Inkjet vs. Silver Halide Prints - 4 Ways that Inkjet Wins

If you've purchased a photographic print in the last 200 years, it was likely produced using a process called silver halide printing. This traditional method is often considered the purest form of photographic printing. However, in the past 25 years, photo labs have increasingly adopted inkjet printing as a superior alternative to silver halide. Today, we'll compare these two printing processes and highlight the top four benefits of inkjet photo printing.
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[@LosPastrana]

By silver halide you mind minilabs like the ones from fuji?

[@ITSuppliesINC]

Silver Halide photographic prints are created using light-sensitive paper and silver-based chemical processes, typically produced in a photo lab environment. Additionally, Fujifilm does manufacture Silver Halide products.

[@rapid13]

I feel very targeted here lol! The inkjet printers you're mentioning aren't direct competitors to silver halide. Mini labs only print up to 12" (in general), and you wouldn't ever try to do production printing via a large format printer. Also, silver halide labs like my Agfa d-lab2 can print upwards of 1200 4x6 per hour. That said, ny D1070's print what appear to be much brighter and sharper prints, and my customers like them a lot. But they stink! Those inkjet prints smell terrible! Still, as soon as I can score 2 more D1070s and a P5370, the Agfa gets retired. Too many breakdowns, service contract is expensive, single point of failure for paper supply. Heck, for the price of my annual service contract I could by 4 new D1070's every year and still save money!

[@user-dq7pq3wh8p]

Is there any truth to the statement that Epson still has an edge over Canon when it comes to emulating the continuous tone achievable by silver halide based photography ?

[@ITSuppliesINC]

I haven't heard that statement. If you'd like to send us some test files we can help you judge for yourself :). Please email us at: [e-mail]

[@qprints]

#1 color gamut and #3 paper types - sure. Color gamut is better, but this is mostly noticeable on graphics - silver halide covers colors that occur in the real world really well. #2 sharpness? I don't see it, technically true as most minilabs max out around 300 dpi. But I don't think an average human eye can see anything near that level of detail to see the difference and looking under a magnifying glass seems like a weird test. #4 is hard to tell, I sort of agree, but I have pics from the 80s that are great, no sign of any change - inkjet hasn't really been around that long to actually know. I think ink jet probably wins on archiveability, though one thing that worries me is that the ink is on top of the print where as on silver halide the dye is embedded in the emulsion which is then covered by a thin protective layer. Which brings up inkjet draw backs... like the surface is fragile compared to silver halide. Even just handling them they get scuff marks and scratches if you aren't careful. The inkjet prints feel a little weird to me and in large quantities seem harder to handle. Also on inkjet prints you can tell where there is no ink - so on random parts of an image that are white there is no ink and you can see it when viewing it at an angle though I have never heard anyone complain about this. All in all I see them as kind of a toss up, though from my view I prefer the durability of silver halide. Long time owner operator of multiple silver halide and inkjet printers - love your videos, keep it up!

[@ITSuppliesINC]

Thanks for sharing your experiences and for the support! Keep an eye out for more videos coming soon.