FAQ's

Q. What is Giclee Printing?
Giclee (zhee-klay) - The French word "giclée" is a feminine noun that means a spray or a spurt of liquid. The word may have been derived from the French verb "gicler" meaning "to squirt".
The term "giclee print" provides an elevation in printmaking technology. Images are generated from high resolution digital scans and printed with archival quality inks onto various substrates including canvas, fine art, and photo-base paper. The giclee printing process provides better color accuracy and longevity than other means of reproduction such as lithography.
Our Giclee prints are created utilizing the highest resolution digital printers available today, the Epson 9800/7800 series using the K3 Ultrachrome inkset. This modern printer is capable of producing incredibly detailed prints for both the fine art and photographic markets.
Giclee prints are advantageous to artists who do not find it cost effective to mass produce their work, but want to reproduce their art on-demand. Once an image is digitally archived, additional reproductions can be made at a reasonable cost. The prohibitive up-front cost of mass production for an edition is eliminated. Another advantage of giclee printing is that digital images can be reproduced to almost any size or media, giving the artist the ability to customize their prints for a specific client or need.
The quality of the giclee print rivals traditional silver-halide and gelatin printing processes and is commonly found in museums, art galleries, and photographic galleries.
Numerous examples of giclee prints can be found at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, The British Museum, The National Gallery, London just to name a few.

Q. How do I setup my files for digital printing?

1. Determine the final output size you want Cali-Color to print (e.g. 20x24)
   Please note that printed images are trimmed to size. If you require borders around the finished piece please size your file with the border space included. Example: a 16x20 inch image with a 2 inch border all around will actually be produced and charged as a 20x24 inch finished piece.
2. Dust Spot, Retouch, Edit, Crop, Adjust, and Size your scanned or digital camera file to the final size that you want using your favorite photo editing program.
3. RESOLUTION GUIDELINE: for best results please follow these guidelines
   All Images regardless of size should be originally scanned at 200-300 dpi (dots per inch) at final print size. If you file is from a digital camera or is scanned at a lower resolution please do not interpolate (scale up) your file in your photo editing program. Please call us with the size of your file (in megabytes) and our staff will advise you as to how large we feel your file can be printed. Cali-Color uses very powerful interpolation software so we can get excellent results from small files.
   Note: Printing and viewing criteria is different for every image. Depending upon the image you can sometimes get away with considerably lower resolutions than suggested above. However, it is an industry axiom that the better the initial quality of your digital image the better you can expect you finished piece to be.
4. Save the file as a flattened RGB .TIF or JPG. To obtain optimum printing results please include your working space when you save your file. (I.e. Adobe 1998, sRGB, Color Match, etc) If you need advice on how to perform this function, just give us a call and we will walk you through it.
5. Use our convenient upload service at the left of this page or burn (record or copy) your file (s) onto a CD, DVD or Jump Drive.

Color Matching and Scanning Service
Cali-Color uses calibrated monitors, scanners, and ICC color profiles to match the various papers that we print on. We will do our best (within reasonable limits) to produce prints that resemble any hard copy samples/proofs you submit with your order. For optimum results we recommend purchasing Cali-Color proofs on the same paper as the finished print.
Cali-Color offers high quality scanning of negatives, slides, transparencies and original artworks using Creo-Scitex Scanning technology. Please see our scanning page or inquire with Customer Service for details.

Q. Can I email my files to you?
Yes, small files can be emailed.  However, simply click on the file upload button located to the left and you send files up to 2GB each.

Q. Do you supply your paper profiles?
Yes we do have all of our paper profiles available. Give us a call with your email address and we would be more than happy to send them to you. Please remember that the paper profiles we use are custom made by us. They are designed to be used on our printers. You shouldn't convert your files to our profiles. They are designed for Soft Proofing Only. Your monitor MUST be calibrated to exacting standards to take advantage of Soft Proofing.

Q. Can you work with Windows and Macintosh files?
Yes we can work with files from both platforms, Macintosh and Windows.

Q. How do I calibrate my monitor?
A calibrated monitor is a critical step in achieving accurate color. It would take a long time to explain the complete process here. However, many newer monitors have monitor calibrations tools located in the system software. We recommend that you purchase a monitor calibration tool and software such as Monaco, Gretag/Macbeth or ColorVision. We have our monitors calibrated to the following settings: WORK SPACE, Adobe 1998, GAMMA, 2.2 and D65 for our white balance.