Photobooks (Memory books)

What are Photo Books?

Photo books are essentially a photo album, the only difference being that the photographs are printed directly on to the pages of the book.

This gives your digital photo album a very professional feel. What's more, you can have your digital photos printed to any size within the book - vary the size of your prints to create a more interesting layout. When you see one for the first time, with your photos, you will say "wow!".

How to create a Photo Book?

Some websites offering photobooks require you to download software in order to create the book. However, there are a good choice of online shops that let you do all the design work online through their own website. Personally, I prefer this as I try not to  install to much software on my computer if I can help it.

Firstly, upload your digital images to the website. Select the style and size of book, then position your photographs to their best effect by simply dragging and dropping your images.

Customise the layout of your pictures and text

Choose a layout style for each page and add text for descriptions and captions. You can save your photobook to finish at a later date, change the layout and swap photos to see which look best. Some sites such as www.myphotobook.co.uk even let you use special effects such as transparency.

Finally, place your order and within days your photo book will be delivered. A perfect present, way to preserve your photo collection of holiday pictures or wedding pictures, or a portfolio of your work.

You can, of course, simply print your digital photos or frame your photos, but creating a photobook is just so much better. Below is a list of what we think are the best online photobook services:

The PhotoBox site is great. It's clear, easy to navigate and there are good instructions on how to order a photobook. I ordered a photo book from this website and was impressed with the flexibility of the layout options, the quality of the book and the delivery.

I ordered a photo book for my Mum, who doesn't have a digital camera, internet connection or a computer so she can't share our family digital photographs. She was thrilled.

PhotoBox have added to their photobook range – you can now order stylebooks and notebooks. Their photobooks are still very good value at £19.99 for 26 pages with the option of adding up to 70 pages now. They come in three different styles with a special Kids style coming soon.

The style books are slightly smaller, come in four attractive styles and contain a minimum of 30 pages, especially good for adding text and anecdotes to your photos. All for £14.99.

Photobox's new notebooks are great, very colourful with three themes and a huge variation on designs for the cover. They are ideal for creating a journal, notebook, recipe book or travel diary and come with lined or plain paper insides. Excellent value.

Photobox is highly recommended for Photobooks

My Photo Book offers a fantastic range of books which come in all shapes and sizes, with different covers including hard back, soft back, spiral bound or a simple booklet style.

Prices vary according to what you buy, but you can easily afford a photobook from this site, or splash out on something special such as their Maxi format with a linen hard back cover in a choice of seven colours.

Have the cover printed with one of your favourite photos or choose from 13 different colours in the soft cover range. Their sturdy spiral bound photobooks are ideal for business presentations or design portfolios.

You do have to download their software and install it onto your PC or Mac in order to use the service. It's compatible with Windows 95/98, Me, 2000, XP and with Macintosh OS X.

 

Cewe Color is Europe's largest photo processor, apparently, with clients such as Jessops, Lloyd's Pharmacy and Rowlands in the UK. And they definitely do photobooks. In as little as 3 clicks you can create the photobook on your PC and pictures look great in various styles and formats with lots of room for individual creativity. Right now the software is not Mac compatible but a version for MAC is coming soon.

So, let's take a look at how My CeWe Photo Book works. Basically:

* Transfer your photos to PC
* Download software
* Install and run the application 'My CeWe Photo World'.
* Choose your book size, i.e. Extra Large, Large, Square or Small Booklet
* Use the "CeWe Photo Book assistant", to create a book in just three clicks. (You may wish to choose from the six cover styles at this stage)
* Click on the 'to order' button to start the order process

 

Prices start from £5.99 (up to £70) at the award-winning Cewe - worth a visit, I'd say.

 

Colourmailer offer many sizes for both their Photo Albums and Deluxe Albums. Photo Albums are spiral bound with a choice of semi-transparent or coloured covers. Deluxe Albums have hard covers and a choice of four colours and are perfect bound. There albums are excellent value, for example their medium-sized album with 20 pages is £10.90.

Their website is very descriptive, giving good images of their albums and clearly showing all of the cover colours and types available. Choose from different backgrounds and layouts and add text

You do have to download Colourmailer's software to use their service, but it's fully Mac and Windows compatible.

TruPrint offer a solid range of photobooks, coming in 3 sizes with several different covers. With prices starting from as little as £9.99, TruPrint are worth checking out (and they're a high street name we're all familiar with).

SPECIAL OFFER:Truprint are offering customers a massive 50% off photobooks all throughout the summer. Create your photobook and use the offer code SUMMERBOOK to receive your discount. This offer is valid until midnight 13th September 2009

fotoinsight have an excellent range of photobooks, small, square, large and extra large, and their website shows them off well so you can see exactly what you're getting. They come with either hard back, soft back or linen covers in different colours (except for the smallest size) and with plenty of choice on backgrounds and layout styles. It's an international site, just select your country from the top menu. The necessary software is for PCs only however.

Kodak Gallery offer three sizes of photobook – regular, large and mini and all include a front window to show the photo on the first page. The choice of covers includes leather and linen (except for the mini size) which makes your books very stylish. Covers also come with a large selection of colours. You can choose layouts and add captions.

Yophoto offer four sizes of photo books but their best feature is the colour range of the bonded leather and linen covers that you can choose from. Select different layouts and background colours and add your own captions.

You must download their software which is only compatible with Windows XP or 2000.

Bonusprint have extended their range of photobooks and now offer spiral bound mini albums in three sizes, as well as their pocket, medium and large photobook range (the medium photobook comes in two sizes). The large and medium books come with leather or linen covers in various colours. Choose from different backgrounds and layouts and as usual you can add captions.

Bonusprint offer a good product but the photo software that you have to download is only compatible with Windows 2000 XP or above. Mac users go to www.photobox.co.uk, www.myphotobook.co.uk or Colourmailer.

Bags of Love have three sizes of photobook, A3, A4 and A5, with the A4 size coming in both landscape and portrait. The cover is personalised both front and back with your photos, the books are handbound and you also can have free red-eye and date stamp removal on some sizes.

Bags of Love are offering an up-market product "hardcover deluxe coffee table style books" with artworkers taking care of your photos, so these photobooks are for a special occasion and the prices reflect this. Presentation box or tin also available. You have to pay before uploading your photos.

Snapfish now offer five different photo books, their large Signature photo book comes with a velvet or leather cover, then they have Classic, Story, Everyday and Mini books too. The Story book comes with a customised dust jacket making it extra special. The Mini books are tiny at 2 x 3 inches but are great for your handbag. There are also plenty of styles and colours to choose from.

You need to have Adobe Flash Player installed on your computer to use Snapfish, if you don't you will be prompted to install it when making your photobook.

Fotobook: an Edinburgh-based company with a very good website and a wide selection of sizes, covers and colours for their photo books. The quality seems to be excellent although the products are a little pricey. Only for PC users, although they have an offline pack for Mac users to correctly save photos, write them to CD and send them in a postage-paid envelope.

Treasure Your Pics offer five styles with a choice of leatherette coloured covers. They also offer a professional photographer site (www.photovalue.com) which is aimed specifically at wedding photo albums and offers a variety of styles and sizes.

You need to download their software which is only compatible with Windows 2000, XP or above.

Klickphotobook offer five different sizes of book from an extra large photo book to a 26-page photo booklet, with all of their books you can add up to 98 pages. You have to download software to use the site and it's only compatible with Windows 2000, XP and Vista.

Net Print
www.netprint.com

Magic Boomerang
www.magicboomerang.com

Jessops
www.jessopsphotoexpress.com Jessops have partnered with Snapfish (see above) so their products are exactly the same.

Truprint
www.truprint.co.uk Truprint have partnered with Snapfish (see above) so their products are exactly the same.
Do you know of any resources we've missed, or do you disagree with what we've put then please get in touch with your feedback, or leave us a comment below...

Comments	Date
By Kate Davies	2009-06-25 21:48:38
I found a site called MyCreation (www.mycreation.co.uk) where I could download photobook software for Mac (I don't much like PC's). I had complete control over the design I wanted and it was quite easy to get to grips with. The finished book was good too...recommended!
By Annabel Hipperson	2009-06-20 23:39:31
I have just got my book I ordered from a UK company called 2m2u.co.uk. It is fantastic, the quality of the product is just what I wanted and it took only 5 days to get it delivered. I want to recommend 2m2u to everyone.
By Kath Bonson	2009-04-04 14:27:42
I just tried out the Aldi Photo site and was very pleased both witht he software which allowed me to personalise just as I wanted and also with the quality and service.
By Paul	2009-04-01 09:05:31
Here is what we did and never looked back - The hardest part buy a MAC - After one day you will wonder why you every put up with Microsoft windows. The easy part use the iPhoto application inbuilt photobook designs. Seamless, effortless and beautiful results every time.
By Anna	2009-02-15 22:57:25
I tried to get my wedding album printed by Snapfish, but when it was (eventually) delivered, the resolution of most of the pages was incredibly bad - as in 1mm pixels! No telephone number to call of course, so I had to wait 2 weeks for a "nothing we can do" response. They refunded my money (less delivery charge), but now I'm back to square one, and of course I didn't have anything to give my parents for Christmas! And no, the resolution of my photos was not at fault - I uploaded at about 600dpi and the preview was fine. Humbug.
By Richard T	2008-12-31 18:13:20
Photobox used to be a good site, which Iused for both prints and photobooks. However, after 'upgrading' their website, I would advise against using it. Every process is slow and pictures in albums often appear greyed out making them unusable.
By Cherri	2008-12-10 17:04:57
For digital albums, I would 110% recommend myphotobook.com. You have to download the software but it is so easy to use, & the quality of the premium book we ordered was great. I used it for my wedding album, even though it was the first time I had used this type of service and I found it was so easy and quick. A great product.
By Les	2008-11-06 17:53:15
For those of you struggling with using online photobooks (Photobox, etc. why not download the free software from various sites - tesco, yophoto, mycewe, fotobook, colourmailer, hoffman, and loads more. Much easier to create in your own time and without having to upload the photos
By Michael Williams	2008-10-24 08:03:00
Hi, I recently used colormailer for printing a photo book. The quality was quite good and the delivery was fast. Their software allows you to change the layout in different ways so that you can customize your photos. Good service! They are competitively priced too. A drawback is that they don't ship to US now so I can send these to my friends there. :-)
By kc	2008-09-10 09:34:59
STAY AWAY from Colormailer. The quality is dreadful, they take weeks to respond to emails. I've had to return products 3 times for basic quality issues.

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