Mypublisher Vs Blurb

[mconti]

Below a comparison between Blurb and MP:
Object: n. 1 hardcover 13x11 printed by Blurb and n. 1 hardcover prnted by MP

SOFTWARE & LAYOUT
Blurb: The software is very good but you will meet some difficulty to match the right size when you load the picture. Layouts are very good and you can use many fonts
Mypublisher: The software is for amateur. No professional at all! Few layouts and few fonts!

PRINT QUALITY
Blurb: Disppointing
Mypublisher: Good

PAPER QUALITY
Blurb: quality of the paper is not good. It?s too light, thin and too much opaque
Mypublisher: Very Good. Quality of the paper is better: it's Shining, heavy and with more thickness.

BINDING
Blurb: No good. I can see the points and some tracks of glue on the back cover
Mypublisher: Good ! the binding is not visible at all

JACKET
Both jackets have a good quality

FRONT AND BACK FLAPS
both softwares allow text and photo on the flaps and spine.

YOUR OWN LOGO
Blurb: if you want your own logo (rather than Blurb) Blurb takes an additional cost of 15 USD!
Mypublisher: mypublisher does not print its own logo on the book. You are free to add your own logo without additional cost

HARDCOVER FINAL COST
Blurb: quite similar to MP but cheapest if you print books from 40 up to 100 pages.
Final Price become highest if you delete blurb logo and if you ship the books in Europe (they take 40 euro for 1 book from USA to EU)
Mypublisher: Expensive as well. Same price (more and less) but quality is highest. Price is quite close to blurb if you print books up to 40 pages but if you print books over 40 pages the final cost become HUUUUGE and offensive!! 358$ for 100 pages ??? Amazing !! No sense at all!

SHIPPING COST:
Blurb: Actually Blurb ship through UPS. This service is very very expensive.
(I spent 40 Euro for getting my book from USA to Europe)
Mypublisher: MP use FedEx. (Cheapest)

BOOK SALES
Blurb: Actually only American citizens are allowed to sell through the Blurb Platform sales. Anyway it seems they are going to enlarge this service to everybody. NOTE If you are not American you can?t show your book because it will appear the cost.
Mypublisher: they have no sales platform but it seems they are going to develope it. (maybe)

BRIEFLY
Blurb : won on the software and on final cost (if you print books over 40 pages)
MP: won on the final quality and on the price (if you print books up to 20/40 pages and you get a promotional discount of 40%)

Rgds / mC

Message was edited by: mconti

Message was edited by: mconti

[Marti]

Thanks. Very nice comparison and I agree with you. I live in South Carolina in the USA so don't have the European concerns. Blurb definitely has the advantage on price and layout options. MyPublisher has the advantage on quality. It's hard to compare because it's not apples to apples.

I received two books this week, one from Blurb and one from MyPublisher. I happened to have the same photo in both books in a large format. The MyPublisher photo was sharp, bright, vivid and crisp. The Blurb photo was dull, flat and slightly grainy by comparison. But if you hadn't seen the MyPublisher photo, you might have thought the Blurb photo was okay; not great, but just okay.

The Blurb book was 200 pages for $53.33, about $.26 1/2 per page. The MyPublisher book was 94 pages for $114.01, about $1.21 per page. The Blurb jacket is included in the price. MyPublisher charges $4.95 for a jacket. The quality of the MyPublisher book is significantly better and it was also larger by 1/2" in height x 1 1/2" in length. That doesn't seem like much, but it is when you put the two books side by side.

I've checked out other sites that publish books, but I like the large image of each page and the ability to view the entire book on one screen in Blurb and MyPublisher. Does anyone know of any other sites where the books are cheaper than MyPublisher with the quality just as good? I can't find any.

[mconti]

hi Marti

Tks for your prompt reply
I agree with you
Actually there are no companies able to offer the same quality of MP

warmest rgds

mC

[nms]

Hi Mconti & Marti.

I agree with both of you.
Mconti, I saw your posting on blurb about the same comparison.

[Marti]

Hi nms and Mconti,

Are you both using Blurb as well as MyPublisher? Just curious. I am for my larger books. I just received a 200-page Blurb book, but it was damaged in shipping. The cardboard carton wasn't heavy enough for the weight of the book. Both the carton, the book, and the jacket were creased down the middle and the book won't lay flat. I sent pictures to a customer service rep, so we'll see how they resolve it. I also had trouble with an 118-page book. I was almost finished with it and my system suddenly froze and I haven't been able to open it since. I can open my other partially completed books, but not that one. Blurb says it will open when they roll out their new upgrade and they'll walk me through it, but the upgrade was supposed to be ready last week and I haven't heard anything yet.

[nms]

Marti.
Sorry to hear your book smashed like that.
But I'm sure you will getting a replacement.
As I stated on another posting of mine, I love blurb software better than MuPublisher.
But overall, I love MyPublisher much more. The quality speaks for it self.
I was not happy with my blurb's book at all.
And I think it's because they're using semi-matte paper instead of semi-gloss like MyPublihser used.
It's affecting the print quality on their book which is more look like USA TODAY color print.
Anyway, like you Marti, I am still waiting to get my book fix with new software which supposedly released the late month!
The things with MyPublsher:
I have to squeeze all my pictures into 100 PAGES ONLY book!
C'mon MyPublisher....when it's going to be change?
And of course the layout too.
Last night I was asking Customer Service because I saw a full bleed layout with white background on "JUST PHOTOS" jacket layout option, meanwhile I'm working my book with "BEST SELLER" stye and they said that I CAN NOT possibly use that jacket layout option into my book. It SAD isn't it?
So I think I have to pay for extra jacket in order to get that layout.
Would it be rational since my book supposed to get a jacket too?
I hope MyPublisher will read my concern.
We love your product!!!

Marti, can I see your book if you don't mind?

Nate.

[Marti]

Hi Nate,

Yes, I understand your frustration with MyPublisher's inflexibility and limited layout and jacket options. For the price, they really should enhance the software. In fact, I'd love to see the Blurb software in MyPublisher. And yes, your comparison of the Blurb photo quality with USA TODAY print is totally correct. When I put my two books together, the one from MyPublisher and the one from Blurb, there's no comparison on the quality of the paper. If Blurb upgraded their paper and resolved their issues with pages falling out (as I read in their forum), even if they raised the price a little, it would be a much better product.

So do you have a book frozen in Blurb, too? You mentioned waiting for a "book fix". They kept saying they would have the upgrade ready in September, but then kept moving the week back and now we're into October.

As far as displaying my two books, I'd love to share them, but they contain private information and I feel uncomfortable putting them out there. They both are done in Best Seller and are very straightforward with the photos placed on white pages. The 93-page ($114) one is called "The Best of Europe 2005" and the other one is a 33-page ($55) book called "Southern Comfort-The Masters 2007".

How about you, though, do you have any books displayed? I assume you're a guy. Do you live in the US? Have you made any comments in the Blurb Forum?

Nice visiting with you,
Marti

[Marti]

Hi Nate,

It's me again. I replied to your message of Oct 2 at 9:25 AM, but when I wrote my reply, I forgot that I had gone into flickr a week ago and saw your beautiful book "the trip to the 3" and some of your other photos, too. But I didn't realize that you were the publisher of that book. Anyway, VERY IMPRESSIVE! I love the cover and the photos you took are beautiful. You certainly have a talent and your trip looked wonderful. I also see that you are a young man from Philadelphia, so no need to answer my question on whether you're a guy or whether you live in the US.

[Marti]

Hi Nate,

It's me again. I replied to your message of Oct 2 at 9:25 AM, but when I wrote my reply, I forgot that I had gone into flickr a week ago and saw your beautiful book "the trip to the 3" and some of your other photos, too. I didn't realize that you were the author of that book, though. Anyway, VERY IMPRESSIVE! I love the cover and the photos you took are beautiful. You certainly have a talent and your trip looked wonderful. I also see that you are a young man from Philadelphia, so no need to answer my question on whether you're a guy or whether you live in the US.

[Sara]

Thanks for all of the info!!! I have used MP to make a couple of different photo books of trips & childhood photos. Overall, I loved the quality & service I received.

I started looking into Blurb because I got married in August and will be making a wedding album soon. Our wedding photographers were amazing, but they charge almost $2000 for just one wedding album. Honestly, I've seen a sample and the quality is a bit better than MP, but not much (I guess the cost includes their time spent editing/arranging the photos).

The MP books are much less expensive, but still the price does start to add up (over $120 per book for the Deluxe size and 40 pages). The discounts do help, but I will be ordering 6 books so it'll still cost around $500 including shipping (with the 40% off). Blurb is quite a bit cheaper & I do agree they have much better layouts. However, after reading the comparison info on the two, I think I'll stick with MP for now. I was very happy with the quality I've seen from them so far & would hate to be dissapointed by the quality of the Blurb paper.

Anyway, thanks again for the info! It would have been a waste of time & money making a sample book in both Blurb & MP to get a grasp on the differences myself.

[acotrim]

I definetely prefer the quality of MP. I solved the inflexibility issue of layout using the option, for the whole book, of a full picture per page. And I create this "picture" in Photoshop, adding how may photos and in any size, layout, border I choose, adding captions etc. Is not that hard. You can find a thread in ths forum on this subject.

[Marti]

Hi Sara,

I think you've made a wise decision. Your wedding photos should look beautiful in the MyPublisher book. I've decided to only use Blurb when I have a very large book (over 80 pages), but probably won't ever use it as a gift. My brother-in-law called us last night as he had just received a 33-page MyPublisher book I did as a surprise gift for him called "Southern Comfort-The Masters 2007". He was beside himself with compliments and now wants to make books himself with his own photos. What I was surprised about is that he's a typical guy, not one to gush, but he went on and on about how great this book was! So the end product is quite impressive, and as the creator, you get all the raves! A nice feeling.

[Marti]

Hi acotrim,

I use Microsoft Powerpoint to do the same thing you're doing, only I make scrapbook layouts including backgrounds, borders, photos, headings, captions, journaling and embellishments. I save each layout as a JPG and then move each of them onto a full-bleed page in MyPublisher. It gives the book an entirely different feel and the designs are endless.

Marti

[Cruiser]

Marti,

I'm interested in how you do the PowerPoint pictures. I tried once but the resolution was so low. Is there any way you could give us a brief tutorial as to how you make your pages? I use Photoshop but am always interested in a new technique and ideas.

[Marti]

Hmmmm, on the resolution comment. I've been making scrapbook layouts for years on PowerPoint because I like the 11x14 landscape size. I've always posted them on-line in livejournal, blogspot or slide.com. BUT, and this could be huge: I haven't yet published a book with the layout images on the pages. On my 14x22 monitor, the layouts on the pages look beautiful, just like all my individual photos do. I fully expected the layouts to appear just as sharp and crisp in the published book, but I can't honestly say until I order and receive a book.

Have you printed a PowerPoint layout image in a MyPublisher book yet? I'd hate to spend $100 on a book that I'll be disappointed with.

[Cruiser]

Marti, I've only used Photoshop and Nikon Capture NX to process my picures. All I know is that my PowerPoint presentations are very low resolution (350kb) ...and the pictures for MyPublisher need to be higher resolution. For example: a Deluxe full bleed picture should be in the neighborhood of 2560 x 1920 and it is recommended that they be at 350 dpi or at least 300 dpi. I have some lower resolution pictures but they are at least 1.8 to 3 mb per picture.

I did see an example of a book printed using PowerPoint in this forum but I can't find the link. The author did a wedding book that was beautiful. She said that she resized her pictures to a very large resolution but I cannot figure out how she did it.

I have a suggestion. Why don't you print out a 20 page paperback book using your pictures and then you can get an idea of how they will look. The book is a bit larger than 5" x 7" and using the CostCo discount would run you about $11 plus shipping. I did that and found that I was over-lighting my pictures and they appeared washed out. From now on, I will do a "proof" book before I spend over $100 on a big one.

Cruiser

Here is a link to another thread. MyPublisher doesn't recommend using PP. http://community.mypublisher.com/jiveforums/thread.jspa?threadID=320&tstart=0


Message was edited by: Cruiser

I found the link to the thread about using PP.
http://community.mypublisher.com/jiveforums/thread.jspa?threadID=286&tstart=0


Message was edited by: Cruiser

[Marti]

Thank you, thank you, thank you!

You went to a lot of trouble to look up this information and it was so nice of you! I have read it all and am informed enough now that I will take your advice and order a 20-page book of PowerPoint scrapbook layouts. When I receive the book and assess the quality, I'll post my opinion on the existing PowerPoint thread. And you're right, the PowerPoint wedding book was beautiful, so I'm hopeful that my pages will be okay, too. We'll see. I'm not very sophisticated when it comes to resolution, DPI's, etc.

Thanks again,
Marti

[Marti]

BTW, Cruiser, I found a PowerPoint page I had done (and forgot about) in a book I received a few weeks ago. I wrote a review about it on the thread on PowerPoint. In a nutshell: my PowerPoint page is just as beautiful, clear, and vivid as all the other pages in the book.

[asmit4]

I have just sent in my 3rd book using powerpoint. The key, the 1 thing you MUST do is make your PP pages HUGE. The issue is the DPI. Powerpoint sizes down the slides when you convert them to 72DPI which is WAY too low.

The ONLY way to correct this is to make your slides huge to start. For instance, I just did a deluxe book, my slides were 30 height, 45 width- that's in inches.

Then when the pages are saved as JPGs they are saved as 72DPI but when they are converted by my publisher to the 11x15 book the DPI is high enough to counteract the problem.

You cannot, absolutely cannot, work with 11x14 slides for a deluxe or even a classic book. You have to work with a HUGE canvas. Other people on here say that you must work with photo editing software to create a good book. I beg to differ. My other 2 books have come out BEAUTIFUL so far using powerpoint. We used them as gifts for our parents (wedding albums) and they just RAVE about them. My mom still has hers on her coffeetable after a year!

I am good at powerpoint but I don't know photoshop that well, and I don't want to learn a new program to create these books, but I hate the lack of layouts and options that MP has preset.

As long as you make your slides super big, you will have a great book. The 11x14 that you said you are working with won't work though.

[Cruiser]

My question to you is how do you make a picture 30" x 45"??? How many mb is that? Resolution? DPI? Do you use digital pictures from a camera or do you scan them at high resolution? I have Powerpoint and cannot imagine how you do it.

[asmit4]

All of my photos came from my photographer for our wedding. The photos are so high in quality that they can actually be printed at poster size and still be good photos. I'm no expert and don't know much about photos though, just know that we can create a photo and frame it for our living room that is poster size with the jpg files seh gave us.

What you do is open up powerpoint. Click on the "page setup" change to 30 height, 45 length (in inches)

Then input a photo, the slide will show at like 13% the real size so inputting the photo isn't the problem. Then you just stretch out the photo to cover the entire space on the slide. Just pull the corner- super easy.

Granted, I know that you are a true photographer so you are "all about" the #'s, the specs. All I personally care about is that the book comes out correctly and so far I've had no trouble working with huge slides.

What I do after that is save each slide as a JPG. The resolution comes out to be only 72dpi, but the size of the file....umm.....those numbers that are like 2000x3000 (not at all sure what they mean) well, those #'s are VERY high, like over 2000 by over 3000.

So even though the file is 72DPI, when it "shrinks" to fit the deluxe book which is MUCH smaller, the DPI magically gets bigger I think.

I choose the "just photos" option and put the jpg slides in. My understanding was that as long as the photo was outlined in BLUE, that the photo would be just fine. All my photos are always in blue so I have not had any problems.

I really don't know ANYTHING about the technical stuff. I got the instructions from a knottie (www.theknot.com) which is a wedding website where people trade ideas/advice.

I saw loads of books done via photoshop but I have no experience with that. I then saw lots of books done via powerpoint and they looked amazing! Now that is a program that I could do, so I tried it and voila! It worked!

The link above to that wedding book is actually my book- the book that I created for my first one. Granted there are some errors in it like photos cut off a little on the ends but I've learned since then to work with the program to make things work so my 2nd book came out perfect.

Here is a link to another persons example and why they did what they did with the PP slides.
http://www.weddingbee.com/2006/09/12/my-publisher-review/

The above response isn't technical at all, and I know that some of it is probably written wrong b/c I don't know what any of the #'s really mean.

All I know is that someone with little to no knowledge, who just follows the directions and creates HUGE slides, can get a perfect MP book. With this method it seems like there is no need to worry about specs or #'s at all which is perfect for a person that has NO clue how to go about "changing" a file in adobe.

I always see people on here typing about specs, various #'s and such and I wonder if maybe I'm missing something. Maybe my book could be better printed if I followed all these "rules" but having posted my books actual photos, I really don't see how :)

I'm thrilled with my first 2 books and can't wait for my 3rd :)

[asmit4]

Not sure if this helps but my powerpoint jpg on shutterfly says:
50955 bytes and 480x321 pixels.

It also says "prints best up to 20x30" which is better than needed for a deluxe book size :)

[Cruiser]

Thanks for the information...I'll give it a try. I'm always looking for a new way to do things.

[Cruiser]

I tried PP with 43.89" wide and 33.9" tall. I imported a jpeg that I had already sized in Photoshop. When saved, the resolution was 3160 x 2440, the dpi was 72 and the file size 1.03 mb. I put it in my existing book as a full bleed and I got a blue line. I might try this technique for scrapbooking and stick to Photoshop for digital photos.

Thanks for the instructions. They worked fine.

[asmit4]

So glad it worked for you! :) I hope the printing is up to snuff :)

I have been posting so much about using PP b/c I want "average folks" out there to know that they can do fancier pages without being an adobe wiz, or a prof. photographer.

I see so many requests that people want better layouts and more freedom and I just want others to know that they can get that really easily using a simple program like powerpoint which many people know b/c they work with it at their jobs to do presentations and such.

I realize that MP doesn't suggest using PP to create JPGS and many other photographers have lots of # crunching explanations as to why it doesn't work well. I think my book speaks for itself and I hope that your pages turn out well too!

The more I can help others create books the way they want them the better!

[Marti]

Hi asmit4,

I applaud you! I have been bound and determined to get PowerPoint to work for my MP pages and I believe you have solved the problem in easy-to-understand instructions. I, like you, am not a photographer nor a computer whiz and thought your explanations were perfectly fine. We shouldn't have to be experts in digital photography and computer technology, in my opinion, to create beautiful photo books. I changed the page setup in PowerPoint to the 30x45 setting you suggested and can really see the difference in the slide size on-screen. I plan to try this on my next book.

My fun in making a book is doing the layouts on the pages. I have been disappointed in the limited layout options in MP and knew that PP could solve my problem. Frankly, I've printed a couple of my PP layouts in books recently and have loved the results, even without changing the page setup size, so am enthusiastically looking forward to seeing the printed results of your enlargement idea.

BTW, your wedding album is beautiful. I have been procrastinating about doing books for each of my children of their weddings, but your wedding book inspired me to get started.

Thank you,
Marti

[Cruiser]

Asmit4 & Marti,

Could you post a link to your book so we can see your work done in PP? I'm curious as to what you can do that I can't do in Photoshop.

[Marti]

Hi Cruiser,

I'm expecting a new book in a few days. The entire 86-page book (the standard classic format) contains PP layouts of photos of my granddaughter. However, the layouts were not done on super large PP slides, so we'll see. I'll post it if it turns out.

Oh and BTW, I used the link you provided to join Costco, had my membership # e-mailed to me within 24 hours, downloaded MP using the Costco link, and ordered my $105.14 book using the 45% discount. It only cost $64.82 - a huge savings! The entire process was quick, easy and worked exactly the way you said. The only thing I forgot to do was uninstall my original MP, but it didn't seem to matter.

Shutterfly offered me a good deal, so I did a quick 25-page book and ordered. We'll see what kind of quality they have. I like their backgrounds and layouts.

[Marti]

If anyone has been reading the past few posts about PowerPoint, I have a question. I followed asmit14's suggestion and increased the size of the slides in PP under Page setup. I then inserted a previous PP JPG image. I spread the image across the new larger slide and saved it under a new file name as a JPG. So now I had the original small image as well as the new enlarged image, and I went into My Documents to compare the dimensions of the two, expecting the enlarged slide to be about 3000x3000.

The original PP slide image's dimensions were 1517x1140 and 227 KB. The enlarged PP slide image's dimensions were 1497x1125 and 266 KB. But on my screen, there's no comparison between these two: one looks like a postage stamp and the other a billboard. Why are these two very different sized images so similar in dimension?

I hope this is clear,
Marti

[asmit4]

I wish I had an answer for that. But I do have a suggestion. Don't insert a PP JPG into PP. Either re-create the same PP JPG again in the new larger slides, OR open the old PP slides that you have (not the JPGS, the slides themselves) and go to page set up and change it to the new larger size. Then save 1 slide as a JPG and test it out again.

I bet your problem is that you are taking a PP jpg done in a smaller size, say 11x14, and inserting it into a 30x45 slide which is way too big to do.

[asmit4]

As for posting a link-I posted a link this morning to the bookstore book. I'm gonna try and take photos of the pages again and post the real book if I can.

I am 100% sure that you can make a book like mine and even better in photoshop. My issue isn't that photoshop doesn't work, it's that many people, including myself can't do photoshop but can do powerpoint.

I know that photoshop allows for much more stuff than powerpoint does, but it's a step up from the prefabricated ones that MP has online to use, not that they aren't nice, but PP allows a bit more versatility.

[Marti]

Yes, that's exactly what I did. I took an 11x14 JPG slide, which appears on the enlarged slide as very small, and I enlarged it manually by spreading it across the enlarged slide. My problem is that 99% of what I'm working with are scrapbook layouts containing dozens of individual elements and embellishments. I have saved them as JPGs already. But I think I still have some that haven't been saved as JPGs and I'll access one of those and enlarge the slide in Page setup and see if it makes a difference in the dimension size. Thank you for the suggestion.

[Marti]

Hi asmit4 and Cruiser,

On the comparison of PP vs. Photoshop, if a person already has Photoshop, I would use Photoshop as I'm sure it's superior to PP. But for those of us who don't have Photoshop and don't want to make the investment, if PP is a good substitute, then great!

[Cruiser]

You don't have to buy the full version of Photoshop. Photoshop Elements has a lot of the techniques that the full version has and runs under $100. The full version runs over $600 unless you are lucky enough to be a student or able to upgrade from Elements or an earlier version of Photoshop.

What I do like about Photoshop is the ability to post-process my pictures. I take out what I don't want in the picture by using the healing brush or the clone tool. When we went to Alaska, we had rain drops on almost every picture on one of our side trips. Easy to remove in Photoshop and the pictures were saved. And I have the ability to set size, resolution and dpi very easily. On the book I'm working on now, I took out a couple of utility poles that distracted from the dancers and a lady's hair that kept getting into the bottom of my picture. I was sitting behind her and couldn't stand up to take pictures.

I was looking at PP for an easy way to make a scrapbook type jpeg easier than in Photoshop. I would process my pictures in Photoshop and then make my scrapbook in PP. And, I can email a complete PP presentation where I can't email a dozen large Photoshop images at the same time. Thanks for all your help.

[Marti]

I use something called Microsoft Digital Image Suite Editor to edit photos. I think it cost around $59.99 and may have had a $10 rebate.

When we're vacationing, it's difficult to take a picture of an icon, i.e. the Trevi Fountain or the Spanish Steps in Rome, and not have other people in the shot. But we don't worry about it anymore. When we get home, we use the features of this software to remove any unwanted distractions, just as you're doing in Photoshop. I've removed telephone poles, wires, cars, people, signs, garbage cans, etc. There's also an airbrush feature, a wrinkle remover, and a spot remover; all work wonders for gentle touch-ups on portraits. Of course, you can re-size, adjust colors, highlight, add shadows, adjust the saturation, etc.

I still think Photoshop is best, but I'm a creature of habit and am comfortable with PowerPoint and my Digital Image Editor.

[Cruiser]

Sounds like your program is working fine for you. I've just never heard of it. What ever you are doing...it's great and your pictures look wonderful.

[Marti]

Hi again, Cruiser,

Did you mean "my" pictures look wonderful, or were you talking about someone else? I didn't know that any of my pictures had been posted anywhere, but it's certainly possible that I posted a couple of books, but didn't know they were being viewed publicly. There's no problem, but could I ask where you saw them? Many of my pictures aren't so wonderful for a variety of reasons, so I keep thinking you must be talking about someone else's pictures.

[Cruiser]

Marti, I'm sorry for the confusion. I believe was replying to asmit4's posting of her wedding album and just forgot to put her name in the memo. The only time we can view your books is if you post a link through the bookstore or enter your order number and password as some others have done. Until you do that, your pictures are safe from public viewing.

I would love to see your book in the bookstore. If you wouldn't mind sharing, you could send me a personal message and that way only I can see your book. If you prefer to keep it personal and private to yourself, I understand.

[Marti]

No problem at all about any confusion. I thought that's exactly what happened.

I just realized that I could send a private message to someone and wouldn't have to put my books out into cyberspace, so I will send you a message with the links as soon as I figure out what they are. I've finished 3 books so far. I should caution you, though, my books are pretty average. I'm not an artist nor a photographer. I'm pretty much an old scrapbooker, but not particularly great at that either. It's just a creative outlet. I started a thread under the new heading in the forum on scrapbooks and explained why I thought bookmaking was so much better than scrapbooking. I love the fact that I can actually make a "scrapbook" page, but in an actual book, not just a photo album. It takes scrapbooking to a whole new level, at least for me.

Anyway, I think my books will improve after seeing other people's. Like after seeing your Antarctic book, I realized how beautiful a page could be with a full-bleed photo, especially one that is so perfect. It really makes the photo pop right off the page. I hadn't been doing that - I tend to get caught up in the journaling.

[Cruiser]

Marti, please check your PM (personal message).