Photo Lab Comparisons

Has anyone done this with their own prints? I've seen some online and thought that it would be a good idea to show clients. I have a digital copy as you can see here and an actual printed copy in a frame that I show people (I'll get a photo later). I didn't do anything to the non-pro lab prints, I actually tried to help them out. It's scary the differences between a pro-lab and a big box store in terms of print quality.

Best if viewed in full size (click):

http://www.jrogdenphotography.com/im...1507798506.png

James,

Did you specify to each lab that they turn off all auto-corrections?

I used to have a terrible time with Walgreens. Years ago, I would get prints done there but sometimes they just didn't look right. I found out that they automatically applied corrections to images that were processed there. I asked them to not apply those corrections to my images - and "voila," they looked very similar to what I was seeing on my color calibrated monitor.

I'm not sure what the other labs' policies are - whether they make automatic adjustments or not.

Yes, when I was at the kiosk, I made sure that they didn't adjust them in any way. Wal-mart had defaulted to auto-corrections which I had to shut off. You can't really tell here, but when you look at the prints closely they are grainy but the one from Mpix is not.

I've compared Walgreens, mpix, snapfish and Walmart. Mpix was the best. Walgreens was hit or miss. Snapfish used to be good, but I wasn't too happy last fall.

I try to turn corrections off, but may not always be successful.