how do you do your printing ?

[911newbie]

How do you lot do your printing ?

At home on an inkjet, via a professional printing company, or high street photo shop (Jessops for example) ?

I've a cheapo Canon Pixma (4200i or something) inkjet at home which is OK but struggles to print anything you'd want to hang on your wall. I wondered what the consensus was with you gentlemen.

[Scho]

i've always found ink jets to be a massive pain in the arse.

just take my stuff to a decent lab.

[_dobbo_]

http://www.photobox.co.uk

Prints ordered before 4pm typically arrive the next morning. Excellent after sales service if anything goes wrong - they usually just reprint no questions asked. One time they reprinted my entire order of 20" prints because one came through with banding on it. The order value was something like £25! Probably a mistake but still...

[F_M-R2]

I use Photobox also. I am in Ireland so the turn around is 2-3 days normally but they have a decent rang of services, its easy to use and a hell of alot cheaper than anyone over here.

[CivicMan]

+1 for Photobox - excellent turnaround and so much easier and cheaper than printing at home!

Edited by CivicMan on Thursday 12th June 09:59

[SpydieNut]

_dobbo_ said:

http://www.photobox.co.uk

excellent

timely thread this - i've been meaning to get some prints done for ages now and was just going to take my CF card to boots or something.

not any more though

thank you

[miniman]

Another vote for Photobox, the turnaround is spot on. I ordered recently at 3pm and had them in my hand at 9am the following morning, which is better than a lot of the supermarkets can do if you catch them when they are busy. Also it will connect directly to your Flickr account and print from there which is excellent.

Also if you haven't seen www.moo.com then have a look and I defy you to resist buying a pack of Moo cards for a tenner!

[Luca Brazzi]

Inkjets at home (A3 and A4). Works fine for me. And I print about 200-250 pages per race meeting.

[furtive]

Photobox colour reproduction has been disappointing of late unfortunately.

[CivicMan]

furtive said:

Photobox colour reproduction has been disappointing of late unfortunately.

What's the customer service response like when you complained?

[burriana]

Luca Brazzi said:

Inkjets at home (A3 and A4). Works fine for me. And I print about 200-250 pages per race meeting.

Hi Steve, how are you these days?

My brother-in-law was asking about getting a digi-printer the other day and whether it was the best option, or simply give the card to a pro-shop to do ... since even our local Boots does not do developing (except the little help yourself machine - 130 hi-res shots, no thanks!)

I'm guessing that getting the right printer is the cheaper option, so long as you only print the shots you want, but say he has a card full of just holiday snaps and wants to run a 6x4 or 7x5 of each one, does it remain cost effective?

I have always used high street developers mainly for time reasons, but I am happy to be advised otherwise.

[Luca Brazzi]

burriana said:

Luca Brazzi said:

Inkjets at home (A3 and A4). Works fine for me. And I print about 200-250 pages per race meeting.

Hi Steve, how are you these days?

My brother-in-law was asking about getting a digi-printer the other day and whether it was the best option, or simply give the card to a pro-shop to do ... since even our local Boots does not do developing (except the little help yourself machine - 130 hi-res shots, no thanks!)

I'm guessing that getting the right printer is the cheaper option, so long as you only print the shots you want, but say he has a card full of just holiday snaps and wants to run a 6x4 or 7x5 of each one, does it remain cost effective?

I have always used high street developers mainly for time reasons, but I am happy to be advised otherwise.

Hello matey...all good thanks. Getting a few commissions to shoot race cars brings a big smile...with the FordGT GT3 team at Paul Ricard last Saturday, and a new Ascari road car last Sunday...so not too bad at all.

I think for your BiL, I'd take them to Boots and get them printed. Easy and pain free, and actually good value. most of all it would be very quick. Factor in the cost of buying a printer, buying the paper, buying the inks, then setting the printer to print per images per page at 6x4, and trimming etc...it soons becomes a very time consuming and expensive hassle for something that may only be occasional, and holiday snaps which are for personal memories rather than sale.

I'm only recommending Boots as a) I work for them, and b) I've recently seen a big batch that was done there and they were really good. I'm sure all walk-in photo labs are just as good, so shop around.

I've got a load of printers going all at once after a race, and its suits me to be able to inspect the pic and reprint if needed. Holiday photos - save the time and hassle and take them to a lab

Regards,
Steve

[poah]

I print most of my stuff at home except for holiday snaps a like when its much cheaper and quicker to get them done at a lab. For labs I use photobox or Asda.

I print at home because I have greater control over the final result and I can print of paper that labs can't.

I use an R2400 A3+ printer which is great for colour and B&W particularly on Fibre based or cotton rag papers

[EmmaP]

I use Photobox but every order in the past 18 months has had a problem (marks from rollers, creases in prints from poor packaging). I'll see how they are now as I haven't used them since February (I don't do much printing).

Customer service is excellent. They called me up twice on one occasion to discuss the matter and to check that I was happy with the results (print had to be printed three times before it was right).

Edited by EmmaP on Saturday 21st June 10:06

[leeb]

EmmaP said:

I use Photobox but every order in the past 18 months has had a problem (marks from rollers, creases in prints from poor packaging). I'll see how they are now as I haven't used them since February (I don't do much printing).

Customer service is excellent. They called me up twice on one occasion to discuss the matter and to check that I was happy with the results (print had to be printed three times before it was right).

Edited by EmmaP on Saturday 21st June 10:06

i have had this a couple of times lately, they seem to roll the large prints (14x10) to tightly and they come out creased.
not happy

[EmmaP]

The problem for me was prints in the region of 10 x 8 having bent corners and an order for 150 7 x 5s being packed so tightly about 30 were creased.

Edited by EmmaP on Saturday 21st June 11:45

[911newbie]

Thanks guys -
I've tried Photobox and the prints were OK and came very quickly. Any complaints I could have are probably down to my photography.... colours are a bit dull perhaps

I also used pictureframeworld to buy a nice and v cheap frame.

I have to say my old Canon iP Pixma 4200 vs Photobox's prints, mmm there isn't much in it. (They may fade like crazy of course.....)

Would I see much of a difference between my ip4200 and an Epson R2400 ?

Cheers
Chris

[stigmundfreud]

I use photobox for huge posters but for everything else I do it at home. It costs a bit in ink but its much more flexible. I use an r1800 which has now been replaced by a new model but if I print at best quality with rpm turned on I've yet to see a difference in quality to any of the places I have bought prints from.

eta thats up to a3+ size which is big enough for most things and fade time is 250+ years. I've had prints in direct sunlight at home with no noticable fading

downside is cost of ink, if you need to replace all 8 its almost 100 quid but they last for ages and you only then need to replace one or two at a time

Edited by stigmundfreud on Monday 23 June 20:40

[Deluded]

Forest Photographic Co Ltd.
128-128a Hoe Street
Walthamstow
London
E17 4QR

Family run buisness for 30 years plus. Fantastic quality and run by the nicest guys you could ask for. Although admitedly, I was a grumpy sometimes when I served in the shop :-) Funny how I still remember the address off the top of my head after 2 years.

Edited by Deluded on Monday 23 June 23:51

[EmmaP]

Ooh! Thanks for that address. My friend lives in Walthamstow and usually uses Snappy Snaps. I'll let her know about this place. She is incredibly fussy about colour and density though