Last Saturday, my mom and I took Kaitlyn to Portrait Innovations. The photographer at our family reunion took a lot of pictures of her, but I didn't get a good picture of her in the dress she wore to the wedding. I hadn't tried this place before, but I was lured in by their $10 package, so I decided to give them a try. Previously, I have done the Target and JCPenney studios, and the quality was . . . fine. There are things you can do in a studio you just can't recreate in your lighting at home. At least they were both rather cheap, and that was good. But you always had to drive back 3 weeks later to pick up the prints, and this place prints them out in minutes, which is just awesome.
The Pros.
I was really impressed with their studio! They had two studio areas, in fact, and the place was just crawling. Each studio could fit a large family reunion easily. They had piles of props, more than I have seen at the department store studios, and the backdrops were a lot more life-like. The huge waiting area had 4 different computers with huge widescreens where people were looking at their pictures and selecting their packages, and they were awesome pictures. Almost every kid looked like a model, and Kaitlyn's shots were no exception. When we took the pictures, Kaitlyn performed beautifully and just stared and smiled at the camera. The photographer took 45 shots in a lot of setting and backdrops, and I would have been proud to have almost any one of them on my wall. Seriously, looking at the pictures made us just gasp. Or I might be biased that my little girl is the cutest ever. :)
The Con.
Then you sit down to select your pictures. The high-pressure selling time. They have you narrow down which pictures you like, and they start in on you once you get down to about 12 or so. Basically, their packages are based on how many poses you select. For each pose, you get 3 sheets of pictures, and their are bonuses like 8x10s with special effects and a CD of all the pictures if you purchase enough poses.
But here's my problem- 3 pages of pictures for EACH POSE? Good grief! The $10 package already gets me enough pictures to give out to the two Grandmas and hang on my wall. I don't have anyone else to give pictures to. I am used to Target and JCPenney, where I can buy sheets at $4 or so and get ONE sheet of each pose I just can't live without. But there is no way to do that here. Well, I take that back, there is. You can buy sheets one at a time for $15 each. Ouch. That poor saleslady did everything she could to convince me to drop $80 or more on pictures, but I just couldn't waste that much money on piles of pictures that would sit in an envelope! Just to get 3 poses was $60 or so, as I recall. From there it is like the price of soft drinks at a fast food place- it is only 10 cents more to upgrade sizes. So why not drop another $10 and get another pose? And another? And then you can have 28 sheets of pictures hanging around your house forever? (Lest we forget, by the way, that a sheet could be one 8x10 or maybe 8 wallets or whatever. So we're talking a hundred pictures or so.)
What I really wanted was a package of a few poses, one sheet of each. To be honest, if they had that, I might have actually dropped $60 on pictures that day, which is HUGE for me, because I am a total cheap-skate on stuff like that. But the pictures they got of Kaitlyn were SO cute . . .. As it was, I got the $10 package and then bit the bullet to get one sheet of another pose for the $15. I felt really bad for the saleslady, but I would have had to spend $80 to get more poses, and then had nothing to do with the multiple sheets afterward.
So, bottom line? If you have a ton of people who would like pictures of your kids, go to this place! I loved everything about the pictures. But for me, my brothers have never sent me pictures, and I don't know that any of them want pictures of my kids either. (If you are reading this, and you do want one, boy, do I have a picture for you! Even the one package was tons.) So I guess I will go back to my regular, cheaper studio until this place gets smart and makes different packages.
The Pros.
I was really impressed with their studio! They had two studio areas, in fact, and the place was just crawling. Each studio could fit a large family reunion easily. They had piles of props, more than I have seen at the department store studios, and the backdrops were a lot more life-like. The huge waiting area had 4 different computers with huge widescreens where people were looking at their pictures and selecting their packages, and they were awesome pictures. Almost every kid looked like a model, and Kaitlyn's shots were no exception. When we took the pictures, Kaitlyn performed beautifully and just stared and smiled at the camera. The photographer took 45 shots in a lot of setting and backdrops, and I would have been proud to have almost any one of them on my wall. Seriously, looking at the pictures made us just gasp. Or I might be biased that my little girl is the cutest ever. :)
The Con.
Then you sit down to select your pictures. The high-pressure selling time. They have you narrow down which pictures you like, and they start in on you once you get down to about 12 or so. Basically, their packages are based on how many poses you select. For each pose, you get 3 sheets of pictures, and their are bonuses like 8x10s with special effects and a CD of all the pictures if you purchase enough poses.
But here's my problem- 3 pages of pictures for EACH POSE? Good grief! The $10 package already gets me enough pictures to give out to the two Grandmas and hang on my wall. I don't have anyone else to give pictures to. I am used to Target and JCPenney, where I can buy sheets at $4 or so and get ONE sheet of each pose I just can't live without. But there is no way to do that here. Well, I take that back, there is. You can buy sheets one at a time for $15 each. Ouch. That poor saleslady did everything she could to convince me to drop $80 or more on pictures, but I just couldn't waste that much money on piles of pictures that would sit in an envelope! Just to get 3 poses was $60 or so, as I recall. From there it is like the price of soft drinks at a fast food place- it is only 10 cents more to upgrade sizes. So why not drop another $10 and get another pose? And another? And then you can have 28 sheets of pictures hanging around your house forever? (Lest we forget, by the way, that a sheet could be one 8x10 or maybe 8 wallets or whatever. So we're talking a hundred pictures or so.)
What I really wanted was a package of a few poses, one sheet of each. To be honest, if they had that, I might have actually dropped $60 on pictures that day, which is HUGE for me, because I am a total cheap-skate on stuff like that. But the pictures they got of Kaitlyn were SO cute . . .
So, bottom line? If you have a ton of people who would like pictures of your kids, go to this place! I loved everything about the pictures. But for me, my brothers have never sent me pictures, and I don't know that any of them want pictures of my kids either. (If you are reading this, and you do want one, boy, do I have a picture for you! Even the one package was tons.) So I guess I will go back to my regular, cheaper studio until this place gets smart and makes different packages.
1 comment:
I know this comment is a little late, But I googled how much a single sheet is, and I found your page lol, instead of calling them I like to find things on the internet. And let me say their pictures are wonderful, and since it's digital they can get three shots in seconds, so they don't miss that cute smile and such. And let me also say your daughter is absolutely the cutest in that dress, it's gorgeous! And the little head band. It's so hard to choose. Like you, I went to the smaller studios when my son was born, and three weeks felt like a lifetime, and you don't know how their actually going to come out. For example at Sear's one his his portraits looked like he had gray lips, and I noticed it, and wasn't happy about it, and their excue for sending them away, is better quality. But in my opinion, innovations is much better quality, and they get much better shots, and the flash doesn't scare the baby as much as the big pop flash anywhere else. And the first time I went to portrait innovations, I thought it was going to be easy to get my pictures down, and I made fun of my cousin who spent $200.00 in a sitting with her two children, and I myself ending up spending $100.00 exactly. I do like the fact I got the cd, because I can print different poses that I did like, but didn't get. My mother-in-law, was furious I spent that much. But my excuse was he's the first one lol. Anyways I thought your post was very informative and you have a beautiful family. God Bless :-)
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