TITLE: Morphic Image of a Complete Variety
QUESTION [6 upvotes]: A variety $X$ is called separated if $\Delta_X = \{ (x,x) \mid x \in X \} \subset X \times X$ is closed in $X \times X$.
A variety $X$ is called complete if it is separated and for any other variety $Y$ and a close subset $Z \subset X \times Y$ we have that $\pi_Y(Z)$ is closed (here $\pi_Y : X \times Y \to Y$ is the canonical projection).
I want to prove:

If $X'$ is separated, $f : X \to X'$ is a morphism  and $X$ is complete variety then $f(X) \subset X'$ is complete.

I know that a closed subvariety of a complete variety is complete. I also know that since $X'$ is separated then the graph $\Gamma_f = \{ (x, f(x) ) \mid x \in X \}$ is closed in $X \times X'$.

REPLY [2 votes]: We expect this to be true since proper is the algebraic geometry version of compact and we know continuous images of compact sets are compact. In fact over $\mathbb{C}$, we could view this as the proof since $X/\mathbb{C}$ is proper if and only if it is compact in the analytic topology. 
In general, suppose the base is $S$ (you could pick your favorite field but since you didn't specify I figured I'd do it in general). Then we will show $Z = f(X)$ is proper over $S$ by first showing $f(X)$ is separated over $S$ and that the morphism $f(X) \to S$ is universally closed. 
For separated, by assumption $X'$ is separated over $S$. Consider the diagram 
$$
\require{AMScd}
\begin{CD}
Z @>>>  Z \times_S Z \\
@VVV @VVV \\
{X'} @>>> {X' \times_S X'}
\end{CD}
$$
You can check this is a fiber product diagram. The bottom morphism is a closed immersion so its pullback is also a closed immersion and $Z$ is separated as required. 
Next, for universally closed, first note that $f: X \to X'$ is proper. This is a general fact about proper morphisms that if we have $f:X \to X'$ is a morphism and $X$ is proper and $X'$ is separated then $f$ is proper. Thus it is closed. 
Now we want to show that the structure morphism $Z \to S$ is universally closed. We know $X \to S$ is universally closed and $f$ is closed. $f$ is surjective onto $Z$ by definition so a subset of $Z$ is closed if and only if it is the image of a closed subset of $X$. Then for any $S$-scheme $U$, we have 
$$
X \times_S U \to Z \times_S U \to U
$$
where the first morphism is the pullback of $f$ and the composition is the pullback of $X \to S$. By the discussion above, the first morphism is closed and surjective and the composition is closed so we can deduce the second morphism is closed. Thus $Z \to S$ is universally closed so $Z$ is proper over $S$.