what do u do to produce the best quality digital prints?

[20Babies]

I have been using film camera for quite a long time and over the last year, i decided to try out digital. Equipped with my 10M DSLR, I have been snapping and storing the pics on my external HDD. Everything is so convenient. Recently, I brought in a batch of pics to Kodak shop to develop and was disappointed with the quality of the prints. I edited the pics (level, contrast, sharpness) before sending them to the shop. In fact, the manager helped me optimised the colour to suit the setting of his machine. At the end, the quality does not even get close to my film prints. What do u do to produce the best quality digital prints?
Thx

 

[Azure]

I get the reverse (kind of). I've been shooting digital, but when I print enlargements (S8R to 12R), my clients sometimes ask me what film I use! I'm using a Fujifilm S5 Pro (and the S3/S2 before that) and I print exclusively at selected Fuji outlets. Perhaps you'd like to share with us some samples of your images and what (if you do) you do with them before printing?

 

[photobum]

Try these few outlets and instruct them specifically not to adjust your images.

• Kim Tian
• Miao Laan
• Triple D
• Grace
• Konata (Penisula branch)
• Fotohub
• Colourlab

 

[gooseberry]

Is there anything in particular that you were disappointed in from the prints ? As Barnie mentioned, you might like to show some examples and describe what you do with them before printing (also without getting too technical, but do you know what colour space you save the images in before sending them off ?).

Also, not all labs give good quality prints (there was a time I was in a rush to give some friends some prints and didn't have time to go to my usual labs - used a lab near work, coincidentally a kodak lab (nothing wrong with kodak labs, I used to always use Kodak film, just pick the right one), and the prints turned out terribly, even for 4R prints).

Suggest you try the labs mentioned above by photobum (although I think Beautiful Memories is no longer around). Another very good lab I've personally gotten good S8R prints from is Aspario Digital labs.

 

[20Babies]

I have to go back home to post the pics for u to see.
BTW, which is the best site for me to upload my pic so that I can attach the pic on this thread?

 

[20Babies]

Here r 2 sample pics which I have developed.....
What do u think of my editing?
Any advice appreciated as long as i can improve on the quality of my digital print.
Thx.

 

[20Babies]

let me try posting again....

 

[20Babies]

this is very strange...
i have a problem in posting my pics.
Can anyone help?

 

[gooseberry]

Here you go....

 

[gooseberry]

No wonder you had poor prints, you were using an Olympus camera...

Hehehe... sorry, just kidding. ;p

Seriously, to me the photo looks fine. Should be able to print a nice print. As I asked earlier, what in particular were you disappointed in from the prints ?

 

[20Babies]

How did u post the pic? plse teach me.
I was unhappy with the quality becos the print came out not as good as my film print. I cannot put it in words, but the digital prints look artificial. Not natural.

 

[20Babies]

testing....

 

[chanxj]

ok. I think i get what you mean here. It could be that the digital labs have over sharpened your picture(which urs is actually already sharpened heavily from what i see and maybe have added too much contrast to your liking. But frankly speaking, do not expect the prints to look exactly like film. I dunno how to explain this, but the output from film is very different in my opinion. Maybe try to print without any editing on your end, and maybe just density correction without other color, contrast and sharpness etc. correction and see if the result is what you want. It could just be ur sharpening being too harsh thus making the prints look artifical. I had a problem with fuji labs in the past as they tend to come out with very punchy prints(high contrast and sharpening processing) which were not to my taste. Thus now I only print on Kodak and at selected shops

 

[20Babies]

silly me...I now know how to post.

 

[catchlights]

I believe the print out you get is over sharpen, over saturated,

Remember during the film days, you need not do anything for the post, the lab will adjust it for you. If you need to do the post production yourself, need to tell the lab not to correct it for you anymore.

Do note once you corrected the image, especially over correct it, there is no way the lab can make it more natural or reverse it.

and my advise to you is just leave the images as it is, except re-cropping, leave the adjustment to the lab, unless you can do a better job than them.

btw, photobum has recommended you some of the labs are known to be very good and consistent in quality printing.

Hope this help.

 

[LittleWolf]

How did u post the pic? plse teach me.
I was unhappy with the quality becos the print came out not as good as my film print. I cannot put it in words, but the digital prints look artificial. Not natural.

I don't know what the prints look like, but the images you posted have excessively steep contrast and look pretty bad even on my screen.

 

[JediForce4ever]

I don't know what the prints look like, but the images you posted have excessively steep contrast and look pretty bad even on my screen.

It looks okay on my calibrated screen.

 

[chanxj]

Everyone has different color and artistic view.