You might wonder what we do with your artwork between the time you leave it at our studio, and your return to proof or pick up final prints. Well, there are several steps we go through to make sure you are as proud of the prints we create as you are your originals.

We start with hardware and software designed for digital capture, color manipulation and fine art output. We are meticulous about calibrating our equipment frequently and also create our own ink/paper profiles. What this means to you is each of your prints will display the same quality of tone and color, time after time.

Step 1: If possible, we ask that you bring original art rather than slides or transparencies. This results in fewer generations between original and print and allows us to control the entire process, keeping your image within our color controlled environment. If this isn’t possible, that’s fine, we’ll work from your slides or transparencies—but keep in mind the quality of the slide will dictate the quality of the final image.

Step 2: Your artwork is evaluated for texture and color. Does it have a matte or glossy surface? Are you using pastels, water color, oils or acrylic? Maybe fabric or a multimedia piece? These all require different lighting solutions—something we are sensitive to and like to discuss with you. There might be certain ways you want shadows to fall on heavily textured work or you may want to emphasize critical areas of your art—we’ll take the time to find out.

Step 3: Your art is prepared for scanning. We illuminate your work with lights from Northlight™ and capture your art with a high resolution Better Light™scanning back camera. This equipment excels at image capture and is state-of-the-art for artwork imaging.

Step 4: Your image is transferred to our workstation where tone and color are matched to your original.

Step 5: The last step in this setup procedure is to output 8.5 x 11 inch proofs on the same media you choose to use for the final prints. We will proof until we're satisfied with the color, then we'll call you back to the studio for final approval. If at this point we need to continue working on your piece, we’ll do that. As long as we’re progressing—it doesn’t matter how many proofs it takes—we’ll keep at it until you’re happy with the results.

Transparencies and Negatives:
If you no longer have your original we can also work from transparencies. We’ll scan your image on a high resolution drum scanner or dedicated slide scanner and the proofing process continues as above, except we’ll match to your transparency.