken that won’t print in a 4X6 format without cropping off the sides or the top and bottom you will need to manually create the negative whitespace around the photo itself.
dv – I printed a bunch of photos on my home printer and the color (amount of light) was great, but they had some oily residue that weirded out the photo album. So I took them into a retail store and had them printed. No oily residue, but the color (amount of light) is horrible and much of the detail can’t be seen. What happened and what can I do about it?
A picture, as taken, of a motley crew of Kansas-born hog hunters at Shiloh Ranch Hunting Camp, Ada, OK.
The same motley crew picture, as printed.
Carrie – In my opinion there are 3 types of printing mediums for the consumer:
1) At home printers: These are great for the average “Joe” that doesn’t care too much about the archival quality or the perfect contrast ratios that hobbyist/amateur/professional photographers get really finicky over. Don’t get me wrong I have a printer at home that I use. But, most of us have inkjet printers and depending on the quality of the ink that the manufacturer provides for a particular model you will get your oily residue. It’s the “super glue” that holds the actual ink together.
Another reason may be the paper you are using. Some paper brands are more compatible with some printer brands. If you have an HP printer, use HP paper. The chemical composites will mesh much better than if you use Kodak (which is actually a superior paper – it is incompatible with an HP printer, yet fantastic with a Canon printer). You will also have to periodically calibrate both your printer and your monitor to achieve matching results. The color on your monitor may look perfect, but when you print it out it may be too light or too contrasty or vice versa. If you want to achieve the commercial quality in an at home printer it will cost you.
2) Retail printers: These stores rely on quantity not quality. They have printers that are bigger and more sophisticated than the at home printer, but they are calibrated for speed and they need to be recalibrated several times a month. I am not confident that my local retail store calibrates their printer even once every 6 months.
When using one of their kiosks the card reader pulls the file off your disc and saves it to their server. The printer then pulls the file off the server and onto the printer’s hard drive. Every time you save a photo you lose some resolution. So, it’s been saved 3 times by now and if your file isn’t at a maximum resolution to begin with you will lose a lot of the detail.
3) Commercial printers: The ideal way to create those photographic memories is to go through a commercial-grade printer. Sounds expensive right? Nope – places like Mpix.com and even Shutterfly will create photographs at an extremely reasonable price that are archival quality with maximum resolution. The only downside is that they are exclusively web-based and you will have to pay for shipping. But, at Mpix.com it’s $1.99 for an 8X10 and a flat rate of $5.99 for shipping. At my local retail store it is $4.99 for an 8X10. Order two 8X10 prints from Mpix and you break even except you are receiving commercial-grade prints that will not fade after 20 years and have been color corrected by top professionals in the business. Also, the shipping for 4X6 prints, especially if you are only ordering 20 or so, is much lower. You could visit a local commercial printer like Ritz Cameras or Mike Crivello’s. They only charge $0.29 per 4X6, but you get the benefit of a commercial printer.
All of these companies will have calibrated their printers weekly if not more and have fancy software that automatically color corrects the file to match their printers’ settings so that the colors printed are true to tone. They keep up with software updates and patches to provide maximum output. Remember, these are the printers that professional wedding and outdoor photographers use with the highest standard of quality. If it was anything less than perfect they would not only have angry customers demanding refunds but they would lose out on the thousands of dollars these clients provide in revenue.
dv - What is the best way to store photos and what is the best way to store them and then share them with friends and family so that they might actually want to look at them? Sometimes they are landscape, sometimes portrait, etc.?
Carrie – Truly, the best way to “archive” actual printed photos is to place them in an airtight box, front of the photo to back of the next photo, in a cool dry place. But, what fun is that? Who gets to see them? There are always fun ways to show off those prized memories. Photo albums are the most logical but you do have the dilemma of portrait vs. landscape photos and turning the book back and forth may not be very feasible. Especially if it’s a large album with hundreds of photos and is very heavy.
Scrapbooking is another way. It’s very neat but extremely time consuming and the materials can be very cost prohibitive. My very favorite way is the digital photo album or coffee table book. Depending on the quality you are looking for and budget you may have there are many options. Mpix.com offers a mid-range digital book for between $35 & $100. Shutterfly offers one for less than $40.
Carrie says a digital photo album is a good way to display your hunting memories.
dv – Any tips, etc, you’d like to share…. Pet peeves…? You’ve got the floor (blog).
Carrie – Exciting backgrounds are awesome for taking visually interesting shots. Just be aware of what’s directly behind the subject. A stray tree limb behind someone’s head may look like they have horns! Nothing is more unappealing for hunters, anti-hunters and pretty much everyone than an animal that looks like it has been slaughtered rather than just shot. It doesn’t take much to wipe off some of the excess blood, hide the tongue (even cut it out) or if one side looks like a grenade went off then turn it over and take the photo from the other side.
Now here’s something weird. I was talking to outdoor’s buddy Seth, see Foundation of an Outdoor’s Person, about this the other day. I just shot the animal, right? Eventually I’m going to remove its “bits”, field dress it, cut its hide off, quarter it, chop it up and package it and throw it in the freezer, but I just can’t bring myself to cut its tongue off. Weird, I know. I’ll stick with Carrie’s advice of hiding it. Anyway, in the future I’ll be composing pictures differently and visiting Mpix.com and Shutterfly as well as my local camera shops to figure out the best options for preserving my memories.
Thank you to Carrie for taking the time to answer my questions and sharing with us here at dv’s Mostly Archery. Please visit Carrie’s Fist Full of Arrows for other great resources.
happy hunting, dv
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