Make your own Photo Book

[glueck]

I, along with many other PS members, will be making their own photo albums after the wedding instead of buying the expensive options of a pro photographer. Can you please list your recommendations for high quality DIY photo books?

I made a book of our E pics with some blank pages and love quotes that will be our guest book. We made it with Snapfish. It will serve as a lovely guest book, but honestly, it is not high enough quality for wedding pictures.

Spill it ladies..... Photo books.... the good, the bad, and the ugly. What interests the most, however, is the FABULOUS!!

 

[honey22]

I used my Photobooks! Very professional quality, the price was excellent for what we got and the software very easy to use. I looked at many companies before deciding on this one and even downloaded a few other companies software only to delete it when it downloaded. Some are totally not user friendly, so before you decide, download a few and have a play around. There are vast differences.

I had a ball making the album from my BFs wedding. I spent 5 whole days nearly making it, and so many of her family members are lining up for a copy, including her parents, they loved it!

http://www.photobookworldwide.com/web/?pg=index

I used the Australian website, as I am in Melb

http://photobookaustralia.com.au/?pg=3delivery

 

[Ms.Goggles]

A girl in my grad school cohort made her photo album at http://www.blurb.com/

Her book looks gorgeous & professionally done! The pages are very high quality & my classmate added quite a bit of text throughout the book which I really liked. We haven''t booked a photog yet, but I am hoping to spend more money on a package with the intentions of using this site to make the book! Good luck!

 

[violet02]

I''m using MyPublisher to make our photobooks!

http://www.mypublisher.com/

My friend made all of her books that way and loves it!

 

[gryffindor]

I''ve used Shutterfly to make a casual album for FF''s cousin''s wedding, and his family loved it. This was an amateur album using the pictures FF and I took on our personal cameras so the quality was fine for that. I think the bride had her own professional albums made by the photographer.

My co-worker''s wife used Shutterfly to make their official wedding album with their photographer''s pictures and it didn''t look professional at all. I was really tempted to call her cheap because that''s exactly what it looked like. (They are an obnoxiously cheap couple to begin with, so it wasn''t really a surprise.)

Another co-worker is using Blurb for her wedding photos, but I haven''t seen the results yet of her project. I trust it will be nice or else she''ll re-do it because quality is important to her.

 

[lovinsparkles]

Great thread idea - I need help with this too!

I would be especially interested in hearing about those who have made their own albums (as opposed to the coffee table book style). I am trying to do this at MPix (their assembled album - see link) and am very confused! I can''t figure out how you add design elements and decrease the size of your photo so that it doesn''t take up the whole page of your album (or include multiple pics on a given page).

http://www.mpix.com/Product.aspx/assembledalbums

 

[lovinsparkles]

Answering myself here (I''ve apparently missed the edit cutoff), but while I love the MPix assembled album look, you can apparently not do any design stuff there (each image is just an entire page). I would love recommendations for other sites that allow you to create an album (as opposed to coffee table book).

Alternatively, what are the thoughts on purchasing prints online and then adding them to an album yourself? How is this done (how should they be attached to the page in a formal album that you want to last for a long time)?

 

[lliang_chi]

I met with a new photographer. she didn''t have the traditional albums but I know she used mypublisher.com. Just wanted to add another a suggestion.

 

[glueck]

I am taking dubious notes! Thanks ladies for posting your research and opinions. I think I am not alone when I say "when I make this album, I only want to make it once!"

 

[AmberGretchen]

Hmmm...I think mia1181 made a gorgeous book on MPix with all kinds of cool effects - maybe try paging her, I remember loving hers and thinking I should re-do my (Shutterfly) one to be more like hers - hers was stunning!

 

[lovinsparkles]

AmberGretchen, I did see Mia''s lovely MPix book a while ago, but I *think* hers was more of a regular book style (image printed on page) rather than album/flush mounted style...

I did just find an album style one available at picaboo though (the wedding flush mount option). Would be curious if others have tried them before.
http://www.picaboo.com/photobooks/optionspricing.html

Would also be curious if anyone has just gotten a more traditional album and attached high quality prints to it in making their own album. I could see something like that looking nice (maybe on black pages? held in place by those fancy corner things?), but I don''t know anything about durability. So many things to consider

 

[lovinsparkles]

And this one might have potential too, for more traditional style albums:
http://www.somersetalbums.com/index.asp

 

[kmci]

A friend of mine used Momento for a couple of holiday albums, which were great in terms of however many photos and text sections you want on each page. Don''t think you can use it on macs though....

Momento

Oh, and its an Australian company.

 

[lovinsparkles]

How about just buying a nice, black leather album like this one (that comes with black page mounts) and slipping prints in? Anyone have any thoughts on why this would be less good than getting a professional one made?

http://www.amazon.com/Professional-10x10-BLACK-Silver-Wedding/dp/B001NU8F1W/ref=sr_1_41?ie=UTF8&s=photo&qid=1233522512&sr=1-41

 

[jstarfireb]

I''ve heard good things about MyPublisher and Blurb (my FSIL''s guestbook was from Blurb and looked great). I''ll probably go with one of those.

I got a free photobook offer from Shutterfly after buying my dress at David''s Bridal. I used some casual photos of us together to make a cute little 8x8 guestbook for the reception (our engagement photos haven''t been taken yet but the offer expired in January). It turned out really nice...but it does certainly have a casual feel, which was perfect for me, but if you''re looking for something more formal, I''d stick with another company. FSIL''s Blurb album definitely looked more "professional." It was slightly annoying that Shutterfly doesn''t let you spread images over 2 pages. I wanted one picture to be like that and had to duplicate the picture and keep cropping it until the halves finally lined up right, which took a while but finally worked out.