Weddingbee Blog

When I posted photos of the MyPublisher album I made for my cousin, someone asked me to post pictures of our MyPublisher wedding guestbook, so here it is. I have a little more insight on the process and the end result at the end of this post. It involved a lot of scanning by me, Mr. Milkshake, and my dad.

I coerced our best man into making write-ups for the bridal party for the first page of our guestbook, so on top of his best-man-speech stress, he was able to come up with these:

The groom:
He is a man of few words and determined will. He can also memorize a textbook in less time than it takes you to eat lunch. Be wary when he begins to use gibberish, it probably means he’s experiencing extreme emotions, or he’s hungry, or he missed a rare item in the latest RPG.

Himself, the best man:
He is currently collecting lichens for a living despite having a degree in English literature. Go figure. Tempt him with McDonald’s Junior Chicken Burgers and he will show you the visage of deep inner conflict.

Groomsman #1:
This marvel of wit and sarcasm and long time haxor runs his own t-shirt company (vansity.com) and has just entered a career in video game design. If you’re looking to get more out of your level 70 gnome warlock, then talk to this guy.

Groomsman #2:
Don’t be fooled by the size of his head; he really can think. Recently he launched himself into a career in interior design. Tell him that you think Danish furniture is atrocious and you much prefer IKEA and he might just burst a blood vessel in his forehead.

The bride:
She is half the reason we are here today. Bride, Pharmacist and CEO of stitchpixie.com all rolled into one small human being. If she’s not stitching stylish (and sometimes provocative) custom vinyl purses or selling drugs, then you will probably find her in cyberspace shopping for mostly bizarre and useless items.

Maid of honor (who also happens to be his girlfriend):
She knows a lot about wood and how to deal with it. Get her and groomsman #2 together and tell them both to admire your brand new IKEA living room set, and you will promptly receive a black-belt certified Tae-Kwon-Do chop to the spleen followed by a burst blood vessel. Yes, IKEA can be a touchy subject.

Bridesmaid #1:
She really is quite the catch, but beware, there’s a large man responsible for the gorgeous rock on her finger. Pharmacist by day, she is very possibly the busiest person we’ve ever met, dividing her time between three pharmacies, traveling the world, and indulging in good foods. Creme brulee, anyone?

Bridesmaid #2:
She and the bride were both subject to wearing kilts and white dress shirts for 6 years while they attended a prissy private school. She is well traveled and also enjoys good food. Look for her by the seafood appetizer tray.

The picture above is he and his men around 11 or 12 years old, and right below it, all of them on the bachelor’s weekend on a private island this summer, at 25 years old. He’s known them since he was about seven years old.

I think MyPublisher is super user-friendly and offers several great layout options depending on how many photos you want on a page, as you can see below. It’s just drop and drag:

However, I didn’t find the layouts would allow for me to create what I wanted as far as picture placement and white space availability for our guestbook. So instead, I made each page manually in Photoshop and set the image size to be 3324×2574 pixels for the classic hardcover. I remember reading somewhere that said a super high resolution image wouldn’t make a difference because their print quality is fixed. So I made sure all my full-page spreads fit those dimensions, and only one photo turned out somewhat pixely, even though I didn’t enlarge it. I had heard from one Weddingbee reader some time back that she had been unhappy with a few pixely photos in her MyPublisher book and they reprinted it for her for free. I did ours so last minute that I paid for overnight shipping, and I was just happy it arrived at my door 3 days before the wedding. There was no fixed date for the book’s printing, so I splurged for the shipping.

Actually, I remember at the time that we had gone back to Vancouver for the weekend for our Chinese banquet and I was terrified that the book would arrive while we were gone, because I’d forgotten to shut the sprinkler system off, and one of the sprinklers always soaked the front porch. For once, I was thankful that overnight shipping wasn’t really overnight.

We provided a fine-point sharpie, and I was really pleased with the overall result. We got a couple witty HAGS and FAGS because it was somewhat reminiscent of a high school yearbook, but it was nice to have pages that encouraged people to write more than just their names. I wasn’t interested in having a cheesy slideshow because I anticipated just how kick-ass our StillMotion same day edit would be, so this allowed us to show guests our pictures growing up with our families, as well as all the baby blue suits my dad and his brothers wore at his wedding!

Are you making your own album? Share with the hive your experiences with online book publishing companies!