How do you show your personal photos?

<p>I hope the moderator will allow at least a short period of time in this forum before moving the thread.<br>

I'm considering which may the nicest way to present photographs of 2009 to my family. It seems a little unsatisfying to print out or recieve prints back and stick them in an album. I could do a DVD in Proshow but then I'm usually disappointed in the resolution and colours if not shown on my editing screen.<br>

I'm only talking about 12-25 prints from the entire year.<br>

So how do you guys do it if at all? DVD? Book? LR Slideshow? Framed prints?<br>

Thanks for any input.</p>

<p>I'm not sure I understand the question. How do you show photos to anybody? Put up a web site. Make prints. Create a book. Make a movie. </p>

<p>Trying hard to interpret the clues in your subject line, I'm guessing that perhaps you know how to show photos to clients, but you're not sure how to show personal photos to friends and family. I show "work" photos through my business web site. But I put personal photos up on normal consumer sites and share those URLs only with family and friends. I was one of the first users of Flickr years ago and still have photos there, but more recently I've moved to Picasa Web Albums. These sites allow family to make prints for themselves if they want them.</p>

<p>Will</p>

<p>Depends on your family. My grandparents wouldn't know what to do with a CD/DVD or anything not-tangible such as a website.<br>

I'm also not sure I'm understanding your question. Do you want to give each family member a "best of 2009" gift or is there a family gathering coming up where you want to show your photos?<br>

Here's what I usually do: I upload galleries to SmugMug and family members with enough time on their hands can either order their own prints or just browse and see our faces again (we live 3000 miles apart). Or I'll email them special photos (i.e. family taking a short trip or whatever) to keep them in the loop throughout the year. For birthdays, I'll usually give them a gallery wrap but it's getting old ;-)</p>

<p>I usually use Kodak's Gallery <a href="http://www.kodakgallery.com/Welcome.jsp">http://www.kodakgallery.com/Welcome.jsp</a><br>

not the absolute best in quality pics...but extremely useable. They allow you to put pics into folders. Then by folder invite guests to view.....regardless if that guest is a member or not. and they canchoose to view the folder as individual pics or in a slide show.....with the option to purchase if they so choose. My daughter loves it for pics I take of her twins.....</p>

<p>OK I'll try to be a little clearer. I don't have clients, I'm not a pro. You guys must present people with photographs all the time so what do you do for your own family?<br>

Or is it a case of a mechanic always drives a car in disrepair? You never get around to presenting a clutch of photos to your family whilst all your clients get the Rolls Royce treatment.<br>

I don't want to tell them to go look at a URL and print their own.<br>

Do you ever frame or print or create print albums of your personal family photographs?</p>

<p>If I take a bunch of photos at a family event I post them on smugmug. Every year I make a hardcover Blurb book with all the best photos of my kids, and give copies to grandparents. </p>

<p>OK so if any of you make books which ones do you recommend?</p>

<p>I tend to send prints to people for them to frame - most of our older generation of family understand prints and like them. They wouldn't know what to do with anything else.</p>

<p>I also would suggest one of those books from Blurb--I use Shutterfly. It doesn't confound older people to look at a book, and it doesn't require set up--a single person can look at it. Multiple copies can be made cheaply.</p>

<p>As moderator, I am moving this thread now...</p>

<p>A very good friend of mine here recommened to me BLURB.COM. I published my first book with them and with the very detailed and critical help from that very dear friend. It turned out amazing; I am very proud of it; "STREET PORTRAITS". I had copies made for me and I passed them out to close friends and family. The response was amazing and very positive. I am using that book to use as a promotion for my next book I am working on to well known publishers; as I was recommended to do by my dearest friend, (name i will keep to myself as requested).<br>

BLURB.COM is not very expensive and it is easy to you. The results are wonderful.<br>

NOTE: LIGHTEN YOUR PHOTOS PRIOR TO GOING TO PRINT AS THEY WILL COME OUT DARKER in print.</p>

 

<p>I send prints. Maybe it's a generational thing but I find that people prefer prints that they can frame, put in an album, or put on the refrigerator. My niece posts pictures of my grandnieces on Snapfish which we can order prints of.</p>

<p>I do prints with matting and frame and/or a simple photo album. I also will attach to an email once in awhile. I'd rather not send a file for another to print if possible, especially if I consider the image will make a nice print, I like to control that aspect myself. I recently had a family member visit and request a print to give to a friend, I explained I would print and frame it myself but she was very insistant that she didn't want me to be bothered. I went ahead and gave her a print, put it in a protective cover and folder. Two days later she emailed me and wanted me to send her a JPEG so she could reprint a copy on her office printer as she had ruined the original with scratches. I told her no, and she now has a matted and framed copy waiting . Maybe I'm just anal, but I want my prints presented as they should be...IMHO.</p>

Magcloud magazine or a Blurb book.

<p>Every time I take pictures of my family, I process them right away, print and send them to the family members. They'd rather put a picture up on their walls or on the mantelpiece, and have not arrived at Internet city yet.</p>

<p>There was a similar question on another forum I visit. The question was <em>"do you print your images?"</em></p>

<p>I was surprised that nine out of ten replies were negative. Most of them only looked at their images on digital frames, computer monitors and websites.</p>

<p>This made me wonder why most of them were trying to get the newest, highest resolution cameras when they were using less than a million pixels in the final output.</p>

<p>Agree on the Blurb idea. That's great stuff!</p>

<p>Many of my recent ones end up on the refrigerator door! Family, pets, new grandchild, wife's garden, etc. </p>

<p>Most others I post in albums on Facebook set up so only family and selected friends can see. They get automatic notifications when they open their Facebook page, and can choose to look at my photos or not. For special events I'll send the digital images off to Wal-Mart and give out the prints.</p>

<p> </p>

<blockquote>

<p>NOTE: LIGHTEN YOUR PHOTOS PRIOR TO GOING TO PRINT AS THEY WILL COME OUT DARKER in print.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Or you could just adjust your monitor to correct brightness/contrast...</p>

<p>There's a certain difference at the extreme ends how much you can see in a print *especially when viewing in normal room light* vs computer screen but if your prints are constantly coming out over all darker it's time to adjust the screen, not edit every image.<br>

Also, editing in a dark room late at night is very bad idea, everything will look different when you look at the images in daylight.</p>

<p>To be fair when looking at Blurb reviews the "LIGHTEN YOUR PHOTOS PRIOR TO GOING TO PRINT AS THEY WILL COME OUT DARKER" was a comment that came time and again so there may be some grounding in it.<br>

I'm going to give <a href="http://www.fotobook.co.uk">http://www.fotobook.co.uk</a> a try.</p>

<p>I show 'em just about any way I can. If I could get my photos printed on the cups of bikinis paraded around some spring break beach somewhere, I'd do it.</p>

<p>"7/7! Excellent compositions. I just can't take my eyes off of them!"</p>

<p>Framed prints; we'll flip through stacks of paper black and whites; slideshow over the web; web page somewhere; plugged a digital camera into a television and showed the images strait; whatever works or is on hand at the time. people around me will just see the photos I want to show them. I am a photo nerd, and they know it.</p>

<p>make a book it's always nice to get something in print than DVD.</p>

<p>Paul:<br>

Blurb customer support and the way it works has greatly improved since it was started. You can design your book then view it as if it were published in print before it goes to print. And, depending on what paper you select and whether you are printing color or b&w it goes well. I was just prepared for printing possibly having an effect on the lightness that I slightly lightened before I published. Again, they are very helpfull. Give them a peak.</p>

<p>I tried scrap booking some of my work couple years ago, I should try it again.</p>

<p><em>Do you ever frame or print or create print albums of your personal family photographs?</em></p>

<p>Yes. My aunt is a digital photo "pose and say cheese!" nut. I love her, and she has worked hard to capture memories, so I can't fault exactly fault her. But everything looks so posed it drives me nuts. Her grandchildren are like trained seals when the camera comes out. I use my old TLR with the waist finder when I am with the family, usually with B&W film, and get pictures of people that are more natural and I hope more artistic. I make prints (not scans) and I give one or two prints in frames as gifts if they are particularly good shots. Sometimes I scan a print, but that's because I have already done all the work in the darkroom to get it to look how I want it to. Sometimes after seeing a contact sheet from a party, one of the family will ask me for a print, and I'll make one.</p>

<p>I found some handsome vellum envelopes on sale at a stationary store last year, and I bought about 100. I use these for packages of 8-10 prints for family or friends, say for instance from a wedding or other special event. The envelope makes it special, and then they can frame them if they wish, or leave them in the envelope since it's archive-safe. Everyone seems to like this approach. A small album is another nice touch. Sometimes I have included a gift certificate to the local frame shop if I don't want to ship a frame or if I don't know their taste (or even if they will like the print enough to frame it).</p>

<p>I too like to control the printing process. I am so nuts about that, I have not charged my few paying clients any real overhead for printing services. I send them to an awesome lab that has good prices, and bill the customer for the cost plus about 5% for handling. I charge for the overall service and don't make money on the prints. I want to be sure they have at least a few good prints that show my work than have them do a bad job with the reprints at home.</p>

<p>I make shutterfly photo albums. I like the fact that they offer unlimited photo storage, and for the most part, it's a good consumer print.</p>