only_print_image.html

<style media="print">
  #printed-image { content: url(/path/to/image.png); }
</style>
<img id="printed-image" src="/images/spacer.gif">

bonus: you can use this with google analytic's tracking gif, just be sure you set query string params correctly in your stylesheet.

does this mean you need to have non-semantic markup in your tempaltes?

@sxtxixtxcxh That's pretty damn smart.

@barraponto I don't see why this would force non-semantic markup.

that img tag, in most browsers, will display a gif which means nothing at all. right? can it be done with any other selector, like selecting a paragraph or a div and use :after to place the content?

@barraponto: I think it can. I used an img to be sure the browser would print it.