Do It Yourself

I decided a little while ago that IÂ’d actively look into getting myself a nice printer. One of Photo quality so that I could print up and possibly sell some of my prestige photos. I was looking at a few top brands, Canon, HP and Epson mid-range photo printers, all around the same price range. I found that in order to get going with a printer a fresh stock of ink (roughly $90 each printer for all the required ink to stock it full; since the ones included are usually half-assed low quantity cartridges); theyÂ’d run me about $300 total to get going.

This is looking alright, not too expensive. Then I started looking at paper. All of the printers I looked at support what is called borderless printing (typically this is what a normal film photo will look like once you develop it). One downside to all this though is that these printers don’t go bigger than 8” x 11” for paper compatibility. Although you can get rolls of paper and print banners, but that’s another day.

I checked out some paper prices too. For 4” x 6” glossy paper, the cheapest I could find was 20 sheets for $11, and the cheapest 8” x 11” was $49 for 100 sheets. Roughly the same price per-sheet, but clearly more paper on the 8” x 11” (but not enough for two 4” x 6” photos! or is it? Hah! some creative snipping, you can get two normal sized photos on there. Hah!) But, then you end up with funky edges, and it requires you to be able to cut straight. I can't, so I'll stick with the 4x6 sheets.

The price of my prospective venture was adding up. I thought about getting enough supplies for roughly 40 prints of 4x6 photos. Although this is hard to calculate because of ink consumption, on average one estimates about 50 photos group of ink, but this varies a lot so I went on the safe side and estimated 40 photos per ink purchase. Ignoring the cost of the printer itself I was looking at a total of about $112 for 40 prints. Ouch?

Let the Pros Do It

I checked out a few services, some online and some not. Their prices varied from 50 cents to $4 per print. There are a few local places that I’d actually have to walk to and pay $1 a print but I’ll do it online, thanks. Being the brave soul I am, I tried out one of the cheaper online services. (404 Not Found and gave their service a whirl. (Mainly I chose them because of the “get your first 5 free” promo, but hey! I’m a cheap bastard.

Their service was incredibly easy to use. Sign up (that part is free) and upload your pictures to a private album. I chose 5 pictures for certain reasons. Black and white, high contrast sunlight, bright vivid colours and one of a macro photo. The online service lets you crop them after uploading so you donÂ’t even have to worry about your photo editing skills. However, if you want to remove red-eye, youÂ’ll have to do that before you upload. The online editor lets you crop your photo using a very easy interface. Since most digital resolutions arenÂ’t 2:3 ratio (most are 3:4, some others vary) you will need to crop, especially if itÂ’s people or subjects that will be distorted if you want the entire image fit into the wrong ratio as-is. But if you donÂ’t understand it, youÂ’ll figure it out.

I uploaded, I picked the pictures I wanted to buy and I cropped them. I even cropped one to a third of its original size just to see how it would turn out. I filled out the order information and had them mailed to me. Of course shipment to me cost money, $2.95 actually. But optionally I could have them delivered to a Future Shop store where I could pick them up for free.

Within 2 business days they arrived, complete with an index card (a-la Advanced Photo System). Although I only had 5 pictures, and I knew what they were the index card was a nice touch.

These prints look good. Damn good. Honestly I couldn’t tell you if they were digital or not. The 1/3rd cropped picture had no distortion whatsoever. All the colours were bright and vivid, just as I had hoped. Maybe if I got out a microscope I could find a flaw, but not with my eyes. Although I can’t openly say “they’re better than any printer I can buy” because I know they’re not. For a mere 50 cents each, it’s a damn good service.

They also offer various sizes, including wallets, panoramic 4” x 12”, and large prints up to 12” x 18”. On glossy or matte paper too. The only flaw I could find with the service was that you couldn’t choose glossy or matte per-photo; it was the choice for the entire order. Hopefully that will change. Aside from that, thumbs up (just two).

Conclusion

I think IÂ’ll let the Pros take care of my digital photo printing. Although itÂ’s nice to do-it-yourself itÂ’s just not reasonable, yet. Besides, inkjet makers have this very bad habit of bending over the end-user for ink prices. Even no-name ink is expensive, and you do notice a quality difference. The true advantages to letting the pros do it though; you donÂ’t have to worry about waste, having supplies or maintenance of your hardware. IÂ’m sure you know what itÂ’s like to experience that ever infamous running out of ink in mid print or streaking print heads of doom.

Peace.