I recently have begun to print a number of my from my K10D, but have had serious issues with many of the local drug store and one-hour photo shops printing the images 1-2 stops underexposed, and on occasion even more. During the days of film I never seemed to have this many issues with printing images. Today I took some fireworks shots into a (*gasp*) WalMart to have them printed and I walked out of there disgusted. All of images looked flat, and the colors were substantially duller than the were out of the camera. In the firework shots, the only PP work that was done was some minor cropping to cut out some of the smoke/haze left behind from the bursts.
While I dont mind paying a premium for good quality prints or enlargements, its nice to be able to get inexpensive prints in bulk so that I have something to show friends. If the print gets fingerprints on it, or creased, its no big deal, but the prints Ive been getting back, especially those from WalMart have been nothing short of pathetic...
The biggest disappointment was in the image below. After spending several hours in CS3 balancing this shot so that the sky remained dark, the lightning bright but not overexposed, and the foreground exposed enough so you could recognize the houses and trees (while still giving the feel that this was shot at around 1 AM), WalMart returned to me a print that was almost solid black minus a white spot in the middle and one bright white line down the center.
Can anyone recommend perhaps a good ONLINE site for purchasing prints? Adorama has sent me a number of enticing emails...I think I may give them a try. Has anyone used their service? Would they get a shot like this right?