just ordered 1st blurb book-others?

magicpic

I just did my 1st book with blurb--
I am interested in trying other photo book companys any suggestions..thanks janis

GJMPhoto

Other Book Companies
I use Asuka books...very nice, very professional. You pretty much should use Photoshop to put together your pages and give you total control. The results are beautifully bound and professional in both appearance and feel.

They only deal with pro photographers - you need to give some proof of your profession (a website will do...now, where would you find one of those? )

- Gary.

cslibby

i have a friend that used asuka books and had great results. his books turned out very professional. only thing is they are not inexpensive and turn around is not that fast...think they are in japan? were you unhappy with the blurb quality?

magicpic

cslibby wrote:

i have a friend that used asuka books and had great results. his books turned out very professional. only thing is they are not inexpensive and turn around is not that fast...think they are in japan? were you unhappy with the blurb quality?

I wish the paper was a little better but for the price it was really good

mrcoons

I recently put together a photo book and it was my first Blurb/Smugmug collaborated book. The process worked very well from the Smugmug side anyway. (I still do not care for Blurb's book creation software.)

I created the same book using Lulu (as they promised me that that they had resolved all their previous problems. The Lulu software is much easier to use and I was able to create my book and request a hardcopy fairly quickly.

I then spent another week wrestling with the Blurb version (I believe I had to delete the whole thing and start over once) and got a copy ordered.

Both copies were delivered to my door on the same day. So Blurb's print service is faster and considerably less expensive than the Lulu's. I like Blurb's paper better than Lulu's but I prefered Lulu's binding to Blurb's.

I was able to print a little larger book with Blurb for less money than Lulu charged and I really liked that. But overall both books have good and bad points but end up being equal to my eye. So I guess I'll present them both to my customers and let them decide which one they want.

So while I am happy with with Blurb I wish they would make their software a little more flexible and then I'd be really happy!

Pupator

I've used Lulu in the past and was totally unimpressed with the product; perhaps they've gotten better with time.

I just did my first Blurb book, got it last week, and it's awesome. I think the quality is really excellent.

mrcoons

Pupator wrote:

I've used Lulu in the past and was totally unimpressed with the product; perhaps they've gotten better with time.

I just did my first Blurb book, got it last week, and it's awesome. I think the quality is really excellent.

Lulu's printing is 200% better now than it was a year ago. Their binding is not that impressive and it's they are still rather expensive in my opinion.

mdh

I haven't made my own blurb book yet, but I did help create a forum book on one of the photography forums I browse. We used blurb, and for the price they're hard to beat. Fantastic customer service too!

mrcoons

mdh wrote:

I haven't made my own blurb book yet, but I did help create a forum book on one of the photography forums I browse. We used blurb, and for the price they're hard to beat. Fantastic customer service too!

Was that for the POTN book?

mdh

mrcoons wrote:

Was that for the POTN book?

Yep.

Mr.Skull

I just received my first Blurb book, an 8x10 56 pager. Since Smugmug is now affiliated with Blurb, I thought it was a good time to give micropublishing a try. The Blurb Booksmart software worked fine, even though I used a "slow" Mac computer that is under their minimum requirements. The integration with Smugmug worked as advertised, which basically downloads images from Smugmug into Booksmart on your computer. So if you already have your Smugmug images handy on your computer, it may not be necessary to slurp them. It's kinda redundant. The software is somewhat limited as far as its templates go, but it was good enough for photo layouts.
After I finished, uploaded and purchased my book, it took only 6 days to arrive. Overall I am very pleased with the quality, especially for the price. The nice glossy dust jacket came out particularly good. One surprise was that they put a barcode on the back cover. I wish this was not there, but all "real" books have a barcode on the back. So in a weird way it makes it seem like an actual mass-published book. The interior photos matched what I see on my monitor pretty well, all things considered. Some shots seemed slightly dark, maybe a half stop darker. Yet the deep shadows seemed to be OK. Blurb claims that the full bleed images will get cropped 1/8th inch on the sides. I found that in reality it is much greater than that, more like 1/4" on the top and bottom, and 1/2" on the sides! So be real careful not to have anything important too close to the edges, or it may be cropped off.
My first book was basically a test, and it passed. The quality/price factor is in the sweet spot. I will be creating a new book soon.

aerialphoto

I've done a few books via Lulu that came out great. Two were paperback photo books, one was a hardback book of a party I shot. All of them were pretty well received, but I have to admit I wasn't entirely happy with some of the images in the latest hardback book. Most of the images were excellent, but several of them were really muddy and/or dark looking. I've also done several calendars via Lulu and they've all been pretty decent.

Now I've tried Blurb (I was curious about them because of the new Smugmug connection) with a small hardback portfolio with a mix of B&W, color, and text. The book looks terrific. Very professional looking with excellent printing from the dust-jacket to the fine print on the pages.

I've heard a lot of whining about Blurb's software, but it is 1000x better than Lulu's online interface for me. For me Blurb was quick (compared to Lulu's online interface), easy to use, and the final results were exactly what I designed.

Here's the cover, a few samples from the inside of the book can be found on my smugmug site here.

jensperl

I took some engagements for a friend last summer and made her a blurb book for Christmas. I liked the program to make the book and had a lot of fun playing around with it.

When my shipment came, I was excited when I saw how sharp and lovely the cover was. I was dissapointed with the paper and image quality inside. I wouldn't upcharge and try to make a profit with these. I probably won't use blurb again unless it is again, as a gift... just a little book of my nephew's birthday party, or something of that nature...not "professional" work.

Although I was unimpressed, my friend absolutely loved it.