online 'Photo Books' any recommendations please?

[GR7]

Has anyone ever bought any of the "photo-books" that are created by uploading and arranging your own pictures of maybe a wedding for example? It looks like there are quite a few companies who do these books and I'm wondering if some are better value than others.

Here's a link to the Tesco one which I suspect is from one of the photo uploading/processing companies like Pixmania etc. I don't see a price for the Tesco book though!

http://www.tescophoto.com/wpp/tesco//buygifts_photobook.jsp

Thanks

 

[GaryS]

http://www.lulu.com/uk/
www.photobox.co.uk

 

[dk]

without doubt its the photobox ones, they are amazing, have loads of choice and easy to make.

you can use photos from facebook or flickr if you have them on there too.

I have a few of them and my company use them too, you will not be disappointed.

Plus when I ordered a couple when it was bogof, one of them arrived with a couple of pages loose. I emailed them and they without quibble rushed through a repeat order, so had two more, all for the price of 1 in the first place. their customer service really is second to none!

 

[Jungle_Jim]

yup i have used the photobox for a couple too, the print quality is very good and they usually come in about 2 days

 

[Djw John]

Photobox for me as well

 

[ukaskew]

Photobox ones are really nice, I was thrilled with mine...

 

[JJ!]

Another vote for photobox - so many options and you can layout each page as you want. They now do an A3 book too!!

 

[James.]

photobox for me!

 

[Rhino172]

tbh I think they are all the same thing, use the same software for creating the boooks etc (if not then they are very very simular)

gf has used both Photobox and trueprint

both very good quality however I believe photobox cocked up with the wording under the pics with spelling mistakes etc...they did give us £30 off the next order though for it

 

[dk]

tbh I think they are all the same thing, use the same software for creating the boooks etc (if not then they are very very simular)

gf has used both Photobox and trueprint

both very good quality however I believe photobox cocked up with the wording under the pics with spelling mistakes etc...they did give us £30 off the next order though for it

lol, surely the spelling mistakes must have been done by the person who created it online, i'm sure its all just fed through a computer to be printed, i doubt they type it all out again?

 

[ukaskew]

lol, surely the spelling mistakes must have been done by the person who created it online, i'm sure its all just fed through a computer to be printed, i doubt they type it all out again?

They messed up my calendars that I just received, several things wrong that are perfect online. Should get some replacements with no hassle though.

 

[dk]

really, that surprises me that its not as automated as i thought. At least they are very giving in their CS and compensation

 

[ukaskew]

really, that surprises me that its not as automated as i thought. At least they are very giving in their CS and compensation

It is indeed very odd, on a couple of mine they are so different from the version online I can't even understand what went wrong, shame as I'm so impressed with them, look fantastic otherwise.

 

[MaLicE]

on the talk of prints i have just ordered 2 prints from http://www.theprintspace.co.uk/ by far one of the best professional printers i have used, guides on how to set the images up to get the best results out of them, besides offering inkjet printing, they also offer traditional printing techniques (chemical and light based) of digital images... and the papers they offer are AMAZING! not just the normal matt, gloss, pearl etc, they do silver laced metalic paper! 2 prints have cost me 40 quid but the quality is crazy.

few other places i have been looking at recently with regards to setting up a small exhibition looking at printing on aliminium and clear plastic as well as canvas etc

 

[Jungle_Jim]

Photobox ones are really nice, I was thrilled with mine...

thats awesome mate, stunning pics

for mine i made a sin city style comic book for a uni project

 

[Rhino172]

lol, surely the spelling mistakes must have been done by the person who created it online, i'm sure its all just fed through a computer to be printed, i doubt they type it all out again?

lol yeah I thought that at first but we double checked as she had "saved" the photobook on the site and we went through it together...was 100% them that got it wrong...I was just as suprised as yourself lol

 

[Maxdicapua]

Photobox sounds pretty good but there's also http://www.blurb.com/ though I haven't used then myself so couldnt say how good they are 100%

 

[GR7]

ukaskew, I remember those superb pics of yours and your book looks amazing!

Do you and others prefer the white background for your pics or the black background? Obviously the pics taken at night with a dark sky look better with the white background!

 

[stevenb]

I used aldiphotos.co.uk as i wanted to design the book my self and beable to layout one jpg onto the whole of the page and these let you do that. Its even printed right to the edge which is what i wanted.

I found out what size the page was and created a jpeg the correct size in corel draw then layed the pictures out witha border and text etc and simply exported it as one picture and they came out fine.

Im going into printing but only big flat things not really the books. Our website is still being built due to it falling over the other week and being to complicated but have a look www.steven-b.co.uk

Steven-b

 

[ukaskew]

ukaskew, I remember those superb pics of yours and your book looks amazing!

Do you and others prefer the white background for your pics or the black background? Obviously the pics taken at night with a dark sky look better with the white background!

When I had that done only white was available, although I think I would have gone with black if I had the choice at the time.

My Motorsport Calendar for 2009 looks superb in black, the pictures really stand out, but then obviously they are pretty much all nice bright daytime shots.

 

[Rhino172]

Black background all the way....always makes the pictures more "punchy" if that makes sense lol

Just designed myself a new desktop calendar for next year...much better with my own pics instead of the shoddy ones work give out lol

 

[Jungle_Jim]

I used aldiphotos.co.uk as i wanted to design the book my self and beable to layout one jpg onto the whole of the page and these let you do that. Its even printed right to the edge which is what i wanted.

I found out what size the page was and created a jpeg the correct size in corel draw then layed the pictures out witha border and text etc and simply exported it as one picture and they came out fine.

Steven-b

you can do that on photobox too mate, thats how i did the comic book (see page 1 of thread)

 

[Rhino172]

PMSL well my new calendar turned up at the weekend from Photobox....

All the wording is in French and the photos are of some random family I've never met what looks like on holiday....

at least they got the black backgroud right lol!

me thinks I'll be making a phone call today

 

[dk]

lol, now thats funny

 

[Rhino172]

lol...I ordered two (one for me and one for the missus) and I gave her her's and she was looking through it rather confused lol

Simple to sort, just called them, send it back to them and they are ordering a re print on mine....lets see what turns up next time

 

[Rhino172]

correct ones have turned up now along with the photobook I ordered...most impressed

 

[ukaskew]

correct ones have turned up now along with the photobook I ordered...most impressed

I got my corrected calendars today, got to keep the old ones as well which was cool.

 

[Revels]

I got my calender today, little white specs on a few pages. Only noticeable if you look close enough.

Emailed them and they are sending me a replacement. Cant fault their customer service at all.

 

[ukaskew]

A few piccies of my calendars for 2009, so much better than the designs/layouts they had for last year, look quite professional now with the black backgrounds...


A3 Double Page Calendar

A3 Poster Calendar

 

[Revels]

They look great, Chris.

Im going to make one of my pics next year, didnt take enough/have enough to fill one this year.

 

[ukaskew]

They look great, Chris.

Im going to make one of my pics next year, didnt take enough/have enough to fill one this year.

I struggled a bit on the normal calendar, apart from motorsport I've not done much this year, all my trips away were in the past couple of weeks and I wanted to get them done before then, so compared to last year I didn't have much content...half of the pics were taken within a mile of my house (like the two posted above)

 

[Rich]

Look good, got a couple of the books done for Xmas, one Black and one White, definitely preferring the Black.

 

[Tom]

http://www.apple.com/ilife/iphoto/printproducts/index.html

never bothered to do it, but i might now.

 

[Alex H]

From the lot who were looking last year, do we rate Photobox as the best still? I'm going to get a book done of my 2009 photos, something to remember the year by.