This week I need to pick your brains. Tasty brains…
Thanks to the Project #365 I ran last year (and am doing now), I have essentially created a photo diary of a year in my life and I really like that. They are all archived online – here, instagram, Flickr – and on the iPhone, but sometimes I just want to hold something real. So I am thinking of creating a photo book to celebrate the year. I’m just not sure exactly how I am going to do it!
Options (as I can think of them)
- Get it done by some online service and bound to look like a “proper book”
- Have the photos printed out and stick into a photo album
- Have the photos printed out and hand-bind them
Of the three, option 1 seems the most appealing to me. 2 just seems a bit tacky and not something you’re going to want to pick up and idly flick through. Also, photo albums rarely go big enough for 365 photos! Hand binding could be an idea, but I have no idea exactly to go about it. I could make the album, and stick the photos in, but you have the same issue as 2. Or I could actually stitch the pages and case it, but that would be single leaf as double-sided printing is just going to be a bitch, and I’d have to make sure the photos were printed with enough edging and… My brain hurts thinking about it.
Looking forward, I am also going to want to do a similar thing when I finish the current year (Jan – Dec 13) and I’m not sure if I will still have access to the binding studio by then.
Which is a long winded way of asking for your help picking an online service to print this photo book.
Requirements:
- Must ship to the UK (d’uh!)
- Must be able to make lowish res Instagram photos look good
- Decent layout control
- Ideally it will pull from Flickr, as it is easiest that way to collate the photos and identify what is and isn’t a #365 image, but I can live with that not being an option
- Ideally, as well as the image itself, it will also pull the title and EXIF data from whatever service it gets the images from. Again, not an essential but certainly easiest. I am not looking forward to having to manually date and title 365 pictures!
- Not too expensive! I am not a cheapskate, and I want this to look good, but I am not made of money!
Thoughts? Experiences? Horror/success stories to share?