Printing S45 Photos on Shutterfly.com

[Jon77]

I own a Canon PowerShot S45 and am about to order print photos from Shutterfly for the first time. I want to know, however, whether the photos that I uploaded to Shutterfly will reflect the full 4 megapixel power of my S45.

The photos that I uploaded were taken at Large setting, Superfine. When I uploaded them to Shutterfly, I did NOT minimize their size. They were 2-3 megabytes a piece.

However, in the Shutterfly scrapbook, my S45 photos are posted in 4 x 6, which is fine, but I cannot expand them to their full glory on Shutterfly like I can on my computer.

I want to know, then, whether Shutterfly can print my 4 Megapixel, Large, Superfine S45 photos at maximum 8x10 power without graniness or loss of detail, despite the fact that I cannot expand them in the Shutterfly scrapbook. I want to know whether Shutterfly just blows up the 4x6 version they included in the scrapbook (thereby losing resolution) or does Shutterfly work with the original 2-3 MB file that I uploaded from them, allowing me to print big pictures at high resolution. That would be very dissapointing if Shutterfly restricts the potential of photos.

[sean000]

Shutterfly should be storing your photos in the same resolution and file size that you posted, but their website may not offer high-resolution viewing. Many websites allow only thumbnail and lower resolution viewing so the general public can't right-click and save a hi-res image of yours. They can only order high quality prints.

I prefer www.clubphoto.com for several reasons:

- They offer free memberships, but If you pay $25 a year, 4x6 prints are only 25 cents and you get 5% off all purchases.
- They offer 4xD (digital) which matches the aspect ratio of the Canon and other digital cameras (4x6 is a slightly differenct aspect ratio).
- You can choose to allow others to view and download high resolution (full size) copies of your images. I allow people to do this since I'm not a professional photographer and I'm not concerned with copyright issues. I know some of my friends would rather print the hi-res image on their own printer instead of ordering from clubphoto.
- You can order prints from 4xD (or 4x6) all the way up to 24x36 posters (they will alert you if the resolution isn't high enough to produce a quality image at any given print size).
- The $25 annual membership nets you 20 albums of 100 images each... no limit on file size so you can upload all high resolution images. There is a $35 membership that bumps you to 40 albums and includes more features for professional photographers.

Overall I'd say the quality is very nice with Clubphoto. Most reviews rank Clubphoto, Ofoto, and Shutterfly among the best in print quality. I went with Clubphoto because of the additional features. I also find their website easy to use, and the prints usually ship very quickly. I ordered some printed and bound photo-albums as holiday gifts and was amazed that I got them in just a few days (I had to pay for express shipping though).

My albums are viewable at
http://members13.clubphoto.com/sean646645/guest-1.phtml

[relux]

Hello, I also have a question about these print places. I have the S50, to get a decent 4x6 photo printed, what size and resolution should these be uploaded at? Also, most of you who do get prints done, do you always shoot in superfine and what size? Am new to the camera thing, so bare with me :)

-Chad.

[sean000]

relux wrote:
Hello, I also have a question about these print places. I have the S50, to get a decent 4x6 photo printed, what size and resolution should these be uploaded at? Also, most of you who do get prints done, do you always shoot in superfine and what size? Am new to the camera thing, so bare with me :)

-Chad.

According to Club Photo's website, a 4x6 needs to be at least 640x480, but I would shoot as high res as you can so you can crop. I always shoot in Superfine and save as a Large JPEG or RAW image, but I also have a 350MB Microdrive CF card.... so I have the space to spare. If I had only a 16MB or 32MB card, I'd be using a lower quality setting... but I'd soon invest in at least a 128MB CF Card. They have come way down in price.