Wedding Blog

Even though Mr. E and I decided not to do Christmas gifts this year in order to save money, I decided to make him a photobook with pictures of our trip to Paris and London. I wanted to do this for multiple reasons…

1. The trip is super meaningful to us cuz that’s where he proposed!
2. I didn’t feel like printing out loose 4 x 6’s and sticking them in a regular album
3. I wanted to test out blurb.com, which I recently read about in someone’s (can’t remember whose?) knot bio, and see if I could eventually use this to design a guestbook for the wedding

Here are a few shots of the finished product:

Cover

Inside spread pages

Back cover

Sorry for the poor lighting! Here is my review:

The Good:
It was very easy to make! I downloaded their bookmaking software, uploaded my pictures, and then it was basically drag and drop from there! They have a number of layout options, and I chose the photobook one with very little text (I wasn’t very creative with captions either ). You have to fudge around with it to get the pictures to fit correctly. It was fairly inexpensive, $43 including shipping, and I had close to 80 pages, with over 200+ pictures. And it also arrived in a week and a half. I LOVE the fact that it comes with a glossy dust jacket cover, just like a real coffee table book. That was the main factor that lead me to choose Blurb over MyPublisher.

The Ok:
It took FOREVER to upload, even with my cable connection! 1.5 - 2 hours… I was doing this around midnight, and I passed out on my couch. Honestly, I was slightly disappointed with the quality of the images. I thought the pictures would be crisper, but I think they are slightly blurred. I don’t think this is on account of my camera, which is pretty high quality and we had it on the highest megapixel setting. The images look very clear on my moniter. Also, the Blurb bookmaking software does not have photo editing options (does My Publisher?) so you should definitely correct for color in Photoshop before uploading. I was in a hurry to make this book cuz I wanted to ensure that it arrived before Christmas, so I designed it in one night. Next time I will photoshop my pictures beforehand. Anyways, the colors seemed rather muted in the book. The book also seemed smaller and slimmer than I thought it would be.

I probably will end up using one of these programs to design a Guestbook with our Engagement photos. I’m sure the pictures from my photographer will be very high quality pixel-wise (knock on wood) so I guess that will be the real test to see how well Blurb/MP prints!

All in all, I think Mr. E will love this present, and it will be a great memory of our trip. I do recommend blurb, but I think I’d like to give MP a try as well! Anyone else use one of these (or another) program, and what are your thoughts?