# How do I order print online?



## duydaniel (Nov 20, 2013)

photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/[email protected]/9532847391/#

(5D3 + 24-105 @105 f4) full raw

I shot this for a friend, who took it to officemax and had them printed 20x30
However there was 2 lines run across the eyes. The people at officeMax explained the camera "didn't have enough resolution" which I considered insulting and ignorance statement.

So I order the same size print at Snapfish whose print has no line or resolution problem whatsoever.
But the color has yellow tint, cast. It doesn't have the green leaves as in the photo. I tried to view the photo from difference devices and they are all similar. 

I requested a replacement and the problem was still the same.

So I wonder where do you print and how you scope with this situation?

Thanks in advanced


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## neuroanatomist (Nov 20, 2013)

Officemax and Snapfish would not be my top choices for large prints, any more than Target or Walgreens. Try Mpix or AdoramaPix.


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## zim (Nov 20, 2013)

Use a company that supply colour profiles, and have a service that doesnt auto colour correct, calibrate your monitor and do small test prints for referance


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## neuroanatomist (Nov 20, 2013)

duydaniel said:


> (5D3 + 24-105 @105 f4)



Also, was that a high ISO image? I'd guess no, because it looks like there was pleny of light. Your image seems to have quite a bit of noise, and doesn't appear very sharp. How was it processed?

The screenshot below compares your image at 100% (top) with two 100% crops of an image with my 5DII + 24-105L at 105mm f/4 (regions chosen to show the area of sharp focus and a dark+light OOF blur area, the original image is here).


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## sanjosedave (Nov 20, 2013)

1. Before I enlarge a print, I get a smaller size to check it out. The way it appears on screen can look different than how it looks printed

2. Did you use something like a colormunki to calibrate your monitor?

3. How important is the print to you - if it is important, use a very good photo service such as Bay Photo. I've had test prints done at Adorama and they were ok. Like them on FB so you can get into their deal stream


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## chilledXpress (Nov 20, 2013)

Costco rocks !!! Just kidding... A reputable lab will use color profiles and send proofs for approval before any printing occurs. In the bay area (California) I use, http://www.photoworkssf.com/ I've also used http://www.bayphoto.com/ in the past but not that much anymore.

PhotoworksSF does good work and will take orders from anywhere in the world. I use them for large prints, client work and all of my medium format film development.


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## duydaniel (Nov 20, 2013)

Wow thanks Dr John for pointing that out.
I lost the cr2 when my pc crashed so i only have the jpg on flickr.
I remembered that iso was under 400 for sure. I had a b+w cpl filter on. 
This worries me so i will take a look at the af adjustment and noise issue.
Any suggestions would be great!



neuroanatomist said:


> duydaniel said:
> 
> 
> > (5D3 + 24-105 @105 f4)
> ...


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## duydaniel (Nov 20, 2013)

1. My friend printed that from officemax and the color was right.
2. I don't have the tool to calibrate my monotor so i tried to see the photo from my android nexus 7, laptop etc to compare.
3. I was upset by the officemax's comment about resolution so I wanted to prove the contrary.



sanjosedave said:


> 1. Before I enlarge a print, I get a smaller size to check it out. The way it appears on screen can look different than how it looks printed
> 
> 2. Did you use something like a colormunki to calibrate your monitor?
> 
> 3. How important is the print to you - if it is important, use a very good photo service such as Bay Photo. I've had test prints done at Adorama and they were ok. Like them on FB so you can get into their deal stream


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## duydaniel (Nov 20, 2013)

zim said:


> Use a company that supply colour profiles, and have a service that doesnt auto colour correct, calibrate your monitor and do small test prints for referance



I have found snapfish to be consistent even the 2 prints were off the same. I felt it was corrected without request



chilledXpress said:


> Costco rocks !!! Just kidding... A reputable lab will use color profiles and send proofs for approval before any printing occurs. In the bay area (California) I use, http://www.photoworkssf.com/ I've also used http://www.bayphoto.com/ in the past but not that much anymore.
> 
> PhotoworksSF does good work and will take orders from anywhere in the world. I use them for large prints, client work and all of my medium format film development.



Thanks i will keep this reference with ones neuro said


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## neuroanatomist (Nov 20, 2013)

Could be AF microadjustment, could be something in the RAW conversion settings.


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## nonac (Nov 20, 2013)

+1 for MPIX. Very happy with the work they have done for me. Turnaround is fast as well. I live within 150 miles of them. That said I can order prints on a Sunday and I'll have them in the mail at times by Tuesday!


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## JPAZ (Nov 20, 2013)

chilledXpress said:


> In the bay area (California) I use, http://www.photoworkssf.com/ I've also used http://www.bayphoto.com/ in the past but not that much anymore.



Curious if there was a reason you don't use Bay Photo "not that much anymore." I've had some nice work done by them. They seem to offer very reasonable prices for services including color correction and the prints I've gotten, at least in 8x11 or so, have been nice.


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## Valvebounce (Nov 21, 2013)

Hi duydaniel.
I'm sorry to hear you lost your raws, and I feel a bit mean picking up on this but only one pc crash? 
I may or may not be a bit OTT on my backup regime but I never rely on cloud, you don't always know where it is, I have a mirrored raid in my pc to protect against drive failure, then I have a mirrored raid NAS drive, then I have a large drive in a USB caddy as a final backup. All files are backed up and the backup keeps two previous versions just in case a file is deleted accidentally then deleted from the backup by the backup process. The only thing I haven't got in place is off site backup and I'm working towards that at my workshop.
Why do I do this? The look on the pensioner ladies face when I told her that the dead drive in her pc was not going to relinquish the images of her recently deceased dog without extremely costly retrieval processes involving sending the drive to a company that could deal with drives with no outward signs of life. Explaining that she needed to try to give the pictures a financial value, £1 £10 £?? and that even then the company would not guarantee retrieval. 
Man that heartbroken look will stay with me a long time, I didn't even have the heart to charge her the call out fee.

People please please backup on more than one machine, no a mirrored raid is not sufficient to protect against anything more than A drive failure! 

Cheers Graham.



duydaniel said:


> I lost the cr2 when my pc crashed so i only have the jpg on flickr.


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## chilledXpress (Nov 21, 2013)

JPAZ said:


> chilledXpress said:
> 
> 
> > In the bay area (California) I use, http://www.photoworkssf.com/ I've also used http://www.bayphoto.com/ in the past but not that much anymore.
> ...



Photoworks SF does a better job with the film for me. So I just started using them most of the time.


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## nonac (Nov 21, 2013)

Valvebounce said:


> "The only thing I haven't got in place is off site backup and I'm working towards that at my workshop."
> 
> 
> 
> ...



I have used Carbonite as my sole back-up for the last 2 years. Works out very well at a low cost per year and it's all automatic, once set-up you don't have to do anything. It's already paid for itself when my PC crashed last year and all of my files, including 5,000+ pictures were safe and sound.


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## ashmadux (Nov 21, 2013)

thats softie file seems that the Af completely 'missed'.

I have quite a few of files like that from a 6d thats going back to the shop. Thanks canon


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## Mt Spokane Photography (Nov 21, 2013)

duydaniel said:


> Wow thanks Dr John for pointing that out.
> I lost the cr2 when my pc crashed so i only have the jpg on flickr.
> I remembered that iso was under 400 for sure. I had a b+w cpl filter on.
> This worries me so i will take a look at the af adjustment and noise issue.
> ...



Flickr does nasty things when you upload a jpeg, so you are working from a image that flickr may have tampered with. Since its all you have, I'd calibrate your monitor and try to color correct any issues. Then have a service print a smaller image first. You can ask them to print the image as-is without any automatic color correction, and it should be fine.


I've had good luck with the cheap Costco 30 X 40 prints, but they are just posters and not serious prints.


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## unfocused (Nov 21, 2013)

A strong vote for MPix. I've never had a problem with them. Sadly, I can't say the same for Adorama.

About a year or so ago, they were running a special and I had a lot of 12 x18 prints to make, so I sent a batch to Adorama that I had previously had printed at MPix. Thought I would save some money. Big mistake.

They weren't terrible, but the colors were much more dull and and just not quite right. 

With MPix I never have to do anything to the files other than upload them and pick the sizes and crops. Even if I am sending something where I've done some extensive effects (With some subjects I like very muted colors and will blend grayscale and color layers to get the effect I want. Other times I may need very vibrant almost garish colors. I'm also a heavy user of OnOne and Nik.)

It always seems that MPix knows exactly what I'm looking for and prints it perfectly. (Without any special instruction). In fact, even when I've sent the same file back to them because I needed more prints or needed different sizes, the prints come back almost perfectly matched to what I have ordered in the past.


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## Rienzphotoz (Nov 21, 2013)

sanjosedave said:


> 1. Before I enlarge a print, I get a smaller size to check it out. The way it appears on screen can look different than how it looks printed


I always do that but the guy at the camera lab, I use, told me that even though the smaller sample image looks good, it is no guarantee that the final size image will have the same colors, he said that it also depends on when the ink cartridges are loaded e.g. when fresh cartridges are loaded the lab produces more saturated images, according to him the when the cartridge is half way through is when he gets good images. Not sure if that it is true or not but that's what I've been told.


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## duydaniel (Nov 21, 2013)

I think it is his job to make the large print identical to the sample print isn't it?
They make money out of this so do it right please.
Imagine your camera take picture differently depend on the battery level 



Rienzphotoz said:


> sanjosedave said:
> 
> 
> > 1. Before I enlarge a print, I get a smaller size to check it out. The way it appears on screen can look different than how it looks printed
> ...


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## Rienzphotoz (Nov 21, 2013)

duydaniel said:


> I think it is his job to make the large print identical to the sample print isn't it?
> They make money out of this so do it right please.
> Imagine your camera take picture differently depend on the battery level
> 
> ...


That's why he suggests to take it after the full cartridge has been used for a bit :


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## dryanparker (Nov 21, 2013)

I use White House Custom Colour (whcc.com) and they are consistently excellent. Their quality control is fantastic.

Caveat is WHCC only services photography "professionals"; that is to say, people who deal in creating or sourcing work for print. I'm not a professional photographer by trade (it's a small part of my role as Creative Director), but I do deal in printing work as a "professional".

WHCC is highly recommended if you fall into that category.


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## CTJohn (Nov 21, 2013)

nonac said:


> Valvebounce said:
> 
> 
> > "The only thing I haven't got in place is off site backup and I'm working towards that at my workshop."
> ...


+1.

My only complaint about Carbonite is how long it takes to upload a week's worth of photos...actually more of a complaint about my internet connection, I guess. It's a very cheap and easy insurance policy.


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## CTJohn (Nov 21, 2013)

unfocused said:


> A strong vote for MPix. I've never had a problem with them. Sadly, I can't say the same for Adorama.
> 
> About a year or so ago, they were running a special and I had a lot of 12 x18 prints to make, so I sent a batch to Adorama that I had previously had printed at MPix. Thought I would save some money. Big mistake.
> 
> ...


I agree regarding MPIX. My only complaint is that I have a real hard time matching brightness from my monitor to a print. I use a Spyder 3 to calibrate colors, and I have brightness in my monitor turned down to 20%. Invariably I need to print, up the brightness/contrast, print, and possibly up the brightness again before I'm ready to print an enlargement. It's not an MPIX problem, but my frustration with the whole digital printing process.

I've recently tried Nations and think they're very comparable to MPIX....both get my recommendation.


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## JPAZ (Nov 21, 2013)

CTJohn said:


> My only complaint about Carbonite is how long it takes to upload a week's worth of photos...actually more of a complaint about my internet connection, I guess. It's a very cheap and easy insurance policy.



I use Crashplan (along with mirror RAID and periodic backups to external drives). Yeah, it is slow but since it is running in the background, it does not matter. It is reassuring. I've had HDD failures and the RAID makes that pretty painless. I hope that I never need to see if Crashplan works cause that would mean I had a more catastrophic computer failure.


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## digitalride (Nov 21, 2013)

I used adoramapix for a 20x30 picture of some deer in winter and it came back with pink snow. Turns out they "corrected" it to try to make the deer look a more pleasing brown. They reprinted it for free with no color correction and it was very nice. I will use them again but will always specify "no corrections" in the future.

I also find that most prints (from everywhere I've tried including adorama) are much darker than I'd like so I always brighten images up before printing, does anyone else have that problem?


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## duydaniel (Nov 21, 2013)

digitalride said:


> I used adoramapix for a 20x30 picture of some deer in winter and it came back with pink snow. Turns out they "corrected" it to try to make the deer look a more pleasing brown. They reprinted it for free with no color correction and it was very nice. I will use them again but will always specify "no corrections" in the future.
> 
> I also find that most prints (from everywhere I've tried including adorama) are much darker than I'd like so I always brighten images up before printing, does anyone else have that problem?



Darken your monitor maybe? ;D


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## digitalride (Nov 21, 2013)

duydaniel said:


> Darken your monitor maybe? ;D



Yes, or put spot lights on all the photos 

If it was just the monitors then the prints would look OK as long as the photo was exposed properly and not changed in post, but standard exposures out of a range of cameras all come out too dark in print. 

Maybe it is just my personal preference for lighter prints.


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## Halfrack (Nov 21, 2013)

chilledXpress said:


> Costco rocks !!! Just kidding...



Actually I have to love Costco because they do have ICC profiles available. http://www.drycreekphoto.com/icc/


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