PixelPrint
Introduction
Background
I design a lot of press media using Inkscape and oftentimes I need to do a test run on my home equipment to see how things scale and look at their original size. Windows 2000 included a tool called Imaging which allowed for native pixel to pixel printing, but with the advent of Windows XP, this tool has vanished and has become commercial.
Since I had some experience creating printing programs for Windows I set out to recreate the functionality of the Imaging application in a new, small tool. The result is PixelPrint, a freeware application with source code to print images at their native size using your printer's DPI setting as a guide. WYSIWYG printing for every home user.
Features
How it works
PixelPrint is the right tool for one job: printing images pixel to pixel. You load up your design and click the print button, that's all there is to it. Optionally, you can print cut guides along the edges of the image to make it easier to cut or fold your design.
You can load images in JPEG, GIF and BMP format. I might implement PNG support in the future, but for now these three formats will do. I currently recommend using BMP as the input format since it is lossless.
Requirements
PixelPrint runs fine on Windows 95, 98, ME, 2000, XP (including SP2), 2003 and possibly Vista. The required Visual Basic runtime files are all included in the download. Besides that, you will need to have a printer device installed, for instance PDFCreator or a physical or network printer.
Because of limitations in newer versions of Windows, you'll probably have to set your default printer settings the way you want to print in PixelPrint. The live preview in the application will show you in advance how your page will be printed, so double check it before pressing the Print button.
Screenshots
This following screenshot shows the program in action. Notice that cut guides are enabled:
Download
Get PixelPrint now
You can download the application setup file right here:
- Download PixelPrint 1.0.5 (ZIP, 1.9 Mb)
Feel free to send suggestions, comments and ideas to my e-mail address.
Version history
PixelPrint 1.0.5 was released on the 29th of December, 2006.
Other projects
Visit the following links to read about other projects I did: