For Brides: Where Should I Print My Wedding Pictures?

This post is part of a series for brides (and grooms!) or for those who are helping someone plan a wedding. My goal for this series is to help you make informed and educated decisions about your wedding day so that it will be as beautiful as possible! If you're joining me for the first time, you can catch up here:

1. Should I Do an Engagement Session?
2. What Should I Wear for My Engagement Session?
3. Should I Do Bridal Portraits?
4. Making a Wedding Day Photography Timeline
5. How to Get Great Getting Ready Pictures
6. 6 Things Every Bride Should Get Ready for Her Photographer
7. Should We Do a First Look?
8. 5 Steps to Great Bride & Groom Portraits
9. How to Get Beautiful Ceremony Pictures
10. 6 Steps to Successful Family Formals
11. How to Get Beautiful Reception Pictures
12. Where Should I Print My Wedding Pictures?

I am ending this series with a post about printing wedding images because I think it's so important! In our day and age, everything has become so digital that people often loose sight of the significance of having tangible, printed things in front of them. There's just something about seeing your beautiful images in print and not just on a computer screen. And in my opinion, when you spend hundreds of dollars on wedding images, they deserve to be printed and displayed in your home! These are keepsakes you're going to treasure and pass on to the next generation.

What many people don't know is that you can tell a BIG difference between prints that come from a professional printing lab and prints that come from a consumer lab. Getting the color printed accurately on your images is very important and professional quality labs will give you drastically better results than other, cheaper options. Professional labs also offer higher quality photo paper, higher quality inks, and special coatings that ensure your images are resistant to things like finger prints, dust, and fading. In case you're still not convinced, here's a post by another photographer that shows you the difference between getting prints from a professional vs. a consumer lab.

I am happy to share with you that I offer professional prints directly through your PASS gallery. All you have to do is click "add to cart" on the image you want and then select the size and quantity. I also offer canvases and albums (I will do a post on this later but you can also tell a HUGE difference between canvases and albums from a professional lab versus a consumer lab).

If professional prints aren't quite in your budget, here's a few good consumer labs I would recommend:

1. MPix
2. Nations Photo Lab

If you found this post helpful or interesting please share it and/or leave your thoughts or feedback in the comments section below! I am sad to share that this is my last post in the "For Brides" series! However, I have some exciting blog posts and series coming up so please visit again soon!

How I Share My Images

I often get the question, "How do you share your pictures?" "Will I get all my images or will I have to pay for each one?"

There are a lot of different types of photographers and methods of sharing images and so it can get confusing! I am what is called a "shoot and share" photographer. "Shoot and Share" is defined as "photographers that focus on service and share the high resolution photos with their clients" (you can learn more at shootandshare.com). Many photographers charge per image or only provide prints and products but "shoot and share" is a business model that allows customers to receive all the edited, high resolution images from their session and to share those images. 

A few years ago I made the decision to start using a professional photo sharing program called "PASS" and I have never looked back! I love PASS! You can learn more about PASS at pass.us.

Why I use PASS:

1. Digital Delivery and Instant Download
With PASS I can deliver all of my images through an online gallery instead of using a CD or USB. That means that my clients receive their images instantly and can send them to friends and family instantly! Instead of having to wait for a CD to come in the mail or having to pay an additional fee to have me mail a CD to family members, you get all of your pictures with the click of a button! I do deliver wooden USBs for weddings (because I think they're so pretty!) and I sell wooden USBs to anyone who would like one from a portrait session.

2. 10 Years of Cloud Storage
With PASS your images are stored on the cloud for 10 years! That means you can access your images online any time you would like. No more worrying about loosing a CD! I've found this feature super helpful with my own wedding pictures. There's been lots of times I've wanted to pull up a picture from my wedding to use on social media or to print out and they've all been available with just the click of a button.

3. Social Media Integration & A Mobile App
PASS integrates seamlessly with social media! You can automatically share an image through PASS onto Facebook or Pinterest. In addition, at the click of a button you can create an app that is added to your phone so you can access your gallery at any time. How cool is that?!

4. Beautiful Galleries
I love the way PASS galleries look! They're clean and simple. In addition, you can organize galleries by "collection." So for wedding pictures I create different collections for each part of the wedding day (for example: "Getting Ready," "First Look," etc.).

I hope you found this post helpful! If you have any more questions about how I share images please feel free to contact me or post a comment below.