Professional Labs

[AXENA]

I know that this is not in the "PRINTING" section of the forum, however, after a search in that section, I could not find a suitable answer to my question, and was hoping that the pros over here could provide some useful insight.

My question is this:

While I do quite a bit of private portraits and sports photography, lately, I have been requested to shoot more and more weddings and engagements. This is fine, however, my current output is on an Epson 2220. I have corrected the problems I encountered earlier with this printer and the prints are really great. However, for a wedding, there will undoubtedly be multiple prints ordered and the customers will be seeking only the highest grade photo possible (for the money spent... I don't blame them). While I do believe the 2200 can rival lab quality to some extent, I don't want to cheat my customers.

Therefore, I am seeking a professional lab (NOT COSTCOs or WALLMART, etc) that specializes in weddings, etc. Do any of the pros here know of a REPUTABLE online lab processor (i.e. such as Lenzart, etc) that can do quality prints at a reasonable cost?

Any help is greatly appreciated. Thank you all......
-GSL

[mgbeach]

Check out White House Custom Color at http://www.whcc.com . They do really great work. Regardless of the size of the order, there is free second-day UPS shipping.

[Digital Prophet]

I use MPix (http://www.mpix.com) and can't say enough good things about them. Excellent work, incredible delivery times. If I put an order in before 9:00 am CST it is at my office 24 hours later. And shipping costs are good at $5 for post and $10 for overnight FedEx.

But the only thing is that they don't "specialize" in weddings. So they don't do the albums and what not.

- Digital Prophet -

[d'homme]

Just a thought, but my local lab takes my CD. Saves me time uploading. And its about the same time frame getting prints back. Just a thought.

[MTalley]

The CD route is handy if the lab is nearby. Our one and only local lab is a 45 minute drive from my house.

[Digital Prophet]

I just got promotions package from a place called Pictage (http://www.pictage.com/photodisplay/PHOTODISPLAY/login.xml?producer=security&xsl=xsl/v3/automatic_authenticate.xsl&continueUrl=AUTO&facility=v3&forced=false). And I have to say that I was SO impressed.

Maybe you ought to check them out. I know that I will be investigating them more in the near future.

- Digital Prophet -

[PhotosGuy]

I just looked at Pictage (haven't used them) & their album design is excellent!
http://newaccounts.pictage.com/album.htm

[MTalley]

I sent off the questionnaire to WHCC last night. I noticed after filling it out that at the very bottom of the page it mentions that the questionnaire is currently off-line for maintenance. It submitted fine, anyway. Just wondering how long it takes them to get back to you after submitting, so I'll know when to bug them if I don't hear from them. I'm going to give them a week or so.