Photobug: Endangered Species

[realthaideal]

I'm so over Photobug. They are #1 in CM, have the best equipment, the biggest choice, but their customer service is soooo pathetic. I'm just done with them.

For instance - and this is about the third time this has happened - I took in some digital pix to print early one afternoon. They would be ready in about two hours but I don't actually come in until about 5 hours later. They had only printed 2/3's the pix, and forgotten about the file I needed printed as 2 copies of each. That took ten minutes to sort out, then.... wait half hour for the pix. Pictures not sized correctly...many with heads chopped off, perhaps my fault on a couple because of digital resizing etc.

So I ask them to redo about 15 of them which they say I can pick up the next day. I tell them I'll be back in three days. I get there yesterday... everyone's watching a movie or standing around. Few minutes to interrupt them, one guy goes to the back. Few minutes later I send another girl to the back, why am I waiting for five minutes with no word about the pix when they should already be done ? Problem with the machine, please wait 20 mins, we'll have them for you. Three days you still didn't print them ??!! Or problem with the machine, you oughta call me and let me know not to waste my time. Patience running thin. Twenty min later here they are, and though they resized them for me, they did not do so with any care as to say, the people in the pictures, so still heads chopped off, though pic resized - cropped incorrectly. Left with a feeling that they couldn't give a fkuc who I am, or about what they're doing. I take only a couple as I need them immediately, but feel that's the end of me n Phtotbug. I refuse to buy the other crappy prints. I politely explain the problems to the one of the owners and that this is just sub-standard, and that they will not continue to grow if they don't give a rat's ass about their service. And believe me this was all done in polite, apologetic Thai. Not hot-headed Farang English. I really wish it weren't this way, and that somebody would actually show some interest in customer care.

On the way home I can't believe they fail so badly to show any interest in caring about customer service. They know me. I always speak politely to them in Thai. They know I'm a friend of a big photog guy in town who goes there. They know I buy equipment from them. They know I've bought alot of prints from them over the years. They know I've sent other customers to them for prints and to buy cameras. I have helped spread word of mouth, and helped them make their precious money. Not only am I treated like any other old Joe, I get crappy service and product. And waste my time. If that's what the avg customer gets, then why would anybody ever go there?

I have a whole other crazy story about getting camera servicing with them which I'll just save for later. Pretty hilarious and frustrating what went down. And likewise, shows they couldn't care less.

So where else do people go to get their prints developed with care and timeliness. And how about the pricing too? I would love to have some alternatives to go to. Photobug is 5b/pic. That's US prices. IMO, if you wanna charge me a top quality US price, you darned well better give me top quality product and service for that price. Your reward will not only be my patronage but my recommendation to those I know. Good service and product will always be rewarded.

[FolkGuitar]

I'm so over Photobug. They are #1 in CM, have the best equipment, the biggest choice, but their customer service is soooo pathetic. I'm just done with them.

[sNIP of good rant with many valid points for the sake of time.]

So where else do people go to get their prints developed with care and timeliness.

First, ALWAYS use the shop on Chayaphum Rd., not the one in Panthip Plaza.

Next, ALWAYS ask for "Jum" or "Pop." They are the young couple who own the shops, (maybe they are not so young, and I'm just really getting old....) and really DO care about customer service. Have them take care of you. The others in the shop are just hired staff, and while usually better than in other camera shops around town, are still just hired staff. Deal with the owners.

Tell them exactly what you want. In fact, it wouldn't hurt to write your needs on a piece of paper so they can match up the results with your requests. No need to use Thai. In fact, that may confuse the issue a bit although I know that your Thai is very good. Both Jum and Pop speak very good English, and will always try to satisfy your needs.

Not once, in the years that they've been open, have they messed up any order for me, not delivered on time (except once when the Bangkok distributor didn't come through on a back ordered item,) and always give me the service and products that I need, and I use their services and products quite often. Perhaps more than most folk. There 'was' another shop at the intersection of Suthep Road and Neimanheiman Roads that did wondeful printing, but they failed to modernize when digital came in, and so went out of business. Other than those two, I'd use pro labs in Bangkok....

[TheEmperorOfTheNorth]

I use the Fuji shop half way down Suthep Road. It's cheap, and they listen to what I want, even when I'm being ridiculous. ("I'd like 5 of these on glossy paper, 12 of those non-glossy 4R, this one I'd like big, but please do a test print first so I can check the colors, ........)

Now, any shop that doesn't throw me out at that point is a keeper.

[Rice_King]

Pictures not sized correctly...many with heads chopped off, perhaps my fault on a couple because of digital resizing etc.

You're setting yourself up for disappointment by leaving it to the staff at the photo shop to do the cropping for you. Crop the digitized photos yourself, using the same crop ratio as the desired finished print size. That way, "what you see is what you will get." The staff may not know (nor care) what part of the photo you consider the main point of interest.

[Cyberstar]

For a measly 5 Baht a photo one can't expect any consideration of individual photos - the about 1 Baht the shop makes after cost doesn't make it worth while also to load the photo into an editor, consider how to crop, save, etc. - what does people expect? The shop can setup the printer to either crop all or scale all. If photo ratios are off the standard one, 2:3, scaling (as to get everything) will leave a lot of white space, in which case there'll be a lot of customers complaining about that - or it will crop in which case there'll be a lot of customers complaining about that ... Third option is to charge according to manual time consumption and artistic consideration of how to crop - in which case there'll be a lot of customers nagging about that.

[TheEmperorOfTheNorth]

Yes, I completel agree. It works like this in digital photography, Ajarn Empy presides:

Many cameras take pictures in a 4:3 ratio. That means for example 2560 x 1920 pixels. When printing, this then gets translated to for example '4 R' size, i.e. a standard postcard size, which however is in a 6" x 4" inch size. Now, 6 : 4 is quite a bit wider than 4 : 3.

This is why photo shops give you the option, and GOOD photo shops such as the one I recommended earlier, ask you this prior to printing, along with your preferred paper type. They will give you the following options:

1. 'Fill in' -> Essentially the image is zoomed so that it fills the entire 6" width. This inevitably means that some stuff is lost near the top and/or near the bottom. GOOD photo shops will look at the image and decide this for every image, i.e. if in a group photo people's heads are near the top, then they will cut all of the needed space near the bottom. However you WILL lose some part of the picture, so also when taking pictures it's good to keep in mind not to have important elements too close to the top or the bottom.

2. Leave it 'as is', this means you end up with two white bands on the left and the right. This looks awful though you could cut the white stuff off, which will then leave you with something not post-card size but more square-ish like a TV image ratio sort of. Don't take this option.

3. (In theory, 'stretching' would also be possible but that would just distort the image)

Now, as per the suggestion above, if you feel you're better at deciding what gets on the picture and what doesn't than the photoshop dude, you could crop the pictures yourself on your computer, then load them back onto the memory stick or USB stick for printing. I've done this in the past, though really if it's a good photoshop then I personally don't find it worth the effort.

But if you do want to go this route, there's an excellent free and simple image processing tool that you can download called 'XN-View'. It can be downloaded here: http://www.xnview.com/ (It's similar to ACDSee that's often loaded on to computers in this region, however ACDSee is commerical software, not free and more than a little bloated; sometimes you want software to just do one thing and do it well. Also worth a look: Picasa, by Google. Some people find this easiest to use, especially people without prior experience with software that gives you more control.

Edited October 30, 2007 by TheEmperorOfTheNorth

[Greenside]

RTD, I think you've been a bit unlucky in your dealings with Photo-Bug - I've never had anything late or messed up size wise (although I must admit that I don't do lots and lots of prints) but I'd agree with some of the above posters that not all the staff who take print orders are quite on the ball so I never leave anything to chance when giving instructions. Earlier this year they installed a new printer and out of interest I did a test by sending an extra pair of identical files to what I thought of as a mass market consumer outlet in Central. Photo-Bug's were a bit more expensive even after discount but most people seemed to find the other lab's prints, although a touch warmer, were just as pleasing. I wasn't using a properly calibrated system so I can't say which were most accurate but in the absence of that, 'pleasingness' is as good a measure as any. PM me if you want to see the results.

Where Photo-Bug scores I think is that they do gloss prints larger than any of the other local outlets. I seem to remember trying to get some 10x12 prints of glossy business cards done a few months ago and finding they were the only ones who could do them. If anyone knows better I'd appreciate the information.

Can I take advantage of this photographically orientated thread to mention that the revived Chaing Mai Photographic Group will hold the first of its regular fortnightly meetings at Tuskers on Wednesday November 14 at 7.00? The emphasis will be on learning from each other to improve our picture taking, processing and presentation and topics to be covered in the future include composition, archiving, web gallery creation, preparing files for printing (OK, I just added that) and more. Everyone interested in photography is very welcome.

[FolkGuitar]

Yes, I completel agree. It works like this in digital photography, Ajarn Empy presides:

Many cameras take pictures in a 4:3 ratio. That means for example 2560 x 1920 pixels. When printing, this then gets translated to for example '4 R' size, i.e. a standard postcard size, which however is in a 6" x 4" inch size. Now, 6 : 4 is quite a bit wider than 4 : 3.

This is why photo shops give you the option, and GOOD photo shops such as the one I recommended earlier, ask you this prior to printing, along with your preferred paper type. They will give you the following options:

1. 'Fill in' -> Essentially the image is zoomed so that it fills the entire 6" width. This inevitably means that some stuff is lost near the top and/or near the bottom. GOOD photo shops will look at the image and decide this for every image, i.e. if in a group photo people's heads are near the top, then they will cut all of the needed space near the bottom. However you WILL lose some part of the picture, so also when taking pictures it's good to keep in mind not to have important elements too close to the top or the bottom.

2. Leave it 'as is', this means you end up with two white bands on the left and the right. This looks awful though you could cut the white stuff off, which will then leave you with something not post-card size but more square-ish like a TV image ratio sort of. Don't take this option.

3. (In theory, 'stretching' would also be possible but that would just distort the image)

Now, as per the suggestion above, if you feel you're better at deciding what gets on the picture and what doesn't than the photoshop dude, you could crop the pictures yourself on your computer, then load them back onto the memory stick or USB stick for printing. I've done this in the past, though really if it's a good photoshop then I personally don't find it worth the effort.

But if you do want to go this route, there's an excellent free and simple image processing tool that you can download called 'XN-View'. It can be downloaded here: <a href="http://www.xnview.com/" target="_blank">http://www.xnview.com/</a> (It's similar to ACDSee that's often loaded on to computers in this region, however ACDSee is commerical software, not free and more than a little bloated; sometimes you want software to just do one thing and do it well. Also worth a look: Picasa, by Google. Some people find this easiest to use, especially people without prior experience with software that gives you more control.

Real good suggestions here. When I posted my original answer, I just assumed that you were doing some post processing on your computer before you gave them the files to print. My bad....

DO IT! Spend a few minutes with PhotoShop CS2 or CS3 and make the corrections that you want before you give the files in to be printed. That way you'll have your crops exactly the way you want them, the levels and curves set exactly the way you want them, and contrast and sharpening (or bluring) exactly the way you want them. THEN give the files in to be printed. Better still, get yourself an Epson printer, calibrate your monitor and create printer profiles, and print them yourself. When you put the two side by side for comparison, well... there is no comparison. With a $400 Epson printer, Epson Ink, and Epson paper, you can out produce all of the shops in Chiang Mai. (If you're using an HP printer, use HP ink and HP paper. It DOES make a difference.) My 'main' printer can handle up to A3 size paper, but I usually have to special order that paper size as few places carry Epson Photo Glossy in A3 size. My smaller Epson can put out prints as good as any shop in town, but you DO have to calibrate your monitor and create printer profiles first to get that kind of quality.

[tigerbeer]

Real good suggestions here. When I posted my original answer, I just assumed that you were doing some post processing on your computer before you gave them the files to print. My bad....

DO IT! Spend a few minutes with PhotoShop CS2 or CS3 and make the corrections that you want before you give the files in to be printed. That way you'll have your crops exactly the way you want them, the levels and curves set exactly the way you want them, and contrast and sharpening (or bluring) exactly the way you want them. THEN give the files in to be printed. Better still, get yourself an Epson printer, calibrate your monitor and create printer profiles, and print them yourself. When you put the two side by side for comparison, well... there is no comparison. With a $400 Epson printer, Epson Ink, and Epson paper, you can out produce all of the shops in Chiang Mai. (If you're using an HP printer, use HP ink and HP paper. It DOES make a difference.) My 'main' printer can handle up to A3 size paper, but I usually have to special order that paper size as few places carry Epson Photo Glossy in A3 size. My smaller Epson can put out prints as good as any shop in town, but you DO have to calibrate your monitor and create printer profiles first to get that kind of quality.

dont forget the free NeatImage to reduce noise on your pictures should you have a camera that doesn't do good high sensitivity pictures. ie ISO 400-3200.

try it out. you'll be amazed.