Weddingbee Blog

After we got our wedding photographs back, I immediately started thinking about the albums for our parents. We had given our parents some gifts at the wedding, but these albums were also part of their wedding present from us, and I knew they were looking forward to having them. My mom mentions quite often how the only pictures from the wedding that she (physically) has to show people are all non-pro shots that she got developed during the 3 month lag before our pro pics arrived.

Our photographer has some wonderful small-album options, and we had had a good experience when we purchased our engagement album from her. However, her options are not cheap. Our engagement book ran us about $200+ for an 11×8 book with 24 spreads. We needed two books, with at least that many pages (though likely more), and we preferred a higher quality album than what we could afford with her.

Enter the DIY album.

Many photo book design services exist on the internet - pick your poison. Shutterfly, Blurb, iPhoto, My Publisher, and Picaboo are some of the many that I looked into. While these books are fantastically priced and very good quality, in the end I was sad that doing-it-myself with these companies meant leaving behind those gorgeous, lay-flat page albums that only photographers have access to.

Then, I found this post written about Adorama, and I was instantly intrigued. Upon researching further, I realized that some professional photographers even use Adorama for clients who cannot afford full flush-mount albums. Combine that with the fact that Adorama offers professional-quality prints at reasonable prices, and I was sold!

I decided to host our wedding pictures on Adorama’s site so that our family could order prints without breaking the bank (we have a print release for up to 8×10). I paid the $25 membership so that our photos will be stored permanently, and while this fee will have to be renewed yearly, it will ensure that our wedding photos are backed-up online.

Once our pictures were hosted on the site, the rest was easy. First I chose my album’s size and page number (both of which can be adjusted at any time), then selected “Build Your Own” and finally indicated where I wanted to pull my photos from (Adorama, Flickr, Picasa, or the desktop). At this point, you can begin the design process! The web-hosted program is a blank slate that allows you to format your album however you’d like. You can easily do full-spread or full-page layouts or have multiple pictures on a page in any configuration you’d like.

2 weeks after our order was placed, the albums arrived, and the results are absolutely amazing.

(all photographs in albums courtesy of Jessica Ames Photography)

Here is a summary of my thoughts on the experience:

PROS:

• Lay-flat pages with minimal crease lines (biggest pro for me)
• Professional-quality photo paper
• Thicker pages than Blurb or Shutterfly
• Excellent image quality
• Design freedom - no pre-determined templates
• Extremely reasonable prices
• Fast turn-around time

CONS:

• Web-based design program is slow at times (could be because of my computer), also, it can be difficult to use in certain situations (for example, to line things up precisely). I am by no means a designer, but I think I did alright with the program. Also of note, I think you can design in other software and upload to Adorama (not sure how this works as I did not have that option)
• Pages are not as thick as flush-mount albums (as expected)
• No options for leather or textured covers (although they do offer image-wrap covers if you are interested in that)

All in all - an amazing quality product for the price. We ordered two 10×10, 50 page albums for $190.00 including shipping. And the square books are on sale right now - 25% OFF until 8/31!

Did you or do you plan to DIY your parent or wedding albums?