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@Tswife4ever: Here is what I wrote in another post. We got ours from our photographer.
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As for the albums there is a night and day difference from what your professional photographer offers vs what is typically available commercially to consumers.
Just so you know the difference, the quality albums that REAL pro photographers typically offer are called flush mount. They have pages that are very thick, do not bend, and lay flat. The pages are printed on professional photographic paper and then mounted on archival board. Most of these are hand bound and sewn using book binding techniques. These books are very durable are made to last generation after generation.
The books that consumer labs typically print are called press printed. Actual photographic paper is not used, the pages are an archival cardstock. They bend easily, are usually thin, not very durable, and can never match the detail, vibrance, or sheen, that a true pro album can offer. The pages are typically glued into the binding so the integrity of the book depends on that glue.
If you are looking for something archival to last yrs and yrs, and truely showcase the professional photography that you paid so much for,I would go flush mount for sure. If you don't, definitely buy two copies and keep one tucked away and un-used. The few press printed books I have tend to show a lot of wear and tear after little use.
I think it depends on what you are looking for in a wedding album. I didn't want the traditional thick page, picture only type thing - I wanted something that felt like a scrapbook! I loved the results that I got from www.mixbook.com. I've been happy with the results that I've had with all the books I've ordered from them and I LOVE the level of creativity that I can put into it.
These are several of the pages from my album (I'd be happy to pm a link to the whole album if you would like to see, but I don't feel comfortable posting it on a public forum):
I want a flush mount album instead of a photobook (AdoramaPix makes photobooks) so we are planing to use Somerset.
AdoramaPix makes a nice photobook, IMO (we used them for our photo guest book) but it is no where near the quality of a professional album.
It all comes down to what you want.
As a graphic designer specializing in wedding album design, I am very familiar with a number of professional print-to-bind companies. I order albums from my clients from the same sources professional photographers do, just without the mark up.
The ones I like the best are: Black River Imaging, NationsPhotoLab, Finao, Zookbinders and BayPhoto. These companies all offer flush mount albums as well as premium photo books (otherwise known as pressbooks). As noted in a previous post, flush mount albums have very thick pages and the image is printed on photopaper, but I have to say that premium photobooks (even though the pages are not as thick and they are printed on presspaper) offer a very elegant and affordable alternative to an expensive flush mount album.
And, yes, these premium photobooks are a quantum leap up in quality from the photobooks available on many commercial sites. I've ordered lay flat photobooks from Smilebooks and AdoramaPix, for example, and the quality of construction just wasn't that great. AdoramaPix doesn't have a fly page, for example (the image is glued to the inside cover) and Smilebooks didn't really lay very flat.
I would definitely recommend ordering your album from a professional source. If you're not up for DIY design and your photographer is too expensive, consider using a graphic designer. It's a much more affordable way to get a professionally designed, premium album for half of what most photographers charge. Susan Gallagher
@dodgercpkl:Cool! I just ordered one from Mixbook and am glad to see yours turned out so well. I hope mine looks even half as nice!!
Mine is from Blurb and I LOVE it! I was able to put as many pages as I wanted (probably too many but oh well!) and custom design the layout to be exactly how I wanted it.
I will have the link to our book for you to check out once it finished uploading online. We are ordering it today and I can't wait! I already ordered a couple books through them for my family and they were SUPER high quality. They have really nice thick professional photo paper and for the price, I haven't found anything that can beat them. I can't recommend them enough! Especially since you can 100% customize it to how you want it to look rather than being forced to use their templates. Which they do have, if you prefer those.
I can vouch for Bay Photo's Press Printed books. They have something similar to flush mount (They refer to it as "Lay Flat Hinged pages."). I upgraded to the 6 color printing option and the quality came out really great. The pages are NOT the thick cardboard type; they are a decent weight though. The pages really do lay flat. You can design your own pages in photoshop or use their existing templates. You can also make it so that one photo spreads across two pages. Their customer service is awesome (Before they printed my book, they called and told me that one of my pictures was a little pixelated and asked whether I wanted to replace it or go ahead and print it anyway). Also, their turnaround time is pretty fast. I think I had the album in my hands about 5 days after I placed the order. Will post pics of it later.
I have also used them for birth announcements, canvas printed photos, and metal prints. Have not been disappointed once...
@Susan Gallagher: I'm still wondering how graphic designers are able to offer albums for half of what photographers charge...that doesn't really make sense to me since I know how much an album costs wholesale and how much the average cost of purchasing an album from a photographer is.
Bees, please make sure that your contract allows for another designer using your photos to design an album for you...if the designer is doing any type of editing (even cropping) to the photos that may be a breach of contract due to copyright.
Also, BayPhoto and Finao definitely do not offer services to consumers...only photographers with legitimate businesses. Can't say about the others, I just know about BayPhoto and Finao because I have accounts with them.
@kate169: I agree with Kate. Everyone running a business deserves to make a profit. If anything, photographers have the smallest markup on an album because they already made a decent chunk of money photographing the wedding and these types of things are add ons. When you consider image prep and album design the photographer is probably breaking even at best even with their markup. For a graphic designer, in order to run a successful business, they would have to mark up the item more to cover overhead and time because this is the bulk of their business. I see the post above as a glorified self promotion, sorry, just calling it as I see it.
@USER876: was "glorified self promotion" aimed at my post? If so, Im sorry you feel that way. I am neither a professional photographer nor a graphic designer. No hurt feelings or anything like that; just wanted to clarify
@kate169: I am just a regular ole consumer and I have an account. I sent in an email request for an account and they gave me a customer number with sign in. Never even heard of them until the photographer who shot my wedding recommended the company.
We plan to use Finao, but DH does photography semi-professionally and has a website and all that, so we had no problem getting an account.
Our photographers (who are AMAZING) use Finao as well.
@Okole Maluna: I have never heard that Bay Photo was a consumer lab...I was pretty sure they were pro only, but I guess I'm wrong :) Also, I think USER was referencing Susan Gallagher's post re: self promotion. She's been on a couple threads now saying that graphic designers are so much cheaper than using your photog. Which I take offense to as a photog.
@kate169. you are correct, Bay Photo is a Pro lab not a consumer lab. The sign up form even asks for your website and what type of photographer you are. So the only way to get access if you are not a professional is to falsify information.
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Was the price good? Quality good? Can you please include a picture? We want to purchase an album this weekend but are trying to decide where to get it from. Someone told us Adoramapix was great but we have never seen their work.