Why do photolab digital prints not look right?

Hi,

I took some of my pictures from the Canon Digital Rebel XT (350D) in to
Superstore's photolab http://www.photolab.ca/Brand/en/PhotolabHP.asp to have
prints made.

I used the kiosk to order the prints in 6x4" and I now have the prints back
and I am not pleased with them at all.

Firstly they cropped the pictures about 4mm on all sides. Secondly the
colours are not accurate. Finally they have clipped both the shadows and
highlights. They highlights are quite blown and the shadows have lost most
of their detail.

Before everyone reminds me that I need a colour managed workflow, here was
the setup:

Canon Rebel XT in raw mode.
Adobe photoshop ACR and CS2.
Viewsonic VP201s 20.1" LCD.
Colorvision Spyder calibrated and ICM file loaded.
The output files were quality 12 jpgs in sRGB colour at 3456x2304
resolution.
I copied them back to a compact-flash card and took the card to the store.

The pictures looked great on the monitor with good detail in the highlights
and shadows. They also were not clipped but they did have full histograms.
I assumed that photolabs have the printing machines calibrated to a standard
so that if I have a calibrated monitor, that the prints that come back will
look the same. I also assumed that the photolabs don't alter the images but
just print what you gave them.

Luckily I only had a 5 prints made, but I am wondering what I did wrong.

Do the kiosks do levels adjustments or sharpening or colour shifting of some
sort or do they print exactly as given. It seems that their black level is
much to high and the white level much to low. My file had values from
0-255, but the printed output looks clipped to about 30-210 or so.

I don't plan on buying my own photoprinter as the operating costs are too
high compared to the 16-24 cents per print at local photolabs.

How do you prepare your images so that the prints will look right when a lab
does them? The blown highlights and lost shadow details are the most
offensive to me, followed closely by the cropping, and finally the colours
being a little off is annoying but less important.

Thanks for any responses.

default wrote:

Before everyone reminds me that I need a colour managed workflow, here was
the setup:

You don't need a color-managed workflow (well, you do, but you already have
one). What you need is for that workflow to extend to the output stage.
You need a lab that will print your pictures as you give them to you, with
no "helpful" automatic adjustments. Basic consumer labs are not those labs.

I assumed that photolabs have the printing machines calibrated to a standard
so that if I have a calibrated monitor, that the prints that come back will
look the same.

You were being over-optimistic, I'd say.

I also assumed that the photolabs don't alter the images but
just print what you gave them.

They most certainly, definitely, and emphatically do not do that, unless
they say they do.

I use printroom.com, which supports ICC profiles and will do your prints
exactly as you send them. There are others like that as well. If they
don't present themselves as a "pro" lab, you should assume they do not
do these things. Almost no consumer labs support a color-managed
workflow.

How do you prepare your images so that the prints will look right when a lab
does them?

The one thing you need to understand is that printed pictures will be
perceptually darker than what you see on screen. I apply a slight gamma
adjustment to files I send for printing. You sometimes lose the deepest
shadows anyway; that's the nature of the beast. But, by and large, you're
doing nothing wrong other than using the wrong lab.

--
Jeremy |

default wrote:
Before everyone reminds me that I need a colour managed workflow,
here was the setup:

:-)

You have missed a step in your workflow. You must also use an output
profile to the photolab. There are 3 choices I can think of ATM.

1) Ask the photolab for a PS profile. This is unlikely with a low cost lab.

2) Find out what printer the lab uses and use a generic profile.

3) Make a series of test prints and do a rough profile yourself.
I had reasonable results using this method with a photolab across
the road from where I work but it took about 30 prints and is still not
perfect.

-Mike

I find it astounding that you would invest all that money, time and effort
(CS2, Spyder, 20 inch LCD) and then worry about the cost of printing your
own images.
You expect quality 4x6 images from a do it yourself kiosk?
This is not a joke?
The money you wasted on the LCD alone would cover many months of printing
costs.
Pennywise and dollar foolish.
Buy the printer.

"Jeremy Nixon" wrote in message
...

The one thing you need to understand is that printed pictures will be
perceptually darker than what you see on screen. I apply a slight gamma
adjustment to files I send for printing. You sometimes lose the deepest
shadows anyway; that's the nature of the beast. But, by and large, you're
doing nothing wrong other than using the wrong lab.


Thank you, Jeremy. I knew they would be a bit darker and not quite the same
as the print reflects light and the monitor emits.

I wasn't expecting such a large cropping (about 3/16" of the picture is
missing on all sides). I've had prints done elsewhere but I didn't compare
them carefully until I got these back and wondered how I blew out the
highlights so bad and what happened to the detail in the dark areas that
were now black. Then I compared carefully and was shocked how bad the
prints were when the image on the monitor looked so good and wasn't blown
out at all.

I'll have to look around for a different place, or go to a small shop where
the owner runs it and I can ask to have them unprocessed, just printed.

Do photolabs use an enlarger and do chemical prints, or are they just inkjet
or laser prints on photopaper?

default wrote:

I wasn't expecting such a large cropping (about 3/16" of the picture is
missing on all sides).

Borderless ("full bleed") prints are always cropped to some extent, and
always were, even with film. Some places less than others; it depends on
how precise they try to be when projecting the image onto the paper.
Personally, I order my prints with white borders, which results in no
cropping at all. I prefer the look anyhow.

I'll have to look around for a different place, or go to a small shop where
the owner runs it and I can ask to have them unprocessed, just printed.

Well, you need more than just unprocessed; for the absolute best results,
you need a lab that actually supports a color-managed workflow. Then you
can leave your files in Adobe RGB or whatever other working space you use,
and the output will be correct.

The place I mentioned, printroom.com, does this, and also provides an ICC
profile for soft-proofing. (There is no need for you to do the color space
conversion.) A "pro" lab should have no trouble with this, and it frees you
from needing to do test prints, adjustments, and whatever other nonsense.
It also frees you from having to convert to sRGB, which is good since almost
all printing processes, especially photographic ones, are capable of colors
outside the sRGB gamut.

Do photolabs use an enlarger and do chemical prints, or are they just inkjet
or laser prints on photopaper?

They will be photographic (optical) enlargements, but nowadays the paper is
usually exposed with a laser in the digital printing machines. Google
"Fuji Frontier" to get an idea.

--
Jeremy |

"Mike Warren" wrote in message
...

You have missed a step in your workflow. You must also use an output
profile to the photolab. There are 3 choices I can think of ATM.

1) Ask the photolab for a PS profile. This is unlikely with a low cost
lab.


I doubt the counter guy would have a clue what it is but maybe a manager
would know.


2) Find out what printer the lab uses and use a generic profile.


This is an interesting idea if the printer they use is reasonably consistant
with others of the same type.



3) Make a series of test prints and do a rough profile yourself.

This may be be fairly good. I can compare the originals to the prints and
figure out what levels they are clipping to and pre-compress the dynamic
range of the picture into this region.

Thanks for your suggestions.

default wrote:

Consumables for a colour printer is an ongoing expense. Printers can be
quite a hassle, especially if you don't use them frequently. Ink cartridges
dry out and get unreliable necessitating early replacement. The real cost
per print for a consumer printer for my infrequent use would be very high.
Besides, after spending thousands to get well set-up, I don't want
significant ongoing expenses.

Ordering photographic prints is cheaper than doing your own printing on a
really good inkjet, and the results are better to boot. With a real,
color-manged workflow all the way to output, you have total control over
the result.

Do most people have low contrast images and it makes them look better by
clipping the extremes?

Yes. Think of the average consumer. They are impressed by oversaturated,
contrasty images that "pop", or whatever sound it is they're supposed to
make. That's the target audience. They don't *want* their pictures to
look just like the files they're sending. They would complain if they
did, and go somewhere else where they would oversaturate them and clip
their highlights and shadows just the way they like it.

Maybe they think if they crop a few percent of each side, the image will
match the 95% view that the viewfinders give?

That's just being sloppy. Think back to the darkroom -- it's harder (takes
more time) to set up an enlarger to do a borderless print while preserving
as much of the frame as possible, than to just let the edges bleed off and
leave it. To really get it precise every time they would probably end up
having to adjust it for each run, at least sometimes. And no one but us
perfectionists is ever going to notice, so why bother?

--
Jeremy |

default wrote:


But thank you for your response. I appreciate differing opinions and
priorities and I might end up having to get my own printer anyway to
really have control of the process end to end.


This is why most people do their own printing, not trying to save money. As
you said the "minilab" 4X6 prints are cheap but this is yet again a case of
you get what you pay for. Also IMHO a good inkjet print looks better than
any of the comercially made prints I've had done even at "pro" labs.
--

Stacey

In article Yp%_f.5066$7a.876@pd7tw1no,
"default" wrote:


I'll have to look around for a different place, or go to a small shop where
the owner runs it and I can ask to have them unprocessed, just printed.

Good inkjet printers are surprisingly cheap (although the ink is sometimes
costly). Get yourself a good printer and calibrate your computer and
printer so you get what you expect.

Do photolabs use an enlarger and do chemical prints, or are they just inkjet
or laser prints on photopaper?

You mean do they take your CD, generate an image on a projector, project
it onto photosensitive paper and process it chemically to create a print?
While that is technically possible (in fact, that is how a lot of movies
are made--shot digitally and converted to film for distribution), that is
not what a typical photo lab would do. They use an inkjet or laser
printer and photo quality printer paper, just as you would do at home,
only with more professional equipment. "More professional" does not
necessarily mean better results, however.

The difference is, at home, you can control the quality. At a photo lab,
unless you want to pay for custom work, you may get no better than what
you got on the K-Mart machine. And that applies to film as well as
digital prints, except it is probably easier for a lab to screw up a
digital print.

Also, keep in mind that a monitor and a printer will not have the same
color characteristics. You have to calibrate each separately. A picture
adjusted to look good from a printer, may not look good on a monitor and
vice versa. But calibration software will take care of that for you.

Merritt