Photographic prints from your digital files

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File Uploads We accept files in many formats, but most users find JPEG (JPG) works best.  The files are well compressed, so the upload time is minimized.  If you use the high quality compression option, compression losses will not be detectable.  

If you are using Photoshop, when you save the file, the program will ask you for an image quality number (1 being poorest, 12 being best).  Use 10-12, for the best quality.

You may upload up to 10 photos at a time.  We have no upper limit on file size.  However, some ISP's have limits on upload time (e.g., 15 minutes to 1 hour).  If you are uploading large files, you may wish to upload them one at a time so as to make sure your ISP doesn't pull the plug based on upload time.
Print Sizes Our minimum size is 4" x 4".  Our maximum is 40" x 72".  Larger sizes are available on special order.
Print Quality We print all files, large or small, at 300 pixels per inch (PPI).

If you use our on-line editing tools, we expand your files if necessary so that text and line art are printed at 300 pixels per inch, for maximum sharpness.
Color Balance We use HP Designjet 5000 printers with #81 dye.  We do 3-dimensional color calibrations using an Epson flatbed scanner.  Our color algorithm checks output with about 5,000 colors, and interpolates for the remaining roughly 16 million colors.  

Every monitor is different.  If you have particularly exacting color balance requirements, you may wish to order a small sample prior to ordering many large prints.
Production, Delivery times In most cases, orders received on a business day by Noon, Central Time, will ship the same day.  We ship by US Mail Priority Mail or FedEx, based on your choice at the time of ordering.
Why edit on-line? Our on-line photo editor has most of the basic photo editing functions (e.g., rotation, crop, lightness/contrast adjust, color balance adjust, vignette, add borders, add captions) plus some capabilities which are less common (e.g., stitch to make panoramas, make calendars, or create a kaleidoscope).

Some users edit on-line to avoid the cost of purchasing a photo editor.  However, the best reason for editing on-line is to save time.  For example, suppose you wish to add a caption and a calendar to a 3 megapixel photo, with the intention of printing the result at 20" x 30".  For the text and line art to be sharp, the 20" x 30" file should be 6,000 x 9,000 pixels -- 54 megapixels.  If you do these operations on your own computer, you will ultimately need to transfer to us the entire 54 megapixels.  If you do this operation on-line, you need to transfer only 3 megapixels, plus a small number of instructions.  
How to use the on-line editor After you upload images, click "edit image".  From there you can make changes and/or additions, one at a time.  At any time you can click "undo previous operation",  and back up as many steps as you wish.

When you are done editing, you must click either "save to replace" or "save at end of directory" for your changes to be retained in your on-line directory.