What software to create a digital album?

I have a potential client asking if I can / will produce a digital (electronic)

album. As they also asked about a print album, I assume by digital that they

would like a CD that runs and shows them a book style colletion of images from

the wedding.

 

Can someone suggest some options? The only one I found online so far is Flip

Album: http://www.flipalbum.com/fahome/

 

They have a Home and a Pro version. The difference seems to be there are

printing features in the Home version, where the Pro version removes the

printing features, and adds watermark and other security features.

 

Thanks.

Well, some people refer to flush mount (aka "coffee table") albums as "digital" albums too.

 

If that's what the client means (and you don't want to design your own pages in photoshop), you might check out zookbinders. They have templates that are pretty straightforward and work with PS. If you want to take it a step further, they partner with a design service too that can do layout and design for you.

 

Of course, this is only my speculating that this client could mean one of these kinds of albums and not an album on CD as you say...

 

If I've assumed incorrectly or insterted my nose where it doesn't belong I apologize! :)

 

Good Luck!

Not knowing what your design/graphics skills are, I'd guess you'd be better off to leave this to professionals. There are a number of services out there you can take advantage of. One I am starting to use is Graphi-Studio. They produce really gorgeous albums, the pricing is great, and they offer design services at $3.50/page. That's pretty reasonable, and you'd be really surprised at how sharp and classic their albums are.

 

http://www.graphistudio.com/usa/index.html

Good point, Heather. Magazine style albums (aka coffee-table albums, flush mount albums, etc) are often referred to as digital albums because they are designed 'digitally' on the computer.

 

Just ask.

Instead of "assuming", you need to ask your client what they mean by "digital album". As other posters have stated, a digital album could mean a flush-mount album that is designed from digital composites. But, since your client also asked about a "print" album, it's hard to know if they want a digital DVD of their wedding pictures plus a printed album, or if they want a Flash slideshow of composite album pages. You need more information from your client.

 

P.S. It would help to know what type of product you were marketing when you were asked these questions.

Thanks for the information - I assumed a CD based one - because the client also refered to a print album. This is for a wedding this summer.

 

I did speak with her last night and she clarified she was not looking for a CD based album. She mentioned something she saw at a trade show from another photographer - and also sent me a link to zookbinders. I am looking at what they offer.

 

I have shot a few weddings but always provided prints and not an album so this is new territory for me. The client is looking for a leather bound album - that much is for sure.

 

I was considering working with the clients in putting together a zookbinder album.

 

What do other photographers do? How much do you charge to put together an album? How much do you work with the clients? Zookbinders doesn't have any pricing info on their website that I can see...I guess I will need to contact them.

They will e-mail you a pdf version of the catalog if you call. I use them a lot...they do great work and their customer service and turnaround time are pretty good too. I can tell you that for a 10x10 leather bound album with 20 pages, foil stamping of the B&G name and wedding date you're looking at around $285.00 not including shipping of the prints to the company (I'm kind of a control freak and don't want to use their print-to-bind service just in case a page looks too light or too dark to me I can catch it and have it redone if I use a seperate lab and ship the prints to Zookbinders).

 

This price also doesn't include your time to layout the pages. If you choose to farm that out, you can go with their design service at about $2 per page (I think). You may also check around with a local college or school to see if there is a student who wants to provide this kind of service inexpensively (I see them listed on Craigslist all the time).

 

As far as what to chage, if you want to figure it out based on what you're worth per hour...my last album took me about 20 hours give or take.

 

Oh, and as far as how to get them to decide on what prints to use...Again, this is what I do and it may not work for everyone, but I post all their images on collages.net and have them put their "favorites" in a folder. Then I go from there. I'll do a page of the dressing, a page of the bride, one of the groom, the ceremony, etc...you get the idea. Then I e-mail them the pages (in jpeg form) and get them to okay everything before it goes to print.

 

Sorry for the long winded response, but hopefully it will help!

Heather - don't apologize - I am looking for this type of information. Thank you.

Would you mind sharing what you charge for such an album?

Admittedly, I'm on the low end...I charge $600 for the album right now (that will change as my business grows). I know other photographers charge about $900-1500.

I just bought the SoHo styler...anyone know if that is a good program? They are cd based, but proprietary.

Have you thought about creating your own pages with a programme called Foto Fusion by LumaPix, you can then work with the client to create the pages with the images of their choice, then use a lab that either uses your completed templates to create the album for you, or buy in albums that allow you to use the finished prints to make them yourself. Take a look at the Lumapix website, there is a quite comprehensive video tutorial that allows you to understand the simplicity of creating some really eye catching pages, I made the move over to them some time ago, as it was too time consuming to create templates in Photoshop, last week I created a twenty four page album in less than four hours, sent a pdf copy to the bride, received her comments regarding adjustments, corrected them, sent it out again, and within two hours had her approval to go ahead and create the album, the prints will take three days to arrive from my lab, and the album will then be finalised in possibly two hours or so, my workflow has improved dramatically since I began using Foto Fusion, there is an excellent book called Mastering Digital Photography by James Karney, in it you will find some interesting guidance on album presentation, including the use of Slide Shows and also Foto Fusion, hope the above helps in some small way, regards

 

Mike