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Printing services to avoid
Amazon Photo Print: This service produced the worst photos, not only from this specific test, but the worst prints I’ve ever seen. a point. The best I can say about it is that it is fast. I got my prints in less than 24 hours. The problem is that out of the 25 prints I ordered, eight had misprints. Convinced that the 30 percent failure rate must be some kind of fluke, I fired another round of 25 (different) images, and this time seven of them were printed wrong. That’s a bit of an advance, I guess, but I wouldn’t recommend it. I didn’t even bother to try again, and I suggest you avoid Amazon’s photo printing service.
Wal-Mart / CVS / Walgreens: Technically, photo booths haven’t died for an hour. They have made their way inside the pharmacy chains. There is nothing wrong with these services. It’s convenient, and it’s still the quickest way to print your photos as the uploaded jobs are generally processed within a few hours. But results vary widely from store to store. Just like the old one-hour services, the quality of the prints you get depends on what the machine looks like and how skilled the technician is working that day. You may be able to get good prints from your local store, and it might be worth checking if you’re not happy with other options, but for most people, this won’t get you the best results.
How to get better prints
We used a mix of images that are a good cross-section of the types of images most of us have. This includes green forests, blue seascapes, browns and grays in city shots, portraits, macros, close-ups, photos with strong bokeh, stacked photos with a long depth of field, and more.
We didn’t limit our testing to good photos either. We tested a lot of washed out photos, photos that were overexposed and washed out, and ones where detail might be lost to shadows. In other words, photos like most of us are on our phones and cameras. Some of the images came from RAW files we edited in desktop programs, others were sent directly from our phones, and we were also pulled from social media posts.
The latter, while convenient, will get you the worst photos. Social media images are compressed, and with the exception of Flickr, most don’t allow you to access your original uploads, so you’re printing from seriously degraded versions. A much better option is to upload photos directly from your phone. It’s less convenient, but the extra work is worth it.
Yes, a RAW file will be printed by a full-frame camera with a good lens better than anything you get from your phone. But as long as your phone has a good camera, you won’t really notice much difference on a 4 x 6 print. Even at 5 x 7 it’ll be fine. If you want to go bigger, one of the tricks to “hide” the defects of a low-quality image is to print on canvas. It’s not cheap, but the texture will hide many art photos and allow low-resolution photos to look good on the wall.
It’s a good idea to use some kind of photo editing app to add contrast and polish your photos before you upload them. Adobe Lightroom isn’t cheap, but it’s popular with professional photographers. Other good options include Google Photos (under Adjustments, look for the “Pop” slider, which is especially useful), Snapseed, Photoshop Express, and my favorite desktop image editor, Darktable.
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