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For us, the album makes it all worth it. It is the fruit of our labor, if you will. Holding this beautiful-big-baby in your hands feels amazing. It is all our hard work and artistic intuitions coupled together with each of our couples' amazing story's...all put in one place. It just doesn't get much better than that! Passing it off to our couples and seeing their reactions is one of the best feelings in the world. We take a lot of pride in creating something that they will have for a lifetime. Something they will show their kids and their grandkids. A story-book of their love story/their special day. I'm a huge advocate for having a wedding album done up right for you.
When Chris and I shoot a wedding we are thinking about the album while we shoot. Asking ourselves, "how will this series of images fit together on a page?" "How can I tell this story of events in the most powerful way?" All of our album design is IN-House, we don't outsource any of it... this is because it is a crucial part to the experience that each of our couples has with us. For us, it is about creating personalized art for our couples from start to FINISH. It is important to see it through to completion.
If you care to see how this particular album design turned out you can see the Album Slideshow here
Also, for those photographers who are interested in who we use; Renaissance Albums are our Go-to for these amazing albums. And if any of you have any other questions about our Albums/the process etc. I'll open the floor up in the comments section and would be happy to help as I can. We leave for San Fran tomorrow so I may be slow to respond, but happy to help. I get a lot of questions about this via e mail and I feel horrible bc. I can't always respond due to time. So this way I can tackle some of those questions here.
Thoughts
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Hi Sarah. Sorry I'm a little late in commenting, but I'm intrigued that you use InDesign for your albums. Do you send one PDF to your lab (prodpi) and they then print each individual page from that PDF? I would love to design all of my albums in InDesign if only I could find a printer who will print from the PDF file.
Sarah,
Thanks for being so forthcoming on albums! I recently saw a 'sample' album of yours, a Galleria album, and was wondering if you can design that without the Soho styler (if you even designed that one--maybe they just used your images). My second question is whether you use the Soho and Mercer books (no gutter) which means you'd have to get incredibly long seamless prints done yourself? Or do you think the Fine Art is the way to go? Albums can be overwhelming! Sorry--this may be too much for a blog.
Sarah!! Do you design your own albums? Or do you outsource it? You dont use indesign do you? hahhaahhahaha HAHAHAHHAA JK. IM FUNNY
Great looking album guys...hope you have a sample to show me when you get back into town :) Isn't it ALWAYS refreshing to work with other vendors (book-binders, pro labs etc.) who actually CARE about the quality and craftsmanship of their products? ;)
Sarah these albums are beautiful, I see why you use them! :)
Such a gorgeous album!!
@daniel as I mentioned to @Liam we do not use Any templates for our album design. Each individual spread is custom created by US for each wedding. No two albums exactly alike. Each of our couples has a truly cutom book that is unique to their story and is created by us, no templates are used.
Beautiful work as usual. Do you use templates for your album design or do you create each page seperately? If you do, are they your personal templates or did you purchase them from somewhere?
@Liam we don't use the soho styler. All of our designs are custom created and designed by us in Indesign. :)
hey Sarah,
you mentioned you use InDesign for album design. Have you used and what are your opinions on the SoHo styler for the design?
Thanks!!!
liam
Wow! Just... wow!
Promise to never put this offline. Because the day I plan my own wedding I'll show this one to the photographer and tell him: That's how I want it to be!
The best would of course be to ask you to take the photos - but I live in Germany and well... the costs... you know ;)
@dennis not a stupid question at all!! It is actually an artist that Chris records with named Ben Rector. Chris laid down a lot of the bass tracks on the record. the song is called "Disarm"
@Ron you know I would love loved to shoot your wedding photos ;) you are too sweet
boy wish we could go back in time and have you take our pictures.
wonderful job as always.
This is probably a stupid question but what is the song in the slideshow?
@merideth we use InDesign for all of our album designs
@jonathan yes we select the images that will go into the album for the initial design preview. We have had nothing but a fantastic response from our couples. Our couples respect and trust the artistic process and the professional and artistic service we are providing them and they know up front that this is part of the overall experience of working with us.
Hey Sarah,
Great stuff. You said, 'Asking ourselves, "how will this series of images fit together on a page?"' Does that imply y'all choose which pictures are put into the book rather than the couple? If so, what has been the reaction of (potential) clients upon hearing that.
Tanksabunch. -J
hi sarah! i was just curious....what program do you use to design the album? i just started photography & want to find the cheapest way to do the albums....and i totally respect doing it yourself!
@sara we send our pages to our AMAZING professional lab in California, ProDPI for the printing. Once they are printed, our lab sends them back to us so we can make sure everything looks flawless and then we send it to our Album Company in NYC (Renaissance) to put it all together beautifully for us. It is a nice checks and balances system. The total design/crafting/delivery process usually takes about 4-6 months from start to finish. hope that helps!
I guess seeing pictures of it is almost as good as having it, right? :P
How many pages on average are your albums?
Hello, I love this album, it's beautiful!! I am wondering where you have your pages printed at? and about how long does it take for the whole process of designing the album to presenting it to the client? thanks so much for sharing, take care:)
that album is amazing!! i am in love with the layouts! and am particularly drawn to those three photos in the tunnel with the shadow play. LOVE those!!
so many outsource their albums and I never see it as an issue, but what a difference your care and attention makes! thanks for sharing : )
Beautiful! Where did you get this? I love the cover material!
Hi Mellissa! What we mean when I say the design is done IN house, is that some photographers outsource their album design to an external vendor. For us, the design is part of our artistic process, so it is done by us personally and then sent to our album company to Bind and put it all together for us and we use Renaissance Albums, a top of the line album crafter for this part. Hope that helps!
What do you mean you don't outsource your images. Lol. I'm slow. You make this from scratch!? Who prints, binds, etc?
What do you mean you don't outsource your images. Lol. I'm slow. You make this from scratch!? Who prints, binds, etc?
Beyond gorgeous!! Perfectly Elegant to match your Amazing Photography!