One of my maternity portrait clients had asked to see examples of an inkjet paper I’d recommended. I searched and searched my room but just couldn’t find my paper samples. Oh well, I sent in a print order late last week. The prints arrived today and once again I’m reminded how much I like this paper. It’s almost a shame to put it behind glass.

Ink on paper just feels organic. The way the ink spreads is natural and forgiving. It’s the kind of work that I’m excited to give to a client because people don’t see this sort of thing every day. A print is a print is a print, right?

Capture. Processing. Development. Karl Lang wrote a white paper for Adobe in 2007 called Rendering the Print. This article changed the way I thought about print - one of the ideas that Karl defines early in the paper is the definition of what a “print” is. It’s anything that’s displayed. It doesn’t have to be ink on paper.

Throughout this paper, the final rendering of a photograph is described as “the print”— indeed, the term is used in the title “Rendering the Print: The Art of Photography.” Today, the final rendering of a photograph may very well be an actual print on paper or other physical material. But it could also just as easily be on a web page, on a cell phone, or projected on a wall. Therefore while reading this paper, please assume the words “the print” to mean any final rendering of a photograph for its selected display medium.

There are so many variables to create a print. The masters of the craft know their workflow backwards… Not only are there the variables of shooting, but also the variables of processing, and the variables of rendering that final print. Today’s technology allows us to give up control of any portion of the process.

Camera on auto. Point shoot click.

Send it off to Target so that somebody else can print it.

This is all very fancy, but it’s the skeleton of the process. The meaning and feeling is completely removed when compared to the process of someone like the iconic Ansel Adams (you’ve probably heard of him?). Ansel knew his tools forward and backwards and had total control. He gained the ability to look at a scene and choose where to place the tones that his eye captured and to recreate them in his final print. He understood the variables to a point that he knew when and how to compensate. He knew the process.

When I hold a print like this I’m reminded of why images have managed to hold my attention for so long. Process and product are two different things, but one without the other leaves out too much of the joy.