Printing with my new HP Officejet 7500A Wide Format Printer

I unboxed my new HP Officejet 7500A Wide Format Printer today and gave it a try. I bought this printer for two main reasons:

1. I want to be able to print 12 X 12 scrapbook papers.
2. I want to be able to print professional quality photos.

Hooking up the printer was not difficult. After installing the ink cartridges and connecting to Wi-Fi, I decided to jump right in an print some 12 X 12 scrapbook paper.  It printed a beautiful, borderless pattern on 12 X 12 card stock  until the final half inch or so. When it got to the last little bit of printing, the paper started pushing out to the right instead of feeding straight through, and the final border failed to print properly. I checked my settings and tried again. Same result. I chatted for over an hour with an HP tech person, and tried his suggestions, but I always got this result.

As an experiment, I stood over the printer as it printed and used my hands as a guide to prevent the paper from going all crooked on me in the final stretch. That did help. But it makes me wonder why the printer design lacks a paper guide in the output tray to do that job. If I want to do massive scrapbooking and print 50 sheets of scrapbook paper, am I supposed to stand over the printer and guide each page through? 

UPDATE 5/20/2013: HP did offer this suggestion by way of a response to a question I posed on the HP YouTube demonstration of the printer. http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/Document.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&taskId=110&prodSeriesId=4083647&prodTypeId=18972&objectID=c03101349

This may have helped me, but I have already returned the printer.

Here is the HP YouTube video where I posed questions about this issue: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ad0nzf5y2bc&feature=player_detailpage

PHOTO PRINTING WITH HP OFFICEJET 7500A

On to photo-printing. I have an old HP Photosmart printer that prints the most vivid, beautiful, and professional-looking photos you can get. Seriously. It's amazing. Or, I should say, it WAS amazing, until HP decided to improve their Premium Plus Photo Paper. They took a perfect photo paper and made it terrible. The prints aren't nearly as vibrant with the new and improved instant-drying Premium Plus Photo Paper. I did some research online and found that printers purchased prior to 2011 weren't working well with the new paper, so I thought I'd buy a brand new HP printer and solve that problem. 

Look at these two photos (click the image to enlarge):

The photo on the left was printed today on my new HP Officejet 7500A using the new and improved instant-drying HP Premium Plus Photo Paper. The photo on the right was printed today on the same new printer using the old HP Premium Plus High Gloss Photo Paper. If you're extremely picky about your photos, like I am, you want the highest quality possible. Can you see that the photo on the left has a sort of haze over it? The blue sky isn't quite as blue. The green shrubs aren't as sharp and clear. To me, it is of no consequence that the inferior photo on the left dried instantly, and the superior photo on the right took a few minutes to dry completely. The vibrance and crispness are simply incomparable.

There are a bunch of crazy photo-loving people online complaining about this. HP's response so far is that you have to use a different photo setting to achieve the old results. I tried every setting, and it made no difference. The old paper is simply better than the new paper, and I want them to go back to it.

I will say that HP's customer service is fine. Although the tech person I worked with all afternoon didn't seem to know as much as I do about printing things with HP printers and photo paper, the person who assisted me when I asked to return the printer was very understanding and helpful. She said that the products I purchased, which included extra ink and three boxes of photo paper in addition to the printer could all be returned and that HP would cover the return shipping cost. I do appreciate that.

What did I expect from my new HP Officejet 7500A? This: http://www.hp.com/united-states/consumer/digital_photography/print_better_photos/tips/scrapbook-pages.html

I really would like to know what printer I should buy now. I want professional-quality photos (not just good photos) and preferably the ability to print 12 X 12 borderless scrapbook paper. If you have any suggestions, please let me know!

Challenge #1: Finished!

It took me a while (weeks?), but I completed my first self-inflicted challenge. There was one item I cheated on. Instead of using my own handwriting for journaling, I used a cursif font called Clipper Script. I have an anxiety issue with journaling in my own handwriting. Here are the results!

I need some motivation.

I don't know about you, but I have lots and lots of scrapbook stuff. I love paper. I love buying new paper. I love printing paper on my Cricut Imagine. I love kits! I love journaling cards! So, I have bought and made lots and lots of paper.

Here's the problem...

I have so much STUFF that I'm intimidated by it. I have too many choices. It's making me unproductive during my precious scrapbooking hours. I need some limits. I need some directions. I need someone to tell me what to do.

I started looking at scrapbook challenges online a few minutes ago, and I found one or two that interested me. But then I thought,

Why don't you just make your own scrapbook challenges, silly girl?!

So here I am, back on my little blog doing just that. If there is anyone out there who has suggestions for helpful challenges, I would love to hear about them. Since I think I am my only reader, however, I'll just move on with the plan.

CHALLENGE #1:
Get out of your rut. Jump-start your creativity by creating a layout with these specifications:
1. Select one of your projects. (I have several open projects right now: Texas book, piano students book, honeymoon cruise book, and Christmas book).
2. Select about 4 photos. Scan them. Edit them. Print them.
3. Select one Cricut shape cartridge to use on your Cricut Expression. You are not allowed to use your Imagine right now.
4. Select solid papers from your stash as a base for your layout.
5. Select patterned papers from your stash for trims and photo mats.
6. Journal by hand using a few of your millions of journaling tags and cards. (This is a toughy for me. I really prefer typing.)
7. Use at least one brad, one button, and some twine.
8. Make a banner-style title.

Okay! That's it. On the off chance that I have any followers out there, please feel free to post a comment. Better yet, if you take up this challenge, post a link to a photo of your layout!

How to unstick the pages of your Cricut cartridge booklet

School-Themed Die-Cuts with Locker Talk Cartridge

Aren't these cute? I had fun cutting out shapes from the Locker Talk cartridge for Cricut this afternoon. There was lots of layering involved in some of the shapes I made, but there is also a blackout feature if you simply want to do a silhouette of an object. Here are individual pictures of each die-cut with a bit of an explanation of what was involved.

Single book and stack of books: For this one I cut out a shadow in black, the main shape in brown, and the layers (pages) in almond. To make the pages look more realistic, I cut out the page section of the brown layer and slid the almond pages underneath. To attach the skinny little book covers, I used a ZIG 2-way glue pen.

This one is probably my favorite. It's a pennant cut with green paper for the flag portion and gold for the ties. The letters were not on the Locker Talk cartridge. I used all capital letters from A Child's Year, and set the size one-quarter inch smaller for each subsequent letter.

The desk is really easy to do with layers. In the instruction booklet, the legs of the chair are the same color as the seat. I just cut the chair portion out twice - once with red and once with dark grey. I cut off the seat portion of the gray die-cut and glued the legs on top of the red ones. The desk was a very simple layer with tan card stock.

The laptop or notebook computer was the most difficult to make. If I had cut a larger size than 2 inches, it would surely have been easier. To make the screen a different color than the rest of the computer, I cut out a second computer with gray paper, and cut out the screen to glue to the black background. Same thing with the keys, except there is a layer to cut with all of the little keypad squares and the internal mouse.

The notebook paper, A+, and paperclip were super easy. No layering involved. One suggestion: use a newer mat with a stickier surface for the paper clips.

The pencil was quite easy as well. I used four colors on one cutting mat, and cut the main shape in yellow, and layers on all three of the others (sand, black, and rose). You will end of throwing away portions of the layers, since you only need the eraser in pink, the wood in sand, and the lead and metal band in black. It took me a while to figure that out.

So there you have it! A little tour of the Locker Talk cartridge. There are many more shapes and phrases available than the ones I'm showing here. 

 

Shopping Links:

 

2-page Piano Layout with Hannah Montana and A Child's Year Cricut Cartridges

I created this 2-page scrapbook layout in 30 minutes or so. Here are the tools I used:

• 2 sheets pink and white polka dot paper, 12 X 12 inches
• 1 sheet pastel pink card stock, 6 X 12 inches
• 1 sheet black card stock, 12 X 12 inches
• 1 sheet black and white striped paper, 12 inches long, 2 strips, .5 inch wide
• Hannah Montana Cricut cartridge, Music Font for "Piano" written on music staff
• Hannah Montana Cricut cartridge for treble clef, bottom right of layout
• A Child's Year Cricut cartridge for grand piano
• Scotch ATG (for attaching larger pieces)
• Zig 2-way glue pen (for music staff, treble clef, and grand piano)

Notes: The music font feature on the Hannah Montana cartridge is very easy to use, and the letters are welded together on a single staff as long as you are sure to start and end with the bar lines shown here:

The grand piano icon on A Child's Year cartridge is great. I like it better than the grand piano on the Quarter Note cartridge, because the lid is open, and I don't particularly want the swirly embellishments that come on most of the images in Quarter Note.


Size Settings on Cricut Expression
Piano headline on staff: 3.5 inches
Treble Clef: 3 inches
Grand Piano: 4 inches

Shopping Links

Look what the postman just left me!

Hello Fellow Cricut Fans,

I'm a bit overcome. I've just received a shipment from Provo Craft which has me all agog. Why? Because I got the deal of the year on three Cricut cartridges during the March Madness sale on cricutmachine.com!  I'm a new Cricut owner, so I have lots of catching up to do. When older cartridges go on sale, I get just as enthused as when new cartridges are released. Here's what I ordered:

• Mickey Font cartridge for $14.99
• Hannah Montana cartridge for $19.99
• Paper Doll Dress Up cartridge for $14.99

The loot I got during the March Madness Sale at www.cricutmachine.com

Utterly delightful, yes? Just look up the going prices for these cartridges and you'll understand why I am so pleased.  I'm rather indifferent to Hannah Montana, but this cartridge is all about musical fonts. There are zillions of fun things I will be able to do with it in my piano studio (including writing words on a musical staff). Yippee! Paper Doll Dress Up looks fantastic. There are fun icons included as accessories (love the princess castle), so there will be much more that I can do with this than make little paper people. Mickey Font has a nifty charm feature as well as faces for Mickey, Minnie, Pluto, Goofy, Donald, and Daisy. You get little phrases the characters say (like "Oh Boy!") and the Walt Disney's last name in his famous signature. Hours of fun await me...

Shopping Links:
Mickey Font cartridge at Amazon
Hannah Montana cartridge at Amazon
Paper Doll Dress Up cartridge at Amazon