Is photo printing dead?

Do you still print photos? Seems like such an outdated practice. But some of us that grew up with it still do it. Are younger generations aware of this practice? Is the service just as accessible as before? Do you print at home? What about scheduled family portraits? Has the digital age killed photo printing?

I am considered a millennial. I am 33 years old, so I still remember printing photos. We would print photos because we couldn’t see the picture you just took. You had to wait until you printed it to see if it was a good photo. A standard roll of film had about 24 pictures. This amount made you more conscious about how you would choose to take a picture because your supply is limited. So you take your vacation or go the wedding and send your film to get developed and finally get to relive the memories. Then you see somebody closed their eyes in a picture, or somebody photo bombed, or the lighting was off. That was the age we lived in, so I am grateful that the technology has now allowed for us to better capture moments. We can review it instantly and hope we still have a chance to retake. So we take all these pictures and printing them is the only way to see them. But why do we print them now?

Since the photos we took were limited because of the film, we had to really plan out or think twice about the shot. Now a photo doesn't take much memory on a phone, so it is nearly unlimited. A phone? Another phrase you will hardly hear anymore, “I wish somebody had a camera!” Unless you’re actually looking for higher quality photos and control over the shot you want, most cameras on our phones are pretty good quality. This is now almost an integral part and deciding factor for some as to which phone you will purchase next. Since we can take so many photos, has the quality of the photo decreased. I don’t mean the dimensions and resolution, I mean the criteria for what constitutes picture worthy. Most of our phones could be filled with useless things, such as a pictures of text, screenshots, etc. These are things are obviously not taken for the same reasons as you would a photograph, with the intent of capturing a memory. But all those selfies you take, do you have the intent of printing? Why? Why not? Cameras on phones have been around long enough now that you probably have gone through several camera phones. Do you still have the pictures from your first phone? Digital or printed? If you don't, is it a real big loss or had you already forgotten? Had you given it any thought before now? This is what I mean by the quality of the photos we take. What percentage of those photos in your phone right now would you be unhappy about losing?

I still print photos, but not in the same way. I don't just get prints to keep in a box and show them to people like that. I mentioned accessibility earlier. It is probably a tiny bit harder to find places that print now. Walgreens is the first one that pops in my head. Before they used to be at Walmart, K-mart etc. Although the service might still be available online, is rare to see it in store.  also with printing, there have been technological advancements. Printers offer software online, where you can make your pictures more presentable. I still print, but now I print into books. After every vacation, and at the end of every year, I look over my pictures, edit them, and place them into a book. It is almost like a scrapbook, but a little more organized And professional looking in my opinion. So even though the services aren't as accessible as before, they definitely have more options. 

Along with those options are big prints, onto different materials, such as canvas, wood, and metal. And again, I like to print photos, but these are the options I like to take advantage of. Technological advancements have allowed for better product options from printing businesses, or simply printing at home. Printing at home is also a very convenient option. But what does it take for you to want to print a picture?

How many of you schedule family portraits? You go to a studio, dressed up and purchase prints for your home? How often? What kind of pictures are up on your wall? The photos of us that are on our wall are from our wedding. Now that we have ur first child, it may be time to update them.

So has the digital age killed photo printing? Maybe it has just evolved. We have more options, and better tools to help us keep track of our memories. And if you haven’t purchased a print in a while, I recommend you do so. Take advantage of the newer options. Find a photo from your last vacation, print it on canvas. Or from your last birthday, or group photo with friends, and print it on wood. I guarantee you will not regret it. Although I am also guilty of having junk images on my phone, whenever I look over the photo books of our vacations or the previous years, it is a very different experience than just looking at it on your phone or computer. Holding and seeing a large photo print right in front of you, makes you relive the memory in a very different way. But my favorite thing about this whole process, is it makes you evaluate the way you take photos. Out of all the photos you’ve taken, you either already have that one in mind out of a hundred that you would like to print, or you don’t have any in mind out of the hundreds of pictures you’ve taken. Either way, what does that say about the way you are taking photos?