Online photo books publishers

Eric Rose · Aug 15, 2007

Well it's kinda paper oriented...

I shot my daughters wedding last Friday and want to do up a book for her. I understand there are online book publishers that could do this for me if I send them the files. Does anyone have a recommendation based on personal experience they can give me?

Thanks,

Eric

rorye · Aug 15, 2007

Hi Eric,
I've had very nice results from Blurb, www.blurb.com
I like the layouts and find the paper/print quality to be very nice.
Best,
Rory

Eric Rose · Aug 15, 2007

rorye said:
Hi Eric,
I've had very nice results from Blurb, www.blurb.com
I like the layouts and find the paper/print quality to be very nice.
Best,
Rory

Thanks Rory. I took a look at their site and downloaded the book layout file. I see over on the Large Format Forum they are using Lulu to generate a book. I took a look at that setup and it would take forever to upload say 200 files one at a time. They say you can use FTP for large files but maybe you can do it for smaller ones too.

rorye · Aug 15, 2007

Hey Eric,
I believe that you can FTP smaller files. On my books (40-45 images, b&w) the upload usually takes about 25 mins. with basic DSL.

patrickjames · Aug 16, 2007

Are you on Windows or Mac? I have had some success for clients doing books on MyPublisher.com to use as a giveaway, but you have to use Windows to get better quality. They do have a plug in for I-Photo but the printing isn't as good. Ditto for the I-Photo books from Apple. I keep a W computer just for this purpose believe it or not.

James Glaze · Aug 29, 2007

I have used MyPublisher for two B&W books and one color book. I am quite pleased with the quality particularily for the color book. In the case of B&W I wish one had a choice of papers. The paper that they use is close to a Luster finish but personally I would prefere a glossy finish----although this is a rather minor complaint. Howver a more substantial complaint is that their so called "book sharing" feature which allows you to send the book to a friend for on-line viewing generally ends up in the recepients "spam folder". There is a way around this but it is a pain. Also, they do not discount their books for volume purchases-----they do, however, offer promotional pricing from time to time. In the future I will try other on-line vendors such as Blurb to gain a comparison.

Scott Peters · Aug 29, 2007

I was told that Graphistudio was very good at B&W. I am waiting on samples. I used blurb for a color book and black and white. Good for color, not for B & W. B & W is tougher to get the tone right...Graphis has some very nice recommendations and seems to be a wedding photographers choice...not inexpensive, but you probably pay for quality. give them a call and they will send samples. I was told they print in Italy...

Eric Rose · Aug 30, 2007

thanks Scott. The book I want to do is B&W and one thing that would just burn me is lousy paper and a weird color cast to the photos once reproduced. I also want to do a wedding book for my daughter as well which will be a combination of color and B&W.

patrickjames · Aug 30, 2007

If you want the book to come out right you have to be color managed. That means a custom profile for your monitor. I have a friend who was having problems until I set him up.

Patrick

Cheryl Jacobs · Aug 30, 2007

Eric, I use American Color Imaging (www.acilab.com) and I'm very happy with them. The print quality of my B&W's (I don't shoot color) is excellent. I usually upgrade the paper to a heavier weight. Their product is very similar to Asuka, but they generally turn books around in about a week, and they charge just about half of what Asuka charges.

- CJ

bob100684 · Aug 30, 2007

I'm going to second blurb. The quality is just about as good as some real books that we own, and the turn around time is fast, the only recommendation I have is to tone your b/w photos a little bit as neutral greyscale is hard to get with color processes.

Online photo books publishers

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