I used to do my own darkroom work, so know how to print B&W and color from negatives. I do my own photo printing at home with ink jet printers. I have used a dye sublimation printer, but don’t own one, and I know how they work.
What I’m curious about is what process is used by the printers at Walgreens, Wal-Mart, Costco, to print from their customers digital source? Is it dye sublimation or a variant of that technology?
Dye sublimation is essentially a dying technology. Many manufacturers have stopped producing the chemicals.
So the printers at Walgreens etc all use dye sublimation eh? I thought there’d be a way to utilize the chemical process printer they use for negative film. Or are you saying that they scan the negatives and use the dye sublimation printer for that too?
My lab has three types of printers: dye-sub, inkjet and a Fuji Pictography. The Fuji is essentially like a big Polaroid; there’s a donor (chemis) and a receiver(paper). The image is exposed on the paper with lazer LED’s. Each type of printer has advantages and disadvantages in terms of cost, longevity etc.
Thanks chacoguy420, I wondered if any of them used a laser or something other than dye sub or inkjet. I’ve used Epson photo quality inkjets for years and they do a fine job, but I didn’t realize that the commercial units were lible to also be inkjets.