I am in the process of hiring my photographer and of course, they offer albums. I was shocked to see how much they cost! I looked online and found several sites where you can order wedding albums at a a fraction of the cost....I am wondering if anyone has gone this route? Any recommendations/feedback?
Re: Wedding Albums?
I have made several [travel/life] photo albums on Shutterfly and Picaboo over the years (get on their mailing list, and wait until a *really* good sale or coupon becomes available). All these photo albums have come out fine. Both offer pretty good "what you see is what you get" online layout tools. Shutterfly also allows you to put a password on the photo-collections you upload so you can share photos with friends/families. I just pulled out a 2005 Shutterfly album of mine to see how its held up, and the photo quality looks fine. Although, at the time, I knew very little about layout, graphic design, and curating so the style of the album is immature.
Most online photo album services have standard and "professional" quality albums, you'll notice. Compared to the rates my photographer gives me, the professional quality albums from Shutterfly/Picaboo are only a couple hundred dollars cheaper than what my photographer would provide. Professional artists deserve to be paid for their work/time.
So, in short, you can get a cheaper wedding photo album using cheaper paper, cheaper leather/fabric covering, and doing it on your own. But depending on your eye for design, the actual style of the book may not be to your liking.
IMPORTANT! In order to print your own photo albums, you need to have the appropriate copyright release from your photographer. If you can't figure out if s/he offers this, you should just ask them if it's possible, with their provided copyright release, to print a photo album on your own with Shutterfly, Picaboo, or Mpix.
http://www.mpix.com/
MPIX is often recommended by professional photographers, as it is a front-facing spin-off for a professional photo printing service. I have never used them before, but I will probably use them to print our photos, if not our album as well. Are they more expensive than Shutterfly/Picaboo? Probably. But sometimes it's worth it to splurge on archival paper
It sucks they are so expensive...and that price was a few years back when I was researching in case I decided to go into the wedding business.
We got an album from our photographer because it was included in our package, and I like it, but the Shutterfly one I made is a lot more custom and personal.