Printing Options

You are welcome to order prints through me. I use a professional printer and guarantee the color and quality of all prints. I recommend this not because I will make a profit, but because I want people see the images I create for you to look their best. At the very least, I urge you to purchase wall portraits via me. I promise, you won't be disappointed. Many of you chose to print on your own. Please understand that I cannot guarantee color or print quality when you choose this option. Also I cannot guarantee sharpness/clarity of your photos. The photos printed at non-professional printers, to put it as lightly as possible, just will not look as good.

If you use Costco, although not my fave, here are a few helpful tips. Upload the photos to an album and add them to the shopping cart. Once in the shopping cart, be sure to select "lustre" paper. Costco will default to glossy unless specified. Select your border "as is" . Select the quantity of the size you want. After doing that a crop warning will appear ( a blue square with a diagonal line through it). Click the crop warning and crop to your liking. Once done, click continue at the bottom. Choose to pick up at  a warehouse and select a location. Please do this because if the pictures look bad due to their error, you do not have to pay for them. Once you have uploaded your photos and cropped them, you will come to a screen that looks like this:

This next part is VERY IMPORTANT. Look to see where I circled "edit options". Click on it and turn off the auto color correct. If you do not do this, Costco's computer will attempt to balance the color. It does not look pretty when they do. Skin tones will look gray and color could look flat or overly contrasty depending on how I may have already processed it. If you turned it off and the prints still look bad, Costco did not turn it off. Do not buy them and have them reprint your images. Sometimes we (including me) just need a visual to further explain differences with labs. Hop on over to my pinterest board to view this image that points out the difference using a good lab makes. You can also click on the link to Paint the Moon Photography to read her article on print labs.  


I would recommend over Costco the following online labs:
Mpix
Prodigital Photos
i print canvas