Almost all of our couples choose a package with an album, or several albums. We let our clients choose the photos that they want. We send out a worksheet to help with this process. We don’t limit the amount of photographs (yet), but we might find the need to.
The problem is that people want to put so many photos on a page that it’s just not achievable to have a clean sleek look. Don’t get me wrong, we are happy you love all the photos, but when we try to cram them all into an album, it starts to look really cluttered. Remember you have the disc of images, and you can make other albums to go along with your Showcase Album.
Here are some suggestions for a gorgeous album:
1. Choose no more than 8 photos for a spread. (A spread is two pages).
2. Please send the worksheet back. The worksheet is designed in “spreads”. Many times I start working on an album designed in single pages only to find that the first page is a single page on the right hand side. When this happens, I have to scrap the design and start over again. The album should be in spreads starting at 0102, 0304, ect. When the couple designs the album as 01,02,03 it’s hard for me to tell how to design the album.
3. Another problem with the “page” vs. “spread” is this: On one page, a couple might say they want 15 photos. On the cooresponding side, they want another 20. They don’t realize that on a “spread” that’s a total of 35 photos. Those thirty five photos will be about the size of a postage stamp, or smaller. (That’s on a 10×10 album. You would need a microscope to see them on a parent album).
4. Naturally, when the couple sees the finished album design with too many photos, they start deleating photos. That means I need to go back in and fix it, and that takes time. I have to get rid of the photos, and then redesign the entire thing. Which basically means that I have to stop what wedding I am working on, and redesign an entire album. I’m trying to juggle everything in attempts to making everyone happy and keep on time with everyone, but it’s getting to be a huge problem.
5. When you make album changes, please list them all in the first edit. Albums can be very hard to build and sometimes have as many as 30 layers on a spread. It is very hard to move things from one page to the next, switch things around, and totally change a spread that you have requested.
6. Please don’t send hand drawn design suggestions. They are normally not to scale, and don’t conform to the album design specs my album maker adhears to. (They have trim lines, gutters specs and soforth that the Bride and groom might not be considering)
Below is a screen capture of a spread I am currently working on. The lovely bride Blake chose well, and she is going to have a beautiful album. I’m putting the screen capture here, so that I can demonstrate what I’m doing here behind the scenes:
And here is an example of the guides that I am seeing as far as bleeds and soforth as I work on a design:
Hopefully, the photos above explains why album design, and especially redesign can be so difficult.
Therefore this year, (excluding past client), I will be installing a photo limit. I will also be installing an album edit limit. I will only accept album photo choices in spreads, and will no longer accept hand drawn design suggestions.
My goal, like yours is to design a BEAUTIFUL album for you. I want to keep letting the couples decide what photos are best for them, and how they want the designs to be laid out as far as storytelling. Not all photographers let you do that. But I’m commited to the album being your vision of your wedding day, and not mine.
