Today we’d like to introduce you to Eric Luden and Andrea Zocchi.
Digital Silver Imaging started when the founder, Eric Luden, saw a technology that he believed would revolutionize black & white photographic printing. The technology uses a photographic laser to make prints on light sensitive photo paper. The resulting print is indistinguishable from a traditional darkroom print made from film. With this new technology, no film or negative is required, but all the quality, expanded tones, long life, and beauty of a darkroom print can be obtained from a digital camera.
Digital Silver Imaging (DSI) was started by Eric and his wife, the independent curator, J. Sybylla Smith in 2008. Their mission was simple, bring museum quality photographic printing to everyone using a digital camera.
A former executive at the British film and paper company Ilford, Eric brought his passion and extensive knowledge of printing to his new company. In 2008 the doors to Digital Silver Imaging opened with 2 full time employees.
The DSI team grew first adding Master Printer, Christopher Bowers and then Andrea Zocchi as a partner to handle promotions, and advertising. Combined Eric and Andrea have over 50 years of professional photo experience. Anne Morrow joined the team shortly after adding her extensive knowledge of framing, mounting and matting photographs.
The business started to really grow with two major developments. The addition of fine art color inkjet printing, sometimes referred to as Giclee. Once known as exclusively a black and white print lab, DSI’s reputation for outstanding color prints earned them accolades and a dedicated following. The international fine art paper company Hahnemühle named DSI a Hahnemühle Certified Studio in 2012 for excellence in color printing. Digital Silver Imaging has also collaborated with Canon as beta testers for their professional inkjet equipment, and continues to innovate being the first lab in New England to use the industry leading Canon large format printers.
2013 was a game changer for Digital Silver Imaging. Unsatisfied with the limitations of the processing equipment commercially available, the DSI Team set out to build a custom black & white, digital-to-analog print processor. Using a Kickstarter Campaign and investment from Luden and Zocchi, a processing line was built to produce the DSI Digital Silver Print®. Now real black & white silver gelatin prints from digital files can be made 50” wide and 109” long, with unsurpassed quality and archival excellence.
Digital Silver Imaging has worked on many great projects both large and small. This summer the Philadelphia Museum of Art opened a one man exhibition of photographs by National Geographic legend, Michael Nichols. DSI worked closely with Nichols to realize his vision in print. 72 images were made for the exhibition, many over 50” wide. To get the prints just right they worked with the photographer on every detail of the process. They believe that collaborating with our customers is what they do best.
Creating a series of printing proofs, frame samples, mounting, and installation, are all within the standard operating procedure. No job is insignificant, they are truly just as happy to print a single 8×10 or an entire museum exhibition. DSI was started to give all photographers excellent printing, mounting and framing no matter how large or small the job.
Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
Digital Silver Imaging opened its doors during the height of the Great Recession in 2008, not the best time to start a business. Because what we do is unique we have had to design and build much of the equipment we use. Even the work tables in our lab were built to our specifications so that they can accommodate the processing of large prints.
Please tell us about Digital Silver Imaging.
Digital Silver Imaging integrates photographic laser technology and classic black & white printing to make the DSI Digital Silver Print®, simply the finest black & white digital print available. We also make museum quality color inkjet prints. Digital Silver Imaging offers a complete line of photographic services; scanning and restoration, a complete frame shop, mounting, matting, installation, film processing, film for sale, and shipping worldwide.
What sets Digital Silver Imaging apart is that we consider fine photographic printing an art and a craft. Our prints hang in museums and photographic collections all around the globe. We take a personal interest in every job that goes through our photo lab. All our staff members are photographers with degrees in the art form. We bring craft into an automated, machine-produced world, our motto is, “The art of photographic printing in a digital world.”
Digital Silver Imaging believes that providing customers with educational resources is key. We host workshops on the use of photographic software, such as Adobe Lightroom®, alternative photo processes workshops, lectures and photo critiques. The Griffin Museum of Photography, The Society of Photographic Education, The Veterans Portrait Project, and The Social Documentary Network are just a few of the photo related organizations that DSI helps support. Our internship programs, free gallery talks and events provide an informative and educational link to the photo community. At Digital Silver Imaging, we hope to be a resource for everyone that loves photography.
If you had to go back in time and start over, would you have done anything differently?
We would have not waited to run a Kickstarter campaign. It is a great way to raise money. But honestly better than the money we raised, our Kickstarter campaign built community and generated valuable publicity for our business.
Contact Info:
- Address: Digital Silver Imaging, 9 Brighton Street, Belmont MA 02478
- Website: www.digitalsilverimaging.com
- Phone: 617 489-0035
- Email: info@digitalsilverimaging.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/digitalsilverimaging/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/digitalsilverimaging
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/digitalsilver
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/digital-silver-imaging-belmont
Image Credit:
Images at Steven Kasher Gallery ©Ruddy Roye
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