I'm in the market for a good digital photobook site. I've always used Walgreens to print my photos, and thought I would start using their services for photo books but wanted to see if there were any better options/sites out there in regards to price, quality, timeliness, book design options.
Creative memories-the lady below gave you a link to her site. Cost effective, easy to use. YOu can print photos with them or Sam's, Walgreens, etc.
I use Snapfish... Really like their quality. I made photo books for grandparents this year for Christmas and the price range was around 11 per book (flip book style). They always run great specials. They are quick and easy to make as well...their photo sharing and printing is good as well.
Blurb.com has the best prices. Their pricing is so good, that my dad who is a professional photographer has begun using them for his wedding albums and they turn out great (and allow him more profit!). I have used them before by uploading my layouts that I did through Photoshop. I think they may have something that you can use their layouts if you like, too. They have some good ones. Digital scrapbooking is the way to go! A good website for free digital stuff is http://www.twopeasinabucket.com/digital.asp They have TONS of freebies (a free digital kit each month!).
I would love to help you with all your digital needs, organizing, editing, and creating digital albums - my website is www.mycmsite.com/debbiekridner
If you want complete flexibility in designing your pages and access to thousands of digital scrapbooking art pieces, you need to check out Heritage Makers. Plus there are thousands of templates that are editable - you can start with a completed book and change any element on any page to make it yours! It is very fun to use!
Their books are very high quality in print and binding too.
Here is a video explaining how Heritage Makers works: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e91MWK3PSqo&feature=ch...
A. Robison
www.CreateHeritage.com
Mypublisher.com is pretty high quality. The nice thing about them is that you can do all the work offline. They also periodically run sales so you can get your book made and just save it until a sale comes along to order.
Shutterfly does a decent job but you have to be online and if you take any breaks, you'll have to keep signing back in-kind of annoying.
Creative Memories has digital software, but it is quite pricey. I am making an album with it right now, so I don't know about the print quality yet.
For a first book I'd go with mypublisher.
I have had coffee table albums created with my digital scrapbook designs and printed at three different companies. I have use winkflash, shutterfly and snapfish. They all have template pages that you can just drop your photos into and also you could use your own designs. I like all the options that each of these companies has to offer.
I will offer one word of caution though. Make sure that you order with a company that stitches their pages instead of gluing the pages. Shutterfly only glues pages. After opening and closing the books a few hundred times the glue will wear out and the pages will fall out. If you're not worried about that then it's not a big deal.
But I do know that winkflash, snapfish and even Creative Memories stitch all their hardcover book pages.
Hope this helps..happy creating of memories!
I ditched real scrapbooking a few years ago and have used multiple sites to find the best one. Winkflash is VERY hard to maneuver, Shutterfly is decent, but Snapfish has been the best! If you pay full price for a 20 page book with shipping & handling it's about $30, but if you drink Coke products you can save the Coke Reward points and end up only paying $2-$7 total for a great quality book. That's what I do for Grandparent gifts and they love them! If you need any help with info on Snapfish I'd be happy to help!
Close To My Heart is coming out with a new digital scrapbooking site. You design your pages how you want to and the best part is that you still get to use Close To My Hearts beautiful color coordinated pages.
Check it out!!
www.studioj.com
www.cherishedmoments.myctmh.com
Good Luck!!
I just started digital scrapbooking also. I use the new Digital Studio from Stampin' Up! You can use lots of their embellishments, papers etc. and send it directly to SU to print so that you get perfect color matching. The software is about $80 and can be ordered online at: www.chrissymentzel.stampinup.net
This is a digital Studio software that does a lot more than just scrapbooking! You can make dvds, greeting cards, calendars and more! It is very easy to use. I am a SU demonstrator and will be giving a class on how to use the software next month. You can contact me through the same website if you'd like to attend. I live in League City.
Hope this helps you.
C.
I love WinkFlash or Snapfish for my photos and from what I understand they do great books too.
Shutterfly is my favorite. One year my husband and I ordered calendars and photobooks from various websites and we found that Shutterfly had the best quality. They also offer a ton of different layouts, backgrounds and borders for your photos. THey also have a feature where once you select the photos you want in an album, it will fill out the entire album for you. We prefer to do it manually but this option would be great if you don't have a lot of time.
Shutterfly also allows you to create a share site where you can post all your family photos, calendars, notes, whatever and share it with your family and friends. You can also password protect the site and only allow members to view it through an invitation.
We have been using Shutterfly for the past 4 years and love it. We've ordered over 10 digital albums from them (each has about 90 pages) and love their quality. They are not the cheapest but I prefer their quality over the others.
I created and ordered a photobook from Shutterfly for my mom for Christmas. It turned out beautiful and looked so professionals. My mom actually cried when she looked through it. It was very easy to put together.
Lisa
I have never used the sites personally but have seen photo albums from Walgreens & Shutterfly. I like the shutterfly better. It seams to be slightly better quality. Walgreens did have a good album though. My mother in law recently made this transition & is using shutterfly & has been very happy with them. Have fun.
I love shutterfly! You can do pretty much everything on the site.
Hello PS! I LOVE LOVE LOVE snapfish and shutterfly! Both of the websites are fabulous! The pictures really come out well with a high resolution camera and if you are really lazy like me, you can collect all the pictures you like, log on to shutterfly, pick a book and they will load all in the book FOR YOU! All you need to do is write in them. God bless the inventor!
Sorry, don't have any places to really compare to, but for the last two years I've ordered photobooks (for ourselves and family) from snapfish.com and been extremely happy with the process and quality.
