Discover the printer making hybrid working seamless

When the Covid-19 pandemic forced employees to start working from home, Jamie Watson, an amateur photographer and strategy director at an advertising agency in Bristol, soon transformed his dining room into his own home office. As deadlines loomed and creativity waned, he found one thing was missing: a good printer.

As lockdown eases, we are shifting to a more hybrid way of working, where the transition between home and office working is more important than ever before. Jamie works with clients, a research team and a creative concept team, to help create innovative campaigns and more for a range of brands. He now works both from home and in the office and appreciates the different freedoms of each.

The perfect home office isn't complete without a good printer, something we often realise during a pressing deadline or before a meeting when the need to print arises. And with many more of us working remotely, it's a functional piece of technology that can result in less screen time and actually speed up creative processes.

The shift between home and office environments can be seamless with the right equipment. With the Canon range of high-performance printers – in particular the 4-in-1 compact Canon PIXMA TR4650 – it's possible to create the same professional standard of prints quickly and easily.

"When I have loads of work to do, working from home is quite a good way to get away from the distractions of the office," Jamie says. "You can manage your time a little better and it's just a bit less rigid than traditional working hours. Obviously, you don't have to commute either, so you can get a bit more work done in a day. I'm quite into cycling, so I can go for a bike ride without having to factor in the time to commute to the office, or vice versa."

However, working collaboratively with team members is easier in an office environment, and tasks can be completed more efficiently.

Here, Jamie shares how his home printer offers him a pathway away from his screen to fully immerse himself in projects he works on at home.

The Canon PIXMA TR4650 printer helps Jamie step away from his laptop to focus on hard copies of documents that are necessary for his work. "I prefer to read client briefs on paper," says Jamie, "to take in more so you don't get distracted by whatever is on your screen like an email or team chat notification. It's easier to focus on what you're reading, highlight it and add questions. I just feel a little bit more engrossed in what I'm doing and what I'm reading.

"When getting survey results back from research agencies with lots of different charts and graphs, I find it easiest to have a few pieces of paper in front of me and compare them, rather than flicking through slides, because then you're only looking at one thing at a time," he adds.

When working at the office, you never really have to worry about the printer set-up and paper and ink levels. At home, it should be no different. A document removal reminder notification, improved front paper tray to make paper loading easier and a faster, straightforward cartridge installation makes this a user-friendly and efficient home printer for professionals like Jamie.

And with the ability to operate the PIXMA TR4650 entirely from the Canon PRINT app including printing, copying, scanning, running maintenance, checking ink levels and buying replacement inks, there's no need for a PC.

The affordable printer that Jamie uses is easy to set up using the Canon PRINT app, offering improved user experience. "It was very easy to set up, which was the main thing for me because I feel like every printer I've ever had has taken me about five days to actually set up and get working. It just did it itself," he enthuses.

It also features a useful connection to the Easy-Layout Editor, which enables you rearrange documents such as PDFs and image files onto one page before printing – ideal for the sort of work Jamie does.

"If I'm doing brand strategy projects or I have to draw out a brand framework, I just prefer to draw it out by hand," he says. "I'll then scan that and email it to the rest of the team as a working draft, rather than spending loads of time designing it in Microsoft® PowerPoint®."

The PIXMA Cloud Link on the Canon PIXMA TR4650 – a feature to help you print and scan to the cloud* – is perfectly suited to small businesses that share and save content on a shared cloud service such as Google Drive™, Dropbox™ or Evernote®, meaning these files can be accessed to print no matter where you are.

When teams share their designs, Jamie says the act of printing documents and drawings before pinning them on the wall, or having them on display, helps him consider creative ideas as he works.

"When we get creative ideas back from our concept teams, which can be drawings of designs, quite often you just need to get on with a bit of work and almost have it in the back of your mind," he says.

"So I quite like having it printed out, as it allows me to mull it over in the background when it's printed and pinned up on my wall or desk. It's a bit easier to refer back to and subconsciously keep thinking about."

The Canon PIXMA TR4650 isn't just great for work purposes, it's also versatile enough for home study, kids' school assignments and family photos.

The Easy-PhotoPrint Editor makes it easy to create a variety of original photo items such as custom-sized prints, calendars and square photo layouts, enabling it to be used for personal projects at home as well as work.

Keen photographer Jamie has used it to create prints for framing as it's possible to print 4x6-inch borderless photos in seconds. "The printing speed is fast and it's really good when printing out photos to get framed on our wall in our new house, which means I don't have to pay to get them printed in a professional print shop," he says.

The Canon PIXMA TR4650 home printer has a clean and sleek design, which is another factor when Jamie and his partner choose something for their home. "Printers aren't always the best-looking things, but the Canon PIXMA TR4650 looks really nice. My fiancée is very house-proud and is a visual merchandiser, so she's very good at making things look great. Getting a nice-looking printer was very important for her," he adds.

Give your home office the finishing touch with the improved 4-in-1 Canon PIXMA TR4650 printer for all your remote working and personal print project needs.

*Scan to cloud and scan to email are only available for genuine Canon ink users.


Written by Lorna Dockerill