Printing photos

New thread started as I can't find one related to photo printing! Please feel free to merge if I've missed something.

Where does everyone favour for printing services online?

Archive quality is what I'm looking for as it's my wedding photos. I have high resolution digital image files.

https://metroimaging.co.uk

£2.46 per 6x4 is that at the expensive end for archive quality? I'm more than sure they're worth it and would get some at that price but not 100..

Has anyone used a company which are a bit cheaper but not rubbish?

No input on printing I'm afraid but digital photos are awfully easy to lose when you plan on keeping them stored for the rest of your life across, by that point, multiple computers/phones etc.
Can I suggest that you get a small flash storage like a USB drive or an SD card which you put the photos on and store it as a physical back up. Won't cost much, I wish I'd done it for events in the past which I've now lost the pictures for. You could stick it in the front of the book if you plan on keeping the prints together.

Thanks for the reminder! They're currently all in Google Drive but I do need to invest in physical hard drive for back up of all my photos.

No problem. My computer was dying a slow, clogged up death so I moved a load of stuff onto an SSD I had lying around (moved, not copied) and yep the drive went and failed so I lost a load.
Keep them with google and on a hard drive but yeah I reckon for special events like a wedding (congrats by the way, whenever it was) its worth the £5 for a 16gb SD card as an extra archive back up.

Good thread. This is my job.

Metro and Printspace in London don’t do anything to justify their inflated prices.

If you’re in London and want really nice fine digital printing, go to Genesis.

If you’re happy to have prints sent to you Photographique in Bristol are good. Or Palm in Birmingham.

If you want really lovely C-types or Silver Gelatin from negatives PM me for recommendations.

And always, always, get C-types over inkjet (aka “pigment”) prints. Inkjets are shit, even the fancy ones.

Amazing information thanks.

So I can get c-types from digital files from the place in Bristol or Birmingham or go in with the files on a stick to Genesis? (I'm in London).

This is all new to me so thanks for explaining!

Correct. No problem. All these labs respond best to a quick phone call if you have questions.

+1 for genesis

And always, always, get C-types over inkjet (aka “pigment”) prints. Inkjets are shit, even the fancy ones.

I'm going to have to disagree here. I've got c-types and home ink jets on my wall, and to be honest I can't notice a difference in quality*
My wedding photos on the wall are home ink jet prints. Sure they may not be archival quality, but as long as you've got the files safe you can always print another one.

*This is at A4ish size. Your experiences at larger sizes may vary

Brilliant, ta!

Yeah having worked with both C-types and Giclée, it’s just horses for courses.
Archival life is certainly better in Giclée prints (but we’re talking like 75 years plus anyway so it doesn’t matter).

Basically long short of it, Giclée prints will be more vibrant/richer black tones, but C-types will give you finer tonal range.

I wouldn’t call theprintspace’s prices inflated though, they are a lot cheaper than a lot of other comparative labs in London/the uk. But it is a self service and if you’re not used to printing/proofing you’re likely to get better results elsewhere.

For high end printing, I always go with Spectrum in Hove, they are expensive, but worth every penny.

https://spectrumphoto.co.uk/?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIh_TOnKSc4wIVxrDtCh31bQd3EAAYASAAEgKujPD_BwE

For a London based lab, I have no personal experience, but have heard good things about them - Bayeux

http://www.bayeux.co.uk/home

Surprisingly, the online shop Photobox does pretty good jobs and quick turnaround. I have never used them for exhibition prints but I have used them many times for anything that I don't intend to sell ...

https://www.photobox.co.uk/

Metro Imaging has a cheaper self service strand, no? I have only used them once but I have heard from folks who have been using them forever that their quality isn't as good as they used to be... ?

I wouldn't go anywhere near Printspace, their print technicians once told me black is black, there is only 1 type of black, take it or leave it. They also argued with me on a different occasion that sometimes prints would come out of the machine with tiny scratches. What happened was that my prints all came out with deep scratches on the same place and they told me it was within their error margin... until I insisted for them to check their machines and made a scene, they then very unwillingly checked their machine and found a bit of paper got stuck on the roller causing the scratches. I was not offered an apology and I was made to wait a long time for reprinting my work that they should have prioritised.

Also, please don't take this the wrong way, how do you mean by high res images?

I imagine if you'd hired a wedding photographer then they would have sent you retouched and colour corrected .tiff? If you went down the DIY route, then what file quality have you got? This can go a long way in determining the best way to print them too. i.e, if you have got your images in raws then you'd have to work on them first to bring out the best of them before printing.

No offense taken. I have .ARWs and the "worked on" JPGs. They were taken on a Sony A7.

Didn't hire a wedding photographer, my friend took them so it's all a bit more DIY.

He's been through and edited them all. We did a cheap test print run and he's going back through them again before I get them printed again properly.

I'm learning so much, glad I started this thread now. Thanks!

Seconding Photographique

Weirdly my degree ended up specialising in hand colour printing, so for once in my life I actually qualified to comment

https://www.simlab.co.uk/

I used them when they were pro-am imaging, good quality Fuji archive prints at insanely low prices.

They merged with Simlab and now do Giclée type printing as well. I’ve not used them in a while but a client got some prints on photo rag recently and was happy with them.

Photographique

Their price list mentions they scan everything (prints and negs) at 72dpi then resample to 300 if needed for print.

That has to be a mistake right?

From above:
Spectrum are pretty good. Simon Roberts uses them I think.
Bayeux are very overpriced for what you get.
Still think for colour photo printing a C-type will always look better than an inkjet/giclée/whatever print. The paper choices are so much better, if nothing else.

Their machines maybe use inverse shims

Ah that's alright then, I'd probably get the finished pics in .tiff as well as .arw for keeping. As for printing, as long as they export the sizing and dpi correct then it makes no difference if they are .tiff or .jpeg.

.tiff is much better if you want to have large prints, but with the small size you mentioned, it doens't matter.

I normally send clients decent quality .tiff and if I want to make a point, like they have been a dick or something then I'd send them small size highly compressed 72dip pics that are just about good enough for Instragm or FB... until I get paid. :-P

Ok this is the bit where I am unqualified....I only printed from negs or slides.

Digital was in the stone age when I was dodging and burning.

All I can say is they turn out a decent print and someone there has a good enough eye not to fuck things up. And that essentially is what you want.

Edit: but getting 300dpi from 72 sounds like some CSI level fictional “enhance”

Not sure this is the right thread, but...

We need a new printer for generic printery things, but I’ve long missed having printouts of photos lying around and so would like to get something that is photo capable too.

In my (very) limited experience, photo quality in home printers seems to be extremely variable. Does anyone have any advice on what I should be looking for, or otherwise a recommendation? We won’t be printing anything big (probably mostly 5x7, 8x10, occasionally ~A4) and mostly from 16MP edited raw files.

I can probably spend up to around £150, which I know will be a long way short of lab quality but still hopefully ok?