Our friends at The Imaging Alliance have put together four helpful guides for imaging enthusiasts. We’ll be sharing one a week this August. You’ll find any additional editorial comments inside brackets. Enjoy! – Blog Master
Smartphones are incredible inventions; amongst other things, they have revolutionized the way we capture our treasured memories. Having a digital camera always in hand with such large storage capacity makes photo taking and video recording as easy as a swipe and a click. However, the one downfall of such ease of use is that we tend to capture these moments in our lives – and then never do anything with the photos that result. They stay on our camera rolls indefinitely, lost to time and to lots and lots of scrolling.
Combining easy digital smartphone capture with the ability to manage and print our photos, allows us to enjoy them in a variety of physical capacities. If you’re feeling overwhelmed by the thought of going through all your digital pictures in order to print them, don’t worry—we’re here to help you through the process!
Photo retailers have come a very long way—as the digital age evolved, so did they! Check with your favorite photo retailer on how their customers currently send images in to be printed. Many allow you to send them in for print from the comfort of your own home. [Including Mike’s Camera! Just visit MCprintlab.com from any browser.]
Photo print apps can also make printing from your phone a snap. All you have to do is find and download the app that you think will work best for you and your photo collection. [Our mobile site is not an app, but is easily accessible at MCprintlab.com!—DS] The tools will all be there right beneath your fingertips.
Don’t feel like you need to print all of your images. We often take many more photos of a moment in time than are necessary. If you’re focusing on one particular time period—say, a family vacation!—give yourself a limit on how many you want to print. This will prevent you from cluttering your life with hundreds of photos that may never see the inside of an album or frame.
A wonderful feature of everyone owning smartphones is the ability to get photos from everyone in the family! Set up a Dropbox or online photo album that all family members can access and add to every month. At the end of the month, as a family, you can all go through the album and choose your favorites to print!
Printing from home has also never been easier. There are an incredible variety and selection of home photo printers on the market today, and they offer the incredible opportunity to print completely at your own leisure.
Don’t forget that there are options for your printed photos beyond frames and albums. Canvas prints, calendars, photo gifts, printed photo books – all of these are fun and interactive options for your precious family photos.
Treasure the sorting process – you get to relive those amazing digital memories as you go through and sort what you’d like to print. Just sorting them may even give you ideas as to how to use your printed photos in a way unique to you and your family.
