Portrait Innovations

This place is OK if you have a lot of patience. Our appointment was at 10:30am. However the family ahead of us had about 12 kids all under the age of 6 taking forever and multiple outfit changes. My son is almost 2 and wasn’t cooperating the greatest for some of the poses – My husband and I felt pressured to get the «60 photos» done no matter what. Multiple times I stated that we would like to stop and just pick from the photos that were already taken and multiple times I was told «let’s just try this or we do 60 photos for everyone lets just try this» as it turns out my son did do ok for the rest of the session, but it was annoying that they weren’t listening to us or honoring our request to stop. Sure, you get the photos that day but you have to wait another half hour for them to develop them… oh and the 16×20 picture? That gets mailed to you within 2 weeks for an extra $ 12.00. I had a coupon for 52 portraits for $ 14.99 — somehow it ended up to be $ 35. At the end of the day it all just seemed like a rip off.

HORRIBLE EXPERIENCE
My boyfriend paid for he and I to get our photos taken as a Christmas gift to me. When we went there to get it done, the photographer asked if we were «mom and son». It was horrifying! I felt like I was going to cry. The pictures came out awful. Partly because I was unable to smile or appear happy at all, partly because the photographer was not the greatest. She seemed to use the standard poses that they use with everyone instead of making it more personal. The poses she used, did not work for us. The backgrounds and the props were old and tacky looking. The studio where we got our photos taken was open so everyone in the waiting area was gawking at you while the pictures were being taken. The experience ruined my weekend. I can’t even look at the photos without getting upset. This place is highly unprofessional with unskilled employees.

I’ve been here numerous times over the past 4 years and majority of the time they’ve done an o-​k job. Many times we don’t make appointments.
We just went here a few days ago. And for the first time, we were told that they didn’t have time for us and that they don’t take walk-​ins. WHAT?! Rude. Did their policy change? There was ONE family in the building and four or five employees floating around.
We called their location in York and asked if we needed an appointment and they said no so we immediately drove down there. Much better service. Do yourself a favor and go somewhere local instead of this location. There are tons of independent photographers around here.

Service was truly awful, bordering on rude. My family made an appointed a few weeks out for a portrait sitting at 3:00 in the afternoon — several people, myself included, had booked travel from New York with this in mind. When we arrived, we were told that there would be at least a 45 minute wait due to ‘unexpected delays’.
What made this worse was the attitude of the manager, who struck me as a bit rude. She didn’t apologize for the delay, stating instead that «When you work with children, you can’t predict schedules…» All well and good, but why make appointments? And, why not give a phone call in advance when you know you’re running behind.
I can’t comment on the quality of the photographers of pictures, but the store appeared to be chaotic — certainly not the sort of environment in which I can imagine my family smiling authentically.
We ended up going to JC Penny’s — who knew they took photos? Nothing fancy, but got us in and handled things professionally. I was pleasantly surprised with them. I’ll avoid Portrait Innovations in the future. A miserable, frustrating experience.

I had my son’s senior pix done here, June 2012.
I called to make an appointment, thinking it would be weeks out, but they had appointments available that day; we chose an appointment a few days later.
We were taken right to a studio as soon as we got there. My kid didn’t want to get his pictures done at all and was a bit annoyed to be doing this. The photographer was a young guy, and he did a GREAT job of getting my kid into poses and and getting him to smile, without being goofy or demeaning.
We did 5 different outfits and about a million poses. I didn’t feel like we were rushed at all. The photographer came up with poses and props he thought would be good, and repeatedly asked if i wanted any other poses, outfits or props, and when I asked for a certain thing, he did it no problem. The photo shoot part took about half an hour-​45 mins.
I had a coupon for a senior picture special ($ 129 for 3 sheets each of 12 different poses, plus 4 «special effects» 10×13’s, AND 20 graduation announcements with envelopes, which included 3 poses on them AND the CD of all the pix; this package is regularly priced at $ 199). So the photographer knew I was getting that package.
Anyway, it took about 3 mins for him to load the pix and we could view them on a big screen tv. I didn’t find the process confusing or feel that it took a long time at all.
However, there was an extremely nasty lady in the waiting area to have her daughter’s picture done, and she was loudly complaining, to no one in particular, just shouting out expletive laced complaints the entire time about having to wait, which was the only bad part about the whole experience. She was very trashy and I felt bad for her poor child, about 6 yrs old, who seemed embarrassed. If I worked there, I would have asked her to leave. There was a family with small children there having pix done at the same time, and that other lady’s behavior was grossly inappropriate.
The photographer went through all the poses in groups, and he would zoom in on ones if I wanted, and crop them as we went. I was able to eliminate some and choose some as we went, then when we were down to about 25 poses that I liked, we went through them a few at a time until I got down to 13. I loved all 13 of these, and the guy said if I wanted to get a package of the extra pose, it would be $ 10 more and I would get a 10×13, (2) 8×10s, (4) 5x7s, some 3×5’s and a bunch of wallets, so I did that with my favorite pose. The selection process only took about 10 – 15 minutes.
We decided to wait while they printed them, but we were given the option of picking them up later if we didn’t want to wait. There are comfy couches and chairs to wait in. Took about 20 mins. I was worried that the quality of the prints wouldn’t be good, but it was excellent, not cheapy-​y feeling or looking.
All told I got (5) 10×13s, (14) 8×10’s, (28) 5x7s and a bunch of smaller ones lol, with 13 different poses, plus the grad announcements and the disk, and the pix were GREAT. There are so many, I can give all the grandparents and relatives a big one of their favorite pose if they want, plus the smaller ones, and ALL for LESS than $ 150 (they don’t even charge a sitting fee)!!!
Compared to the senior pix they did at my kid’s school, this was a ridiculous bargain! The school photographer (Prestige/​Lifetouch) wanted $ 169 for (2) 5x7s, (2) 3x5s and (8) wallets all of one pose! $ 20 EXTRA for each additional pose! A single sheet was $ 65! PLUS sitting fee! So I felt great about this deal.
The only thing I would keep in mind is that they don’t do retouching, if that is an issue for you. But I guess with the disk you could do that yourself if you wanted.
I didn’t see any list of package prices there, but they have alot of info on their website, which is where I found my coupon, so that might be worth checking out before you go.

Worst experience EVER! This was a horrible company to due business with! The photographer was friendly and that’s about all i can give this place… We had a $ 50 gift card and were told that we HAD to spend it all at once. We could not use some and come back for other sitting in 3 or four months. The way the explain their packages is also nuts. Its like they are trying to confuse you! I will never be back…

Went there today to get pictures as a gift for my mom who just retired. The photographer was nice, the picture taking process went fairly smooth and I was worried that we would be rushed, we were a little but not to the point of where it was annoying. We got to change outfits and take a good amount of pics with a selection of different background colors.
The only problem we had was the process of selecting the pictures along with the packages. This process is EXTREMELY confusing and frustrating. All i wanted was to see in writing or hear someone tell me prices of different packages we could order and what it would come with. We were told to pick out the exact pics we wanted printed first and then would be told a price afterwards and if we ‘qualified’ for any freebies depending on what we ordered. I am pretty patient and tried to explain to the photographer that we would just like to see the packages first and then decide on how many pics we would like to be printed out, however we were unable to do that b/​c that is not how they do it apparently. My brother is not to patient and almost walked out b/​c of this, however at the end, we got what we wanted and everything came out fairly well. We ended up getting a disc of the entire shoot which we are using to put on a digital photo frame and ton of printed pics for $ 95 total. Pictures look good, not GREAT, but definitely good. Photographer was nice, however i could see she was getting frustrated w/​my brother who wasn’t to happy with the way things were being done. The location was nice, everything was done on time, so all in all i would give it 3 – 4 stars but that process of picking out the pics/​packages and not knowing how much money its going to cost was a nightmare so i gave it 2 stars.
Please PI change that process or put up posters or signs of different package options in your store and on your website to make it more clear to the consumer.
Hope this helps

Portrait Innovations has an everyday, no coupon needed 9.95 special, where you get (one pose only): an 10×13, two 8×10, four 5×7, four 3×5 and 32 wallets, with no sitting fees or charges, available every 4 months. Of course, if you order addition sheets or poses the costs go up sharply. Pictures are printed & available about 20 minutes later.