Photos printing too light

My real life printing problem was the inspiration for this tech tip. We had a snowy weekend where I am, so I decided to straighten up my home office and update what I call my “vision board.” I like to hang images associated with the novels I write. So I decided to print out some promo art and book covers. Here’s what the image I was printing looked like:

brothers-small.jpg

Here’s how it printed out.

faded-photo.jpg

In fact, all three covers were faded.

faded-photos.jpg

I’d just replaced both the color and black ink cartridges and I’d successfully printed other things earlier in the day.  I was printing these images from the Windows Photo App which is the default application for opening images on my PC.  I decided to do another test print. I clicked the print icon in the upper-right corner of the photo app.

print-photo-app.jpg

I noticed the checkmark next to Let the app change my printing preferences. I unticked the box and did a test print of a smaller sized image on plain paper instead of the glossy photo paper I was using. I might as well save on expensive ink and paper if it didn’t work.

let-app-change.jpg

The smaller test print was the right color. Here it is compared to the initial printing.

compared-small-photo.jpg

I reprinted again and everything looked great.

compared.jpg

If you’re printing from the Photo app make sure to keep an eye out for that setting.

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