Digital printing

Digital printing is the most recent development in the reproduction of fine art. It involves printing from a digital (computer) file on an EPSON large format eight-colour process inkjet printer. To create this file, an original work of art is professionally photographed to produce a transparency, which in turn is scanned at high resolution to allow the image to be reproduced. The print is proofed by the artist to ensure that it meets the required standards of clarity and colour correctness before an edition is undertaken.

Digital printing allows for the widest possible colour gamut by layering thousands of microscopic pigment droplets on top of each other providing hundreds of thousands of possible colours. The image is printed on fine art paper, and may be restricted to a limited number of prints by the artist. Each print is then numbered and hand signed by the artist.

As with any work on paper, digital prints are best kept away from direct sunlight to avoid any colour deterioration, however, if kept under glass it should remain in perfect condition for a minimum 75 years.Edition size, limited editions
A printing of a group of prints from a single screen is called an edition. A limited edition is one in which the numbers of the print are decided beforehand, and then the edition size is limited to that number.

These limited edition prints are each numbered below the image. This takes the form of the number of each image in the order of its making, then separated by a slash, the number of the total edition. In this way, a number of 17/99, means the 17th image completed out of a total of 99 made.

Certain collectors prefer lower, mid or higher numbers of the series; this is a personal preference. In general the smaller the total edition number, the rarer the prints and the higher the value. Thus a print from an edition of 99 should be more valuable, all other factors being equal, than a print from an edition size of 500.