[Kombisaurus]

Hey peoples,

I am going to a close friend's wedding in a few weeks (which involves another trip to Tasmania ), and while I'm not the official wedding photographer, I thought it would be nice to create an album of photos for them.
The photos I intend to include are not just of the wedding, but also some other shots of places and people that I know will have meaning to them (and that they can't see now as they no longer live here). Kind of a mini-timetime from the time they met up to the wedding, followed by wedding shots.

Anyway... this post isn't about the photos... its about how I'm going to present them!

I've been looking around at various methods of creating photo albums, and there seem to be a few interesting options availabe. I thought it would be good to share these ideas and also ask for input and possibly other options that I hadn't considered.

Firstly, the simplest option is to buy one of the Canon "Album Kits" and put it all together myself (http://www.authority.com.au/review.aspx?...IaRID=2339)
The level of finish looks acceptable, but I don't like the cover style and the cover can't be easily customised by the look of it.

The second option is one I have done before for gifts. I simply bought some nice quality small blank albums from a scrapbook/craft shop and printed my photos in standard sizes to stick inside. This worked really well except it was hard to find a suitable album to use. I wanted something pre-bound and hardcover, but most of those are big enough to hold hundreds of photos and I only wanted about 16 pages (I wanted to produce a finished book, not something with blank pages in the back). The album I finally found was excellent in every area except it wasn't hardcover, but it did use a fairly stiff cardboard sleeve system with a nice ribbon that gave it a nice feel of quality. This is a great option to give a really nice hand-made look (which is actually very suitable for a wedding), but you wouldn't confuse one of these albums with a properly bound book you'd buy in a shop - and I guess that's what I have my sights on in this case.

The third option is something along the lines of one of the self-binding systems such as the new UniBind PhotoBook system (http://www.dcviews.com/press/Unibind-Pho...reator.htm). These look good but I think the initial costs of the binding machines are too much for a one-off project. If I were going to be producing these things regularly (or I could convince my employer that we needed one for work!) then this looks like a really good option.

The fourth option is to find a local company to print and bind it for me. I'd expect that, like the UniBind system, this would only become economically viable for larger volumes though. But I must admit I haven't looked closely into this option.
Also, if I'm going to all this trouble to put together an album then I'd probably want to do a few copies anyway. Apart from a copy for the couple being married, I'd like a copy myself, I'm sure the parents of the bride and groom might like a copy, and I know the bride's best friend would. But 5 copies isn't really going to make it any cheaper I don't think.

Which brings me to the fifth and perhaps most interesting option.
http://www.lulu.com/

This company is an on-demand publisher with no setup or joining fees - they just charge a certain (affordable) amount for each book they print, and also take a commission if you are trying to sell the books online for profit.
They are most commonly used to allow people to self-publish books and sell them online, but I'm looking at it as simply a low-volume printing and binding service.
You upload the book as a PDF for free.. and then you can just order a printed and bound copy as you would on Amazon.
It seems to be a very similar model to companies such as Cafe Press... but they are simply printing onto different media.
There appear to be a number of advantages to this kind of thing:
1. There are no up-front costs involved for me. The only costs will be two copies of the printed album - one to send to the bride and groom and one to keep for myself.
2. Any number of copies can be made at any time in the future by anybody. So if other guests at the wedding want a copy then they can simply order it online themselves. I no longer need to be involved, I just need to tell people the web address.
3. They allow you to include PDF versions of your books for customers to download for FREE. Obviously I'm not doing this album as a money-making exercise, so other wedding guests who don't want to pay for a bound copy of the album can at least download an electronic version for free.
4. As far as I can tell, the quality of the books is really quite good. It might not be the best of the best, but from what I read it is certainly as good as many hardcover books you will see in shops. There are plenty of photography books listed there, and I first found out about lulu from www.luminous-landscape.com with some positive comments regarding their printing and binding quality.

A quick search of lulu.com for "weddings" shows that I'm certainly not the first person to think of using them in this way - there are a number of personal wedding albums listed there (some offering free PDF downloads too).

So... what do you think? The lulu option has really got me curious. Can you think of any other better options?

Thanks
Adrian

[adam]

o, I typed a reply but it didn't send properly :O
I wrote something like...

the Lulu option looks good, from the options described, would be my favourite
but the shipping method, International is 10-15 business days (may be up to 30 business days)
or the International Express which is 4-8 business days.
Just worried that if it's in a few weeks and if you don't take the express option (which you probably will?) the "up to 30 business days" sounds slow. but maybe that is the worst-case.
Still sounds good though, I saw some of the books on their page.
I don't know of any other options.

[Schellamo]

I was going to suggest something like this: www.lifecatchers.com.au
its not the exact one I was thinking of, but there are a few companies that do coffee-table style books with your own photos in. However, I think they are fairly pricey so I imagine the place you are going to is a better option.

[Wedding Shooter]

I do all my wedding albums through Jorgensen Albums (based in Perth). They might be too expensive for you though - happy to help you out with them if you are interested.

www.jorgensenalbums.com

Cheers,

Chris

[Kombisaurus]

Thanks for the replies

Adam, the shipping time will be a factor.. but not a show-stopper for me. I was never planning on having this ready before the wedding. If it takes a month for them to get the book, that's just tough luck!

Schell.. I think you're on the right track with lifecatchers, but it sounds like they are more of a "just give us your photos and we'll do the rest" kind of outfit, which usually means they spend a lot of time working on it, which then usually means they charge a lot to do the stuff that I'm happy to do myself.

But that link of yours Chris looks *very* interesting, and the fact they are based in Perth means I can just go up to Malaga and check out their stuff "in the flesh" so to speak.
As far as expense goes, I am somewhat flexible. My first priority is getting an end product that is up to a certain standard, but I simply don't want to waste money getting there or end up having to do things twice, etc.. I guess I'm also thinking in the back of my mind that situations like this will come up again ocassionally in the future (all my friends seem to be getting married lately), so I'm happy to do a bit of homework now if it will save hassles or unnecessary expense down the track.
I had a look through the albums Jorgensen Albums offer and there are a few that look like they might be really good options, but its hard to tell from a few little web photos. I'd be interested to hear a bit more about you experience with them and advice in general regarding wedding albums.

One of the main reasons LuLu got my attention was that it seemed to be a very simple way to allow other guests to get copies of the shots as well, something not really practical with the other options. I think the affordability of the album will be a factor for others buying the album. For the one or two copies I need for my purposes, I'm quite prepared to spend more if it will get me a better result.

Thanks
Adrian

[shuttertalk]

Hey how about a coffee table book - something like this:
http://www.mypublisher.com/default.php

From a brief skim of their stite, Lulu looks like a very flexible publishing system catered towards all sorts of authors; whereas this one is more specialised and geared towards printing photo albums/coffee books...

[Kombisaurus]

ooo... MyPublisher also looks good ST. Thanks for the link.

The only problem is they don't list Australia as one of their shipping destinations But they do look like nicer books. I might send them an email to ask, as it seems a bit odd that they should ship to a bunch of countries (they list about 20) but not Aus.

And.. I can't seem to find hardcover books on lulu any more!!?! I'm sure they had them listed before. I really do want hardcover. (Edit: I found the hardcover ones again on Lulu, but they are only available in 6x9" and only in b/w :/)

Maybe I should do one "proper" hardcover version (using jorgensen albums for instance) as a gift for the bride and groom, and then knock out a PDF file to put on Lulu for any other family or friends who might want a copy (including myself and a couple of people who I know want them) - This requires a bit more prep work, but it has the best of both worlds.

Cheers
Adrian

[Wedding Shooter]

Sent e-mail.