Prints
Jan 15, 03:57 PM
I have had a Flickr Pro account for a few years now. One of the handiest things about upgrading to a Pro account is that your images do not get resized. So I use it as a place to keep full resolution adjusted images; I generally tend to only post pictures that I like to my account, so it also acts like a ‘favourites’ collection. I realised recently that having the full resolution images online meant that I could get them printed and at any size that I wanted. The fact that they are also adjusted saves me having to aggregate the images I want to print and go down to the local photo printing shop and then collect them an hour or so later. Lazy I know, but with the new addition time is precious.
So, for Irish users Flickr sends you to Spectra Online’s photo sales website, which is powered by Snapfish. I found ordering the images quite straightforward and the prices are very reasonable in my opinion (18c for 7 × 5 inch print). I ordered them this day last week and they were on my desk this morning when I arrived into work.
Snapfish appears to be a UK based company. I feel it is a shame that an Irish company isn’t used and I must admit this would make me seriously think about ordering prints online again via Flickr. It’s not that I have anything against the UK (naturally), I would just prefer to be supporting a national business. Anyway, the prints arrived in a sturdy cardboard envelope which was in a reasonably good condition after An Post got their hands on it.
I had ordered a single 12 × 8 inch print and eighty five 5 × 7 inch prints. The large print was packaged in a cardboard cover and it was in perfect condition when I got it. The reproduction was good, the original shot was grainy so it can be hard to guage quality. Certainly worth what I paid for it.
There was an error on the print however. There is a white dot on Alex’s chin which is not in the original image. It’s a shame to have an error in such a prominent place on the image. It may sound like nit-picking but printing is one those industrys that strives for perfection, and this is not perfect.
The 7×5 inch prints came in a single sleeve. They too were in perfect condition. The print quality was good, not quite as high as you might like. I have seen no errors in the smaller images, so all is good on the reproduction front. I did however order 5 copies of each image and it would have been nice to get 4 extra sleeves to put these in. A little detail like that would have been impressive, I would prefer to hand people their copies in a proper sleeve, but an envelope will suffice.
All in all I would say it is a decent service. The positive side would be the cost to quality ratio and the prints are safely packaged. The negative side would be a slight lack of attention to detail and that I am not supporting a local or even national business.
I am not sure if I will order prints this way again. I like the local photo printers and I can have them within an hour. However, doing large volumes locally would be costly. I’ll just have to wait and see I suppose.
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