Please I ask only those who have a college degree in a field relevent to this
question or professional photographers answer. Sorry I have to be so strict,
but I need advice from people who know what they are talking about. But if
you
know what your talking about and do not have a degree go ahead and answer, but
cite your sources, thanks...

Question
Will a home photo printer produce the same long term results as the 1 hour
photo lab? When I mean long term, I mean a photo lasting a number of years
without fade. My family purchased a cute little photo printer to go with our
Sony digital camera that is 5-6MP MP I believe. The pictures look just as
good
as a 35mm, but I wonder if they will last 5-10 years. On the other hand I can
go to a photo lab and insert a Memory Stick, pro, SD, mini SD, XD, San Disk,
CD/DVD, CF, or a floppy disk into one of the machines an receive goodprints
within the hour. Dont tell me that the little photo printing machine that we
have is as quality as the 1 hour photo labs. Because they both look the same,
there has to be a huge price difference between the home machine and the
professional machines.

I've attempted to persuade my family not to completely dump their 35mm cameras
and the idea of biringing their camera into a photo lab to have the pictures
printed, but they do not listen. I personally own a Vivitar camera that uses
SD cards and the 1 hour lab produces good results. But their photo machine
only takes memory stick, bummer!!


Thanks,


John