Printing books - which company?

[anxela]

Which company do you use, and why? Shutterfly, Blurb, whatever... Would love to hear your opinion on the options. When I'm going to order, I want to be sure they turn out ok, because shipping to Norway is usually so expensive I don't want to have to re-order. Thanks!

[muddygirl]

I have got two books from shutterfly now. The first was 8x8 and the pages had been cut off on the bottom. I contacted them, and posted photos of the problem, and they replaced it free of charge, not extra postage. My next book was a 12x12, 101 pages. It is beautiful. I'm more than happy. I got christmas cards and calendars aswell. The cards were a little off center, but no big deal. the calendars were really good too and everyone who got one for christmas loved them.
I am interested to know how they compare with blurb, cause they can have more than 101 pages. I'll be keeping an eye on what others say.
HTH

[Monique1971]

I'm curious also. At the moment I'm making an vacation album and I want to get it printed at Blurb. Hope it's gonna be beautiful.

[earlofoxford]

I've had three albums printed at Blurb and just received my Project 365 book from them. I am very pleased with the printing quality. For the last two albums, I paid the upcharge for premium paper and will continue to do that. One thing which disappoints me is that they are now gluing their bindings as opposed to stitching them. (There are some parameters for which books are glued and which are stitched, but my 365 album is over 80 pages, and it's glued.) On the family photo shoot album I did, there was a slight distortion in the cover photo because the album was an image wrap 8x10 size. (I'll do square from now on.) My Project 365 album had a slight smudge on the back cover (looks like it might be dried adhesive). Blurb offered to reprint the album or credit my account for the price. Their customer service is excellent. On the whole, I am very pleased with Blurb, but I sure wish they'd stitch the bindings.

[HeatherPrins]

i like the print quality of Blurb better

[whatnext]

i'm a Blurb fan. i find Shutterfly's proceedure needlessly complicated.

[Joey_M]

YOu might want to look into colorincprolab.com They print more than 101 pages. I have never printed here, but I MIGHT print my 365 using them.

I have always used shutterfly, but their process is harder than it needs to be and I have had binding issues with 2 of my 10 books. They do have great customer service and have replaced the 2 books free of charge.

Godd luck!

[connieg]

I tried an offer from webshot, they work with American Greetings Photoworks for a hard covered 4x4 book. The book turned out wonderful, the pages are stitched, the process was extremely easy you just plopped your photos or layout into the page template, no enhancements, the only downfall was I couldn't design my own cover.

[Blossom]

I have used shutterfly, blurb and mypictales.com for my printings and they have been terrific.

You have to ask them to put value less than 30 dollars due to VAT so that you don't have to pay VAT ... they do that if you ask them - shutterfly do it automatically without asking.

[anxela]

Originally Posted by Blossom

I have used shutterfly, blurb and mypictales.com for my printings and they have been terrific.

You have to ask them to put value less than 30 dollars due to VAT so that you don't have to pay VAT ... they do that if you ask them - shutterfly do it automatically without asking.

Thanks, good to know! I love saving VAT. That's another great thing about buying digital supplies btw - I don't have to worry about anything like that (or high international shipping costs) when I press that little, cute "add to shopping cart" button. aaaahh.

[deanie]

I have used both Shutterfly and Blurb and have been happy with both. If you are doing a photobook only, or a book with lots of text, I love the adaptability of the Blurb interface. I've used the premium paper at Blurb.

[suzanne]

Has anyone used scrapbookpictures.com? I noticed on their site they do 10x0 size and I'm curious about the quality.

[marnie]

I've only used Shutterfly and been extremely pleased with about a dozen different books.
They have really good custormer service as well.

[faerywings]

I think I am one of the few people nt so happy with Shutterfly. I had a few books done with them- and on one of the the cover tore at the spine. The colors always seem a bit flat to me as well.

I had a book, prints and several gift items done at artscow, and I was very pleased with the quality. The only downside I found with them is if you are on a "deadline" it does take a while for shipping.

[LisaD]

If you order from artscow they suggest using a full 8x8 image for their 8x8 album. Is anything cut off if you do this? I have a coupon & book that I'd like to order today?

[anxela]

40% off and free shipping at Shutterfly. At least I got a coupon in my mail today.

Do they use sRGB or AdobeRGB?

(faerywings, if you send pics with the wrong color space, the colors will look dull. I don't know which color space you used, but it's worth checking out.)

[faerywings]

anxela- I am assuming that they would be what I have set in PS.- so that would be sRGB for me- don't know much other than that. I'llkeep that in mind for next time.

LisaD- I just resized my LO's 8x8, 300 dpi and uploaded them to the site. When I previewed the pages I could see where some of them needed to be shifted a bit- where a swirl ran off the page, for ex. but I was able to fix it easily right on my computer. When I got the book, it really looked great.