Originally Posted by sitarro

I know this wasn't addressed to me but i do know a little about photography and dealing with labs.

I have always used Epson. The newer ones are available with archival ink but besides using the inks made by Epson be sure to get the best paper Epson makes. Their inks are formulated to work with the coatings that are on their paper. I use the Premium Glossy Photo Paper and I am still using my old Epson 820. It was less than 80 dollars and puts out lab quality prints if the best paper is used along with Photoshop color correction and sharpening.

If you find a lab that will actually print each shot rather than run the batch through an all in one unit you will get much better prints obviously than the minimum wage pimple face who is talking on the cell phone while the machine is pumping out your prints will give you.

All depends on what you want. Photographs are moments in time captured by you and can easily be priceless down the road. The same is true with motion pictures. My brother made my Father sit down and talk about his life, his recollections of WWII, some of his flying memories with the Air Force and later my Mother joined him and they spoke about the 57 years they had spent together. My dad was gone 6 months later, that film is priceless stuff. If you still have your parents around I can't recommend it enough to do the same.

I wouldn't get the printers that you just put a card in unless you don't have a program like Photoshop(seems to me my printer came with a version of Photoshop Elements). Those printers will make all the decisions you would make, for you, like the quick print photo labs. If you want to print 8x10s I think you will find that the cost is a lot closer to the regular lab cost. At any rate, you will learn a lot more about photography by printing them yourself even on a cheap desktop printer like my Epson.

Another option is available, I'm not sure where you need to go for a PC but with iphoto that comes with OSX on MACs you can get a variety of photo books custom made for relatively cheap. With Apple you have numerous templates available to insert your photos into, you add whatever text to each page, choose the size and cover material and send it to their sight. They have a deal with Kodak. For 30 dollars they print 10 pages both sides and put it in a 9x12 hard backed book, extra pages are .99 each. I would guess there would be something like it for PCs maybe through Kodak. They are very nice and make a great personalized gift to grandparents, parents, a potfolio with some class, etc. There are smaller books available including some with soft covers. Go into an Apple store and ask to see one, they usually have samples of the sizes available.