I was asked to Review CG ProPrints & of course I was happy to…I always like to try anything that pertains to photography and I love to talk shop!
With anything there are pro’s and con’s and so many choices in life, especially with photography! So – let’s talk about CG Pro Prints and the company a bit and then get to the pro’s and con’s. What is CG Pro Prints?
- CG ProPrints specialize in canvas prints for professional photographers and artists.
- They offer amazing prices for their products.
- Company guarantees 100% and will pay for the return shipping.
My experience…
I received a CG sample kit and was definitely impressed with the quality of the canvas in the kit, but knowing they’re not going to send me a bad canvas, I was curious on how one of my own images would look and feel. So I went online to their website and ordered my favorite anniversary rose (the rose on my website home page). I did enjoy the ease of the site and I liked that they have an area where you can click on to find out how much your tax and shipping will cost before you actually get to the end. Once I ordered my canvas, I received an email confirmation ASAP with my receipt.
These are some images from their site and it true….
- The backing is solid…loving this!
And…
- Finished backs & ready to use! Yep…very nice!
The site states that they print all RGB color spaces but I did notice that my image was dark on the sample in the order area (I do have a calibrated Eizo monitor), but I decided to print anyways to see what was going to happen and I was right – the color information was not my ProPhoto RGB. With that said, to be safe use srgb, that is what they recommend and I would go with that.
They do have a limited amount of prints but with the wholesale prices I’m okay with that! They ship within 3 days and you choose the shipping preference.
- Snap shot from CG Pro prices.
Newest addition is the Framed Canvas!
Prices:
It was easy to order my canvas but I do recommend you size your image before you upload…usually I send my original file to my printing company and they prep for me. But again…the price is amazing and we are all photographers…it’s not hard to re-size your image in Photoshop or Lightroom.
Below are the pros & cons:
Pros:
- Loving the closed back that’s strong and durable.
- Amazed with the quality print…thumbs up!
- Hardware attached, ready to hang.
- PRICE, wow!
Cons:
- Limited sizes.
- You must save your image file to the size you want (or close to it) for quality prints.
- Color space issues. (I don’t like jpegs or srgb)
Summary
I can say this…Quality with a capital Q! I have paid hundreds of dollars for my 24 x 36 canvases and I only wish those companies would have put the time & effort into their construction. I’m amazed on how beautiful my canvas came out..see below. I LOVE my anniversary rose!
- Canvas on my Chair
- Getting ready to hang canvas on daughter’s wall!
- Adding a bit of POP to wall with new Canvas from CG ProPrints.
The company has a limited amount of prints, but I say who cares!! I will definitely be using them for marketing….I’m so excited that I can now afford a beautiful canvas to give to my clients as a thank you gesture.
Many people just don’t have the money to buy expensive Canvas prints. This is a wonderful opportunity to get your work out to the public, it’s great to give a canvas to clients for free if they order a certain amount of $ from you. I bet they will order a canvas from you when they receive your freebee 🙂 With CG Pro Prints guarantee and discount for the professional it doesnt’ hurt to try this company for yourself.
Cheers,
Janice Sullivan
Find me on Google+
Hi Ricky, Thanks so much for your comment this is good information for people to read. BTW..I was out photographing for the long weekend so I’m just now catching up on things 🙂 I was again so glad you gave us details so others can read. I basically feel the CGProPrints are good for us business owners that want to give a freebie to our clients or to offer a discounted canvas price to them once in awhile. If you want high end printing…I agree, it’s time to do more research. But with that said…I love my canvases and am very happy with them, but I wouldn’t sell them for high end purchases, like limited editions. 🙂 I’ve been printing my work now on metal, for me it’s a better option for my clients but I do love the feel of canvas. You might want to checkout WhiteWall…they do beautiful work: https://us.whitewall.com/photo-lab/print-and-draw-up-photo ? If you find any good canvas printers I’d love for you to let us know. Thanks!
Thank you Janice!
Your point makes a lot of sense. Thanks for the recommendation. I will look into Whitewall 🙂
Good luck with your business!
Cheers,
Ricky Mujica
Thank you Janice!
Your point makes a lot of sense. Thanks for the recommendation. I will look into Whitewall 🙂
Good luck with your business!
Cheers,
Ricky Mujica
thank you for this review! I was wondering if you had to do any special calibration to your monitor using their particular calibration specs. I was wondering because I just got back a canvas and it came back much warmer than my calibrated monitor.
I’m a painter not a photographer and I’ve been selling prints for years through an online print gallery called ArtFiftyTwo. They make gorgeous prints and I wouldn’t be leaving them if it were only about the prints. But unfortunately ArtFiftyTwo has not managed to keep current. First of all they don’t integrate with Shopify and worse, they aren’t mobile friendly. Mobile friendly is so important now as 80% of my traffic comes from people on their cell phones or small tablets. Do to the rise of Instagram everyone is looking at art through their phones and if your print provider isn’t mobile friendly, you are losing money. They have no plans on coming into the future, so alas, I am in search for a new print provider.
Everyone seems to recommend CGProPrints and because of that I signed up for an account and began to upload my files. I haven’t ordered a print yet, but right off the bat, I’m worried. First of all, they only accept JPGs. That’s unacceptable for a professional print service. But my second biggest concern is the 35mg cap on file size. Many of my paintings are in the 30″x40″ size and that means I can never get high resolution prints of those files. CGProPirnts says that they recommend 150dpi or less for canvas and that this prints better. I call BS on that claim. I’ve been selling prints of my work since 2008 and I’m telling you 300dpi looks a lot better. You have to hold them up side by side to see the difference. It’s especially clear that 150dpi is unacceptable for a professional print if you have the paintings printed on paper. To be honest, I’m a little shocked that they call themselves a professional print shop with these horrible limitations. It’s a shame because they seem very together in other areas and I will probably end up using them for smaller canvases because I like the way they stretch the canvas. But I guess my search goes on 🙁
Hello Ms. Janice,
Thank you so much for taking the time to write a review of this company. As a new photographer, researching who to go with can be very overwhelming.
I spoke with the company, they said the issues were most likely due to a bad batch of glue & said they will give me a refund
Great article. Thanks for the review. I was interested in what other photographers have to say about CG Pro Prints, and I came across your site.