Is Pictage overpriced? Is there a better choice?

[lovinsparkles]

Hi PS,

I''ve got a question re: photographs for those who might have been through this before.

We eloped last month, but had a photographer capture everything so that we could share with friends and family later. She loaded all our images onto Pictage, which we can then "release" to everyone to view and purchase from that site. After we release them however, she will also send us a CD of the images.

My question is whether there is any advantage to purchasing prints through Pictage? They seem wildly overpriced to me based on typical prices for one 4x6 photograph, but maybe the quality or something makes it worth it? Have other people purchased through Pictage, and recommend this? Or does it make more sense to wait for the CD and find a less expensive printer? If so, any suggestions for an alternative (ex. would Snapfish provide similar quality?)?

Thanks for any advice!!

 

[AllieLuv83]

I really think the only benefit is having your pictures printed by a professional studio. I only printed some of my epics once at walmart and they came out lookin icky, like over exposed much brighter than they looked going in. I dont know if walmart tweaks the images or what but they looked bad. I might try to print them again and see if the same thing happens.

 

[v!v!]

I believe the photographer sets the price on Pictage. My photographers starting point on a 4x6 picture was $18! It''s just another way for them to make more money off of their clients. I bought the cd from my photographer, printed the photos at Costco and my mom bought one of the photos from Pictage so we could compare the print quality. Absolutely no difference...

 

[lovinsparkles]

Hmm, interesting. Thanks for the feedback.

v!v!, I''m hoping it works that way for us too. Maybe I''ll order a few of my absolute faves from Pictage, but have most done from the CD by Snapfish or something.

 

[BigDiamonds]

FWIW, my photographer does something similar. In his case, though, the digital images released on the CD are the raw, untouched originals. The photos that he puts on Pictage are generally tweaked, color-corrected, hand colored, or otherwise digitally enhanced. So you can reprint all the normal photos for cheap, but if you want the special ones then you have to order through him. However, even the original images are still quite good, for most purposes I will probably save the $ and print on my own.

You may want to try printing through a local camera shop, you might get a little more control over quality than someplace like Wal-Mart or Costco. I''ve printed a lot of pictures in those places, and it''s about 50/50 - half the time they''re great, and half the time they''re weird or off in some way.

 

[blinkydoll]

I think Pictage is way overpriced. My photographer uses them also. He also issued a credit to try them. But I found the quality pretty bad! I had to have them reprint almost all of them again. And they weren''t that much better. But then again,, I''m really picky about prints.
I got all the high rez files... so I have been printing them myself. MPix.com is pretty good too--- they have some good better paper choices.

 

[SarahLovesJS]

I was happy with the smaller prints I received from Pictage, haven''t tried any larger ones yet. Prices didn''t seem too crazy to me personally.