Anna1013

I was doing research for my own photo book for my trip report, and stumbled across this website that others recommended. Thought I would let others know that they have a promotion going on(until the end of the year) in which you can receive a free copy of a photobook that you make with their site.

I've tried looking up info on mypublisher.com or blurb.com - I noticed that some people mentioned that blurb.com was a bit too hard to use, although they seem to have better prices. Does anyone want to share there experiences for either of these sites?

janisj

Anna: You might want to post this over in the Lounge . . . .

paigenet

Anna - I made a great hardback book on mypublisher a few years back and was really happy with it. I'm not familiar with the promotion they are running but the site itself is great! It took me a little bit to get used to the layout techniques but I bet the software is better than 5 years ago and even easier to use. Good luck Paige

paigenet

Also - I've never heard of blurb. I definitely think mypublisher has been around longer and know several people that have used it too. And nope... not affiliated with either but contact me if you have any questions!

appletea

hello there. i've done books on mypublisher, iphoto as well as blurb. i really like the open window on the mypublisher cover. the iphoto book was the most expensive to print. the iphoto book also had the worst hard cover. it was also kind of slow to use, maybe because of my powerbook. my favorite of all of those photobook sites is the blurb ones because you can choose to print the cover on the hardback itself. they also have the selection of 7x7, which makes for a cute book. they are also the most reasonably priced. you can do a search for free shipping codes. it is kind of slow though . . . but be patient. it's worth it!

jamikins

I make coffee table books of all our trips using mypublisher and the quality is always outstanding. Their software is also easy to use. I would highly recommend them.

amyb

I've used MyPublisher for quite a while now, easily 5 years. The book formats have evolved (you don't have to get the window cover anymore, they have dustjackets which are gorgeous) and the software is better, but still not intuitive all the time though. I found other services easier to use, but none are the quality of product that MyPublisher is.

vicki2201

I've only done iPhoto books on my mac and ordered it through Apple. How does this compare? Thanks!

baby2

I use MyPublisher through Costco and get a discount. I have done two books and working on my third.

julia1

I've done books with iPhoto, My Publisher, Shutterfly and Blurb. I teach photography courses and received questions about these books from students, so I made sample books in order to show the differences. And there are some definite differences.

The best for print quality is Shutterfly, although the others are slowly catching up. Shutterfly is also different in that you first upload your photos to create albums on the server, then you create your book online. With the others, you download software, create the book on your own computer, then upload the finished book. And this partially explains why Shutterfly is the highest quality - because you upload your images at their full resolution and these are used to create the book. With the others, when you go to upload your finished book, the images are processed before upload.

iPhoto books are actually printed by My Publisher and there is little difference between the two, except that page layout options differ. The quality is high and quality control is good.

For these three, you are limited to 99 pages and costs are high, although they all often run special offers with discounts that will bring the prices down. And of course, if you've already spent several thousand dollars on a holiday, what's another $100 for a beautiful book to preserve the memories?!

Blurb is kind of a 'new kid on the block', but they're catching up fast. They aim to offer 'bookstore-quality' books at lower prices than the others. The books are available with up to 400 pages, although I'd recommend you keep them to no more than about 200 pages. As the books get larger and heavier, there's more stress on the bindings, which are glued, not stitched, in all of these print-on-demand books. The paper used in Blurb books isn't as heavy or as glossy as the paper used by the others, but image quality is still very good. Blurb has had issues with quality control and with buggy software, but recently they seem to be getting these under control. And their customer service is very quick to print and ship a replacement book if there is a problem.

Bottom line is, whichever you choose, you won't be disappointed, as long as you use high resolution, sharp, properly exposed images. The important thing is that you do print or make books with some of your best photos. That way they won't be lost if something happens to you or to your computer or to the CDs/DVDs/HDs you use for photo storage.

Here's a link to one of my websites with three of my Blurb books featured. http://www.gardentouring.fotopic.net/ You can click on a book to get a 15-page preview.

Here's a link to my Shutterfly books: http://community.shutterfly.com/gall...4ab00f16ca9e1e

Anna1013

Sorry if this was supposed to be posted in the lounge, but I thought I was travel related.

Wow - thanks for all the replies! I really appreciate everyone's feedback.

appletea - was the blurb software hard for you to follow?

baby2 - did you go through the costco website to get a discount with mypublisher?

julia1 - thank you so much for your detailed reply! I would like a book that shows the pictures better(like shutterfly as you mentioned), but I want to have a trip report to go along with the pictures.

I was thinking that I would have to find pictures that were really high quality, which does narrow my selection a bit - thanks for posting your links...I'll be sure to look at them.

Just a question - I noticed on both blurb and mypublisher you can look at other people books, which are also for sale. Does this mean that these websites can sell, or preview, these books to other people on the internet...without your permission?

amyb

FWIW, I did use Shutterfly once and I felt the paper quality really distracted from the quality of the book, and I also didn't like being forced to choose a "theme" for my pages rather than just use a white background and a nice layout. This was about 18 months ago, so maybe things have changed since then, but I like that the MyPublisher books look like professional, clean, coffee table books and not overly-crafty scrapbooks with juvenile backgrounds. Just MHO though.

Anna1013

amyb - thanks for the info. I really didn't want to sacrifice quality for price, so I think I may use either blurb or mypublisher instead of shutterfly.

Anna1013

julia,

I just checked out your books on blurb and some pages of your shutterfly book - I have to say that your books on blurb were incredible!

I guess your opinion differs from Amy on the quality at Shutterfly - as a photographer did you like the way your pictures came out better at blurb or shutterfly?

Do you have a link for any of the books you made with mypublisher?

julia1

Anna-- I'll answer a few of your questions...

The Blurb software is not difficult to follow. All of them have a learning-curve of sorts. They also all have options for text-only pages as well as pages with varying amounts of text and images.

The easiest way to get started is to organize your photos into folders or albums in somewhat the same order you want them to appear in your book. I usually spend time thinking about my next project for a week or so before I get started - I think about it on my drive to and from work, rather than listening to NPR or music.

Blurb, My Publisher and Shutterfly all have 'bookstores' or galleries or pages where you can see other people's books. This isn't done without their permission. With Blurb you have the option of making your books public or private. If you make them public, they will appear in the Blurb online bookstore; you can set a price and sell them online. You get the difference between Blurb's price and the price you set. With the others you have the option of adding your book(s) to the public galleries - otherwise your books are available only to you and anyone else you want to share the password with.

With all of them you have the choice of using their 'themes' or just choosing white/black/colored backgrounds, whichever you prefer. I use very simple, plain, white backgrounds for most of my books. You also have choices of fonts to use and also you can choose text color.

As far as photo quality in the books, it's very dependent on the quality and resolution of your images. If they are good, they will be good in the books, whichever one you choose. Shutterfly definitely has the best print quality, mainly because of the paper used. This isn't just my opinion - many photographers agree, as does the tech columnist for the Wall Street Journal. But the others are very good also and you won't be disappointed by any of them. When you hold your first book in your hands, a book filled with your own photos, it's a thrill.

julia1

One more thing-- in reply to amyb's comments about Shutterfly, I wonder if you might be confusing Shutterfly with Shutterbug? I've been making books with Shutterfly for over two years now and haven't run into any of the issues you mention. ;-) There's nothing 'overly-crafty' or scrapbook-like or juvenile about them. Take a look: http://community.shutterfly.com/gall...alias=JuliaM50 Just click on any of the books and you will be able to look inside. In the upper-right side you can click on 'Full-Screen' to see them in better detail.

Anna1013

julia,

Thank you so much for taking so much of your time offering help - I really, really appreciate it

I'm thinking I have to go through my photos again and see which one are worth putting in a book - not all of them are the best quality.

Thanks for letting me know about the policy of whether your books can be private or put out for sale.

vicki2201

Thanks to everyone on this thread! This is very very useful information for me--who has just used iPhoto and Ofoto (now called KodakGallery(?).

Sometimes it's very tedious to come up with a book that conveys the feeling of a trip, moreso since I usually come home with more than a thousand photos. I find that deleting all the less-than-spectacular photos is a start, then choosing the best of the best and putting it in a separate folder just like one poster does here.

It also helps too, when on a trip, I am already visualizing the book, therefore taking establishing shots as well as a few closeups of interesting details--architectural, food, etc.

Thanks for sharing..

amyb

Nope, it was definitely Shutterfly, as that's where I get my photos printed when I print them. I just felt the backgrounds were kind of hokey and there was no option at the time for just white.

I guess it's personal preference, but I really love the quality of the My Publisher books. I just looked and I've done 12 over the last few years, including trips, family party/wedding photos and concert photography, and you'd be hard pressed to tell that they weren't professionally done. Personally I wouldn't go back to Shutterfly based on the one I had done with them.

eurogals

I have created 5 books using MyPublisher and my first book was the only one where I didn't get a second one free.

I love my books. They are a wonderful way to save your photos instead of a photo album. My friends are so impressed when they see them on the table.

My photo albums will be sent directly to the trash when I die, but my books I believe will be saved.