Recommendations for good Online Photo Service (1 Viewer)

[Rob Gardiner]

Hello everybody,

My dad just bought himself a nice Olympus digital camera (the model escapes me right now). Although he has a color inkjet printer, he wants to explore his options as far as utilizing an online photo service. He wants to be able to upload his photos and have prints sent to him. The main concern is that inkjet prints do not last as long as actual photo-chemical prints. Any ideas? Many thanks.

 

[Thomas Newton]

Look for a Wal-Mart or local photo shop that has one of the digital "one-hour" kiosks, and ask the staff there if those machines use a photographic printing process. (Avoid the instant Kodak/Polaroid kiosks. My guess is that they use inkjet or dyesub printers, and thus do not satisfy your requirements.)

Alternately, if you're going to be doing a lot of uploading of photos, consider a DSL or cable modem connection.

 

[Rob Gardiner]

Thomas,

Thanks for the tip. They live in a small town, however, so there may not be many kiosk-type options that are convenient for them. They DO however have cable internet.

 

[Citizen87645]

I've used Ofoto and have just ordered some prints from NikonNet. Ofoto's were okay, but I found I could do as well or better on my own. I'll let you know how the ones from Nikon are if someone doesn't have any experience. The thing is I sized and adjusted them specifically for printing, so it would really be just a test of the service's printers, not the image manipulation features.

 

[Michael St. Clair]

18 cents per 4x6 on a wet-process Fuji Frontier at Sam's Club.

Worth the price of a membership.

Convert your images to 300dpi at 4x6, 5x7, or 8x10 and you control the cropping.

 

[Rob Gardiner]

Thanks for all the ideas. I will check out NikonNet. I'm 99% certain there is no Sam's Club in the small town where my parents live.

 

[Michael St. Clair]

I don't know if they have changed or not, but Ofoto and the like used to use dye sublimation. The laser-generated prints on true photographic paper from the Fuji machines looks better than any dye sub that I have seen.

Supposedly some WalMarts use the same kind of Fuji Frontier machines as Sams Club.

 

[Ari]

EZ prints (www.ezprints.com) seems to be the choice for online prints.

 

[Rob Gardiner]

Thanks, Ari. That is exactly what I'm looking for.

I'll pass along the info to my Dad and let everyone know how the pictures turn out.

Thanks again for all the ideas, everybody.

 

[Mike LS]

I've had great results using Wal-Mart's online photo department. You upload them to walmart.com and make your order there, then you can have them sent to your closest store and pick them up to keep from paying shipping (or you can have them sent right to you).

I've also had good luck with http://www.snapfish.com/

 

[Rob Gardiner]

Thanks for the tip, Mike. There is a Wal-Mart in the town where my parents live, so this may work for them.

The Wal-Mart website says the following:


Can I assume this means we would be getting actual photo-chemical prints, and not inkjet or color laser or dye sub or any of that other greasy kid stuff?

 

[Michael St. Clair]

Yeah, if it's on crystal archive, it's a wet print. And it will last five to ten times as long without fading, and it will fade less when it does...

 

[Citizen87645]

Do you have info on how this is done? I just received my first order of prints from NikonNet and was (pleasantly) shocked at the quality.

 

[TonyD]

thats all i can find.
were did you read

quote:

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Now you can turn them into film-quality prints on Fujicolor Crystal Archive Paper.
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i just printed about 20 pics at wal-mart using the kodak machine.
they look better then regular photos.
i didnt check to see what way they are printed.

i was going to use the walmart machine for .24 a pic but it was broke so they let me use the kodak one for the same price.
she said both machines are the same.

 

[James^Brian]

Let me give also give two thumbs up for Sams and Walmart. If you can find somebody who prints on the Fuji Frontier printers you'll be doing yourself a great service.

My wife is a professional photographer and sends her stuff via net locally but used to have them mailed to us. She's out doing a wedding today but when she gets back I'll give you some recommendations for the on-line.

 

[Michael St. Clair]

The Kodak machine is not the same as the Fuji Frontier machine. I'm not sure what process the Kodak machine uses, but we've compared prints here at work and the Fuji machine is superior.



Regular photo paper is exposed by scanning red, green, and blue lasers over it at 300dpi.