I’m determined to educate my clients on the importance of print quality.

 

Say you get your digital images, and you get them printed at your local drugstore or maybe a cheap online printer. 

You might not notice the color shift or lack of sharpness.  You might have your “mommy goggles” on and think that picture of your child is the best picture ever. 

When your friends see that picture, they’re going to tell you, “Oh, that’s such a great picture!  Little Sally is so cute!”  You know what they’re saying inside?  “Ew, why is it green? Who took that picture?  I hope she didn’t pay for that.”  Do you know who ends up looking bad?  The photographer.  Not to mention, your prints just lost that photographer potential business.

I’m not about to let that happen, for my sake and yours.

Not all printers are the same.  Not all 8×10’s are created equal.  Some of you gasp at the cost of prints by a custom photographer.  You know Walmart charges $2 for an 8×10, so how in the world can XYZ photographer charge so much more!  This post isn’t about the extreme expense that goes into running a legitimate tax-paying business and offering personalized service to you, or the amount of time that goes into creating your images, far beyond the one hour you see the photographer shooting.  There’s a lot more that goes into it than you see during your shoot.  But let me give you this answer:  Quality.  Professional photographers use professional print labs.  I don’t mean the camera store at the mall with pricier prints than the drugstore.  Walgreens is a good  printer to use for your vacation photos, but it is not a professional print lab.  Professional labs offer higher quality photo paper, higher quality inks, and special coatings that ensure your images are resistant to finger prints, dust, and fading.

 

You get the idea of what I’m saying, right? 

So, let’s move on to an example.