12
Apr
Author: admin // Category:
Online Photo
Photo Prints - At Home Or Online?
By Christian Collard
You have two different options when it comes to producing digital color photo’s: (a) your own inkjet or digital color printer or (b) an online photo prints service. There are advantages to both choices of photo printing. The key is to choose the factor most important to you - quality, convenience, and cost.
At Home Photo Printing
For around $200 - $400, you can purchase a decent inkjet photo printer online from HP, Canon, or many others. In addition to the initial purchase, you need to invest in ink and a photo-rated gloss or matte paper stock. It is difficult to ever come up with a true per print cost as you would find in online print services. Based on recent testing from numerous studies, prints can cost anywhere from 28 to over 50 cents per copy dependent upon the type of ink and quality of paper and efficiency of the printer used (price does not include printer).
The quality of home prints is most likely comparable, if not just as good, as the prints you would get from an online service. However, some tests suggest that cheap paper and inks will fade in short time. The higher resolution of your printer and images, the greater detail you will get in your prints.
Costs aside, there are certainly advantages to printing your own photo prints. Convenience of having the prints on-demand within minutes if not seconds can be beneficial dependent upon your needs. You also have much more control over the color and look of your pictures by instant trial and error.
Online Photo Prints
Without the same investment of a physical printer, you could print about 3,000 4″ x 6″ prints. The only costs to you are prints and shipping. These costs will vary from service to service. When pricing online photo prints, it helps to know how many prints you will be ordering since many photo prints services discount print costs as your order volume gets higher. Currently, the price per photo print for a standard 4″ x 6″ is as low as 9 cents at Snapfish.com or PhotoWorks.com.
A great feature to many online photo print services is the ability to store and share your images with others on the internet. When ordering prints, your images will need to be uploaded to a server. In this same step, your pictures are organized and hosted. Additionally, if you have friends and family interested in your pictures, they can easily create their own account and order your pictures for themselves. This saves you some money right there!
Best of Both Worlds
When looking for a new home office printer, spend a little extra and grab a color photo printer. When printing emails and documents, you can print black only, saving your color ink for photos. This gives you the convenience of having prints when you want them and save a little bit on 8 x 10 prints when compared to online prices. However, when you have more than just a few pictures (after the family vacation) or ones you would like to share with others, try an online service.
21
Jan
Author: admin // Category:
Articles,
Digital Camera,
Online Photo
Digital Cameras + Photo Printers = Quality Instant Photographs
By W R Kirk
In the 1950’s and 1960’s Polaroid’s instant cameras were all the rage. You could shoot a picture and have the finished print in a minute or so. The quality wasn’t that great, but hey, you had your pictures now! Today with digital cameras and high-tech photo printers , we have quality instant photos virtually indistinguishable from processed prints. And unlike the old instant cameras, you have the digital equivalent of a negative for future use.
Checking photo printer reviews happily discloses that even an inexpensive photo printer produces true photo quality prints. The main difference in printer prices has to do with features for printing digital pictures. Of course the best digital photo printers will produce better quality, but for the average consumer there’s no noticeable difference.
A Quick Review of Printer Types
The two types of true photo printers are: 1) thermal dye transfer (usually called dye sublimation), and 2) photo ink jet. A quick photo printer review reveals the differences.
Thermal Dye - These printers dry transfer pigments from a ribbon, usually 3 colors plus a protective clear coat. Most have a maximum print size of 4″ X 6″, but a few will print digital photo enlargements up to 8″ X 10″. Many are portable, some even battery operated. A thermal dye printer’s 300 X 300 dpi resolution will match an ink jet’s 1200 X 4800, and the print’s clear coat makes it look and feel more like a conventional photograph.
Photo Ink Jet - Differences from traditional ink jet printers include; faster printing, inks formulated specifically for photos, and more nozzles applying the ink. Prints are very high quality and generally cost less than thermal dye transfer prints. Photo ink jet printers print photos up to 13″ X 19″, and can also serve as an all-purpose printer for your computer.
Tips for Comparing Printers and Printing Photos
• If you want to print photos directly from the camera, both camera and printer should be PictBridge compliant. Most camera/printer dock combos are brand & model specific so if you replace either one, you can’t use it with the other. PictBridge is a standard allowing any compliant camera and printer to interface with a USB cable.
• When reviewing printers make sure they will print the sizes you want. Otherwise you may not always be able to get the prints you want, and/or waste a lot of paper and ink in doing so.
• Just because a printer has a lot of whistles & bells, high resolution settings, etc., doesn’t mean it will give you better pictures. Look for the features you will actually use, and by all means carefully compare the finished print quality for each printer.
• Download some free photo editing software for easy picture enhancements. It isn’t necessary to buy expensive computer software when you can find a free photo editor with a quick online-photo-prints.
Photo printer technology has come a long way in the last couple of years. Even though do-it-yourself prints are still about double the cost of print processing services, it’s still cheaper than conventional film processing and the flexibility and convenience can be well worth it.
