Making your own photobook

http://www.alternativephotography.com/wp/post-printing/how-to-make-an-elegant-photo-album
Lately I've been getting a bit frustrated with the delivery times for photobooks so, when I get some time, I'm going to have a crack at creating my own.

I'll be using this page to collect links to photobook making guides that look like they could be useful.

Pixelpaint.co.nz A3 Photobook Review Part 2

Some Context:

What follows is the summary of experiences related to 4 similar but not quite identical photobooks ordered from an emerging company during their first Christmas Rush. Lessons have almost certainly been learnt and all interactions with customer service people were fantastic. While I may have been able to get things moving a bit quicker by making more noise I was sympathetic to the stresses they were likely to be under at this time of year so I avoided  being difficult.

Overall:

The products and the people were great. Delivery times and clarity around the construction process provide areas for improvement. Sadly patience and understanding seem to have been a necessary component of completing the ordering process during the pre-Christmas period. While I assume this was a freak occurence I cannot yet be sure. I will re-update with future orders.

Would I order again?

I would, my wife wouldn't, and the people we gave the gifts to already have. I would as I believe that this is a valuable service that will improve overtime. My wife wouldn't as she found the uncertainty and failure to deliver our first order by the Christmas deadline unacceptable. The people who received the photobooks as gifts were impressed enough by the quality of the prints to spread the word about the company and use the service themselves.

Materials:

Cover:
The cover material is very nice and differentiates itself from the book's interior. The cover seems to be printed on a light fabric or canvas. The texture is nice to the touch and also to the eye.

Construction:
The books feel secure when vieiwing them on the table but a little wobbly when carrying them open. The books are generally uniform in this regard but there are slight variations in the gluing of some elements.

Pages:
The pages have a nice feel to them. They are 170gsm with a slight glossiness to them. The whites are also nice and clean. They do become translucent while turning (you can see through them a bit) but are perfectly opaque under normal viewing conditions (lying flat).

Ink:
The colours are vibrant and strong. In the imperfect book some of the black and white shots appeared to have a minor green tinge to them. In the reprinted book and the other books the ink goes in the other direction in some places (a magenta tint). The contrast in the new books also isn't as strong as it was in the earlier version. The cover of the new books is noticeably lighter and shows a wider range of tones. This was an improvement over the initial print.

Print Resolution:
The print resolution is solid. Some of our shots came up with a resolution warning, we suspected that these warnings were on the conservative side - aimed more at printing from point-and-shoot cameras than cameras and lenses with a higher image quality (dSLRs and the like) - and it looks like we were right. All of our images look great resolution wise but it should be noted that the quality of their printers will not make up for poor quality images, cameras, or lenses.

Service:

Pros
Their Zealous service came through in their detection of imperfections in our photobook. As a result they took the initiative and reprinted our book before we asked them to. As an added bonus they sent through the imperfect book so we had something to look at in the meantime. They were also easily contacted and very polite in all our dealings with them. The customer service focus of this company is a great strength. Unfortunately the cons also make it a necessary one.


Cons
When the books were first listed the turnaround time was listed as 15 days. In fact the turnaround time is 15 working days. This lead to a bit of dissappointment in that the book didn't arrive when we expected it to. That being said I have been in touch with the pixelpaint team and this error should be fixed soon.

The information in the my orders section still leaves a lot to be desired. While it does indicate whether your photobook order has been placed or is printing these labels don't seem to mean much. In fact your book will be in the printing phase from the moment your order is officially processed. As such it can be 'printing' for 15 working days. Furthermore our book needed to be reprinted - this was not indicated in the my orders section.


Surprisingly our reprinted book was the last book of our batch to be completed. This seems odd given that the order was placed first and they decided to reprint it before our additional orders were placed. It is also strange that, when we contacted pixelpaint to follow up on the progress of this book, we were told it was almost ready to be shipped a full 2 weeks before it was shipped and this book was rushed through an additional reprint when it turned out it was never dispatched.


It seems that the processes (the behind the scenes elements of the business) would benefit from some love and attention.

5 Christmas Gift Ideas for Photographers in the making

If you have a friend of family member who can be difficult to buy gifts for but is showing an interest in photography here are a few gifts that you might like to consider:

Buy Now

Digital Photographer's Handbook - A Book by Tom Ang

One of the best gifts you can buy someone who is interested in photography is one that will help them develop their skills. Tom Ang's Digital Photographer's Handbook is a detailed but easy to read introduction to digital photography. It covers camera mechanics (how your camera works), image composition (techniques that will help make your images more pleasing to the eye), visual effects, and even includes projects to help develop photographic skills. In fact it even goes beyond cameras taking in film scanners, lighting set ups and more. While the title suggests that it focuses solely on digital photography if your friend or family member is more interested in film most of the lessons contained in the book will still apply. In fact the section on Film scanning is targeted specifically at film shooters. As an added bonus it even includes some photos taken in little old New Zealand. Awesome!

A Tripod

Blurry photos should be a pet peeve for photographers in the making. A tripod is a great tool that can be used to reduce the odds of encountering this problem. It also has the added benefit of making night-time landscape photos possible. If you live near a road a tripod will help your photographer in the making take photos with blurred lights passing through. Focus on getting the sturdiest tripod you can for your money. If the tripod is likely to shake or wobble under the weight of the camera it is not worth paying for. As it is best to test tripods out in person I have not provided a link here. Instead pop down to your local camera shop (NB:// by this I mean a shop that specialises in selling camera equipment - I would advise against visiting a chain store that does not specialise in photography equipment as, chances are, the salesperson will not be able to give you the information you require to make the best decision).

Shutter Release Cable

If your friend or family member already has a tripod a shutter release cable is another tool that can help photographers reduce the chances of taking blurry photos. By taking photos by pressing something that is not part of the camera the odds of producing camera shake are greatly reduced. These are also usually fairly affordable.

Prints or a Print Voucher
In the age of digital cameras we often forget that photos are things that used to be printed an hung on a wall. You can remind your friend or family member of this by organising to have one of their favourite images printed to a large scale or getting them a voucher to enable them to do this themselves. 

A Film Camera
This is the option that I would most and least recommend. I strongly recommend film here as it will force them to shoot differently. If they use the film camera they will have to slow down and think about their shots a lot more. Raising the stakes in this way will highlight the importance of pre-visualising images. Try to purchase one of the same brand as the odds of knowledge around layout transferring from their digital camera to the film camera will be higher. The odds of them being able to use lenses across systems will also increase. The key reason to avoid this option is the fact that you will be introducing an ongoing cost to your friend or family member. Additionally as film photography differs from digital photography in the delay between shooting an image and seeing an image the film camera may end up being left on the shelf.

Pixelpaint.co.nz A3 Photobook Review

UPDATED - Click here to see the review of the final product

A while back I did a review on a pixelpaint.co.nz canvas print. I was happy with the canvas and the service they provided so when they introduced their photobooks I thought I'd give them a crack as well. Today we got a book in the mail. While it looks great the Pixelpaint team weren't 100% happy with it yet as they thought they could do better. As a result the official review will be coming soon. Until we receive their final copy this will act as a fill in for anyone thinking about making a purchase before we get our final copy.

Overall:

So far it looks promising. While I noticed a few minor imperfections in the first book they sent through they did tell us that they were fixing them up (See the note in the picture above - click it to enlarge it). I look forward to receiving a book that is up to their standards in the days ahead.

Materials:

Cover:
The cover material is very nice and differentiates itself from the book's interior. The cover seems to be printed on a light fabric or canvas. The texture is nice to the touch and also to the eye.

Construction:
The book feels secure when vieiwing it on the table but a little wobbly when carrying it open. The glue in our book has spilt out a bit on the last page - I suspect this is an imperfection that they are looking to rectify in a subsequent copy.

Pages:
The pages have a nice feel to them. They are 170gsm with a slight glossiness to them. The whites are also nice and clean.

Ink:
The colours are vibrant and strong. In our current book some of the balck and white shots appear to have a minor green tinge to them. While most people wouldn't notice this it could be what they were talking about when they mentioned the imperfections.

Print Resolution:
The print resolution is solid. Some of our shots came up with a resolution warning, we suspected that these warnings were on the conservative side - aimed more at printing from point-and-shoot cameras than cameras and lenses with a higher image quality (dSLRs and the like) - and it looks like we were right. All of our images look great resolution wise but it should be noted that the quality of their printers will not make up for poor quality images, cameras, or lenses.

Service:

Pros
Their Zealous service came through in their detection of imperfections in our photobook. As a result they took the initiative and reprinted our book before we asked them to. As an added bonus they sent through the imperfect book so we had something to look at in the meantime.


Cons
When the books were first listed the turnaround time was listed as 15 days. In fact the turnaround time is 15 working days. This lead to a bit of dissappointment in that the book didn't arrive when we expected it to. That being said I have been in touch with the pixelpaint team and this error should be fixed soon.

The information in the my orders section still leaves a lot to be desired. While it does indicate whether your photobook order has been placed or is printing these labels don't seem to mean much. In fact your book will be in the printing phase from the moment your order is officially processed. As such it can be 'printing' for 15 working days. Furthermore our book needed to be reprinted - this was not indicated in the my orders section.