Please, need advice having pictures printed

[Virginia]

I am ready to print my pictures from my new digital camera for the first time and I have a few questions.

I want to manipulate a few pictures before I have them printed at a photo place. I like to using TIFF format rather than jpeg, but I am not sure if that will be OK at the photo lab.

What I thought I would do is download the pics to my computer in TIFF format, manipulate them in Photoshop and change them to the exact standad size that I want them and save them (still TIFF) in a CD to have them printed. Is that the way it works? Do they take CD or does it have to be a picture card?

Also, is there a place that you guys recommend to have pics printed? I have about 200 pictures and I'd like to take them to Sav-on or Long Drugs for convenience but I really want to get a very good printing quality. So if the difference is significant, I'll take them somewhere else. I just don't want to spend hours uploading 200 pictures on-line

Thanks for your help.

[another view]

I want to manipulate a few pictures before I have them printed at a photo place. I like to using TIFF format rather than jpeg, but I am not sure if that will be OK at the photo lab.

There really isn't much need for shooting in TIFF format. Both TIFF and JPEG assign the color balance, contrast, sharpening, etc to the file but the difference is TIFF isn't compressed. If you shoot JPEGs with the least compression (fine mode) you'll end up with very high quality images that can make excellent prints - but they have to be handled correctly. TIFF's take up tons of card space and make the camera run slower for very small (if any noticable) benefit. If your camera has the ability to shoot in RAW mode, then that's worth talking about (RAW lets you set color balance, etc later)...

What I thought I would do is download the pics to my computer in TIFF format, manipulate them in Photoshop and change them to the exact standad size that I want them and save them (still TIFF) in a CD to have them printed. Is that the way it works? Do they take CD or does it have to be a picture card?

Once you bring a JPEG in to the computer (or TIFF in this case), open it in Photoshop to do all of your editing. Save it only one more time as a JPEG at the highest quality setting (level 12 on Photoshop CS). You probably will never see a difference between this and a TIFF file if you do it this way (my experience). Nothing wrong with a TIFF file here though - although you probably have to take it to a lab to be printed (Fuji Frontier minilabs at Walmart, etc don't take TIFFs). Burn it to a CD or right back to the memory card - either way.

I use a Fuji Frontier minilab at a local store for quick prints and a lab that has a big Epson for larger prints (Fuji maximum is 10x15). Quality of even the .18 Fuji 4x6's is very good. Try a few and see what you think.

[Dave Gold]

I'm trying to develop my digital pictures at a local Walmart for the first time, problem is that the Fuji computer does not recognize the JPEG edited in PhotoShop, why is that? Can I do anything about it?

Thanks,
Dave G.

[christopher_platt]

I'm trying to develop my digital pictures at a local Walmart for the first time, problem is that the Fuji computer does not recognize the JPEG edited in PhotoShop, why is that? Can I do anything about it?

Thanks,
Dave G.

The Fuji kiosk at our Wal-Mart (Salinas, CA) recognizes both JPEGs and TIFFs from photoshop. Could it be a software issue (I mean the software installed on the fuji kiosk). . .
Chip

PS As a response to the original question: I've always had a HORRIBLE time with Walgreens. STAY AWAY (IMHO)! When all of my prints came out as yellow cards with a generic Windows icon and the file name written in big bitmapped looking letters, the district manager (who argued with me for twenty minutes before giving me my money back) looked at me dumbfounded. Everyone I know who's ever taken anything to walgreens (digital or film) has been sorry. Complete opposite for walmart though. My brother in law took some files there to get printed and they came out nice. . .