printing professional quality photos

[Tinkerbella197]

hi i have a question about printing photos. I'm in the midst of starting up my own photo restoration/retouching business. i'll be doing it out of my home through a website set up so people can email me their photos. in terms of printing, i am not ready to invest in a home printer .. i think i should first see how this whole venture works out for me before putting out too much money. therefore, i will need to take the restored photos somewhere to be printed. i am thinking that i probably can't be using walmart or snapfish as my method of printing lol so this is the part i was hoping you all could help me with. what type of places should I go to get professional quality photos printed on archival paper? also, i'd prefer to have the option to send in my photos online if the need arises, rather than having to drop off and pick up the prints. would i take/send them to a store dedicated to cameras, such as The Camera Shop ( http://www.thecamerashop.com/ )? any suggestions and specific resources would be greatly appreciated.

also, just for future reference ... what types of printers are the best (while also reasonably priced) for printing photos? laser or ink jet? and what brand/models are good?

thanks. i look forward to any advice you can give!

[mistermonday]

Is there a Costco near where you live? They use high end Noritsu printers on archival Fuji Paper. You can download a customer icc profile so that your prints will be color accurate (assuming your workflow manages color and your monitor is calibrated).
Regards, Murray

[pixelzombie]

the epson inkjets with the K3 inks give very good results...

[Kraellin]

hi tinkerbella and welcome to RP.

since this is a printing question and not a restoration question, i'm moving this thread to a more appropriate forum. hopefully, you'll get the responses you need, there.

[pixelzombie]

Originally Posted by mistermonday

Is there a Costco near where you live? They use high end Noritsu printers on archival Fuji Paper. You can download a customer icc profile so that your prints will be color accurate (assuming your workflow manages color and your monitor is calibrated).
Regards, Murray

do you happen to have the link for that profile?..i'm curious to see how it compares to a Lambda...

[Janet Petty]

A lot of photographers I know use Mpix ( http://www.mpix.com/ ) for their printing needs, especially when the photo is a large one. Results are good, color quality is good. Turn around time is also good. Their site is pretty easy to navigate.

Good Luck,

Janet

[Damo77]

Originally Posted by Tinkerbella197

I'm in the midst of starting up my own photo restoration/retouching business. i'll be doing it out of my home through a website set up so people can email me their photos.

I also do this as a small sideline, and the trouble with it is, you can't really let people scan their own photos and email them for restoration.

I've got a good scanner - well, better than the average person's scanner, anyway, it's an Epson V700. So I can get much better results by doing my own scans, than letting the average Joe scan on their all-in-one scanner/copier/fax machine with a Dmax barely higher than 2.

So if people request restorations, I try to arrange them to post the photos to me. That's always touchy, though, when it's a precious family relic.

Anyway, I just thought I'd thrown that in, to see if you'd considered it, and also to hear other people's experiences.

[Nanls]

I have an Epson 9800 printer and I still took my portfolio samples to Costco. You can send them a profile; they have nice mat paper and their price is good. Pain in the a** to print and trim multiple 8"x10" on a wide format printer.
Hope this helps.
~Nancy


______________________________

www.PhotoArt123.com

[duwayne]

Thanks Murray for the tip to use Costco. I've used Cord Camera and got nice results.

Damien - I found pepole very reluctant to part with the original photo. I tell them to take it to a local camera store and have it scanned to CD. They either ftp the file to my server or mail me the CD. Work great. Good scans and happy customers.

[pixelzombie]

here's the link to get the profiles:

http://www.drycreekphoto.com/icc/

[Damo77]

Originally Posted by duwayne

Damien - I found pepole very reluctant to part with the original photo. I tell them to take it to a local camera store and have it scanned to CD. They either ftp the file to my server or mail me the CD. Work great. Good scans and happy customers.

Thanks duwayne, that's a good idea.

[mistermonday]

Duwayne, if you are planning to give Costco a try this is important. After you upload and select the image(s) you want to print, near where you select the size and finish there is a check box that says Do Not Make Any Adjustments. Make sure you check that one.
Costco typically runs tow sets of printers. One has auto color, auto contrast, and auto sizing for customers who are not technical. If you check No Adjustments, your images are printed on the equipment used mostly for professional photographers and businesses. They make no adjustment and assume that your images have been converted to the the profiles you downloaded from Drycreek (even if the icc profile is not embedded in the file). So what you output is what you will get.
Regards, Murray

[duwayne]

Thanks Murray, I'll keep that in mind. Cord Camera basically does the same thing. The default is a standard set of corrections but if you teel them no corrections or adjustments they will print them as-is and they do a very nice job.

[AFrazier]

Originally Posted by Nanls

I have an Epson 9800 printer and I still took my portfolio samples to Costco. You can send them a profile; they have nice mat paper and their price is good. Pain in the a** to print and trim multiple 8"x10" on a wide format printer.
Hope this helps.
~Nancy


______________________________

www.PhotoArt123.com

I ran into almost the exact same problem. I have the Stylus Pro 7800. It will print on small media, but it's more trouble than it's worth getting it lined up if you're printing single cut sheets. And it's definitely a pain trimming multiples off the roll. I image it's even worse for you. My roll cutter at least accommodates a 36" print. What does the 9800 do? 48" or 64"? Or is the 64" the 11800?

Anyway, I went and got the 4800 for smaller prints. A lot less cumbersome, and still does a lot of the larger (though not too large) portraits, like the 16 × 20s. My material costs (vs. the labor involved) to purchase cut sheets for smaller media ended up being a wash, and they run through the 4800 without any issue.

[Dmax]

I have Fuji 355 Laser print processor Epson 9800 Kn Type inkjet printer and Chromira 30 and in my suggestion Chromira is No1 out put source even if you compare it with quality or price with anyother machine.