RFI: Online processors for 5x7 prints

Hi:

I have reviewed all of the "online" processor posts, but I wanted to
get a little more specific info for my needs. Specifically for 5x7s.

I give out photo albums to all of my wife's family and my own family
every year for Xmas. Family pics, you know grandkids, cousins,
reunions, etc. I take a ton of photos so I usually have a pretty good
set by the time I am ready to order. I always do 5x7 prints. I have
a nice album that I use which is perfect for 5x7s. I just ordered
last night for this Xmas, and my order was for nearly 450 5x7 prints
(each album holds 36 prints and I do a bunch of them). Needless to
say, this gets very expensive very quickly.

I wanted to find out what other on-line processors I should consider.
Important is pricing and quality. Prices are always being compared
for 4x6 prints, and that seems to be what most processors are aiming
at, the 4x6 prices are very competitive, and that is the price that
almost exclusively is discussed in this forum. 5x7's however are more
variable, and when you order 400-500 of them, this can mean hundreds
of dollars.

And a very important part of the pricing is whether the on-line
retailer sends out Email "coupons". Typically I have seen these for
up to 20% off.

So far I have just used Ofoto and Shutterfly. My experiences:

Ofoto- More expensive at $0.99 each with no volume discount. Coupons
for 15 ro 20% off used to come all the time, but they have stopped
coming the last few months. Quality is very good.

Shutterfly- Cheaper, starts at $0.99 each but they have a volume
discount, and I get the lowest rate with the number that I order,
something like $0.75 each. Coupons drop this to the low $0.60's.
However, the quality is definitely not as good as Ofoto.

After reading posts in this forum, I would like to try Kellards.com,
but their prices are much higher, $1.49 each. Maybe I'll use them for
4x6 and photos to go in frames on the wall.

So my questions are:

What other processors should I try for a combo of price and quality.
I will probably try out Walmart and Sam's, and definitely Kellards.

Which of the on-line companies send out Email coupons? That can mean
a lot of savings for me.

Thanks.

andyd

 

I found this page the other day:
http://s87486672.onlinehome.us/onlineprinting.php?orderby=p57

You can sort prices by size.

I've only tried a few on the list, so I can't really add input as far as
quality goes, but there are certainly some inexpensive 5x7 options out there
if they turn out to be decent prints.

Good luck!

- jz

 

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x-no-archive: yes

If you could accept 4x6, you could keep OFOTO and get a discounted price of
$.29 per print. I realize that this may not be the solution that you are
seeking.

I have read that SHUTTERFLY makes dye sub prints, whereas OFOTO makes "real"
photo prints, usinf photo paper and photo dyes/chemicals.

OFOTO is the only processor I have ever used for my digital prints, and I
have always been pleased with their consistently excellent results. If I
had to make a choice, I would stick with OFOTO and go with the smaller print
size, to save 70% of the 5x7 price.

I suspect that if you go elsewhere, you may get a somewhat cheaper price,
but will see a noticeable decrease in quality. What's that saying, "You
know the devil you've got; you don't know the devil you'll get."

 

walmart 4x6 is at 24 cents. I hear sams club is at 19 cents.
walmart 5x7 is 96 cents, i assume sams club is less....

I am VERY satisfied with the results i get from walmart. I have given
them jpg, tif and files sizes from 100k to 17Mb.

you can walk in with a CD or other media and in theory, get the pics
in 1 hour. I suppose with 400+ 5x7s, 1 hours service is asking a bit!

They can also do this via email - see walmart.com.

chris

 

Shutterfly says they use a Fuji Frontier system in their FAQ. That is
probably exactly what ofoto uses. Most places use the Fuji Frontier.
The thing to be careful with is you have to specifically specify to
not modify the pictures on Shutterfly. I've never tried ofoto. I
have tried Walmart, a local graphics company with a Light Jet
(expensive), Walgreens and Shutterfly. I would rate them:

Light Jet - I would use only with 48-bit tiffs using RAW data. You
can tell color is missing if you try to print from 24-bit sources.
Although it still looks best. It cost about $12 for an 8x10.

Shutterfly w/o processing - 2nd best

Walgreens - 3rd best

Walmart - the picture I sent to Walmart looked terrible.

Eric

 

I just got my order back from Ofoto, including some of the same 5x7s
that I ordered a couple of months ago from Shutterfly. I do not
modify any pictures on any of the sites, I do everything in Photoshop
prior to uploading. I am not an expert by any means, but I have read
that Ofoto and Shutterfly do not use the same processing technique
(not sure about this though), and I can say that to my non-expert eye
the prints I have gotten from Ofoto are significantly better than
those from Shutterfly, though more expensive by about $0.20 each after
discounts.

andyd

 

You did not change anything? What I'm saying is shutterfly makes
color corrections for you. You HAVE to change it or they will screw
it up. Especially if you had it in PS. Here is the option I'm
talking about. By default it is not checked.

http://home.houston.rr.com/ejwitte/images/shutterfly.jpg

If I send out for another print it may be http://www.kellards.com/ .
I hear they have the best of all of them. Except for the places that
do lightjet.

Eric