A wedding photo book, printed and bound as a single print or in any number of copies. Thanks to free software from online vendors such as FotoInsight and Printing-1 this has become accessible to everyone. How fast a glossy wedding book can be done and that a wedding photo book in deluxe leather cover is available for under 40.- Pounds is shown in the following article: "wedding photo book - five minutes for eternity."
The best news first:
photo book software from vendors such as FotoInsight and Printing-1 is designed so that the photo book can almost completely be done in autopilot, while it still offers you the option to edit the design or to add finishing touches. Thus, even design novices can cheer the creation of their wedding photo book. But the artistically well-versed will have all the freedom to express their own ideas in the photo book.
Design software - free and self explanatory
The software for the creation of photo books is available online as a free download, for example on
http://fotoinsight.co.uk/ and
www.printing-1.co.uk - for both Windows and Mac computers (FotoInsight Designer is also one of the few options for Linux users). The installation is easy and takes less than 10 minutes. When opening the application, the user is given the option to edit an existing photo book layout or to create a new one. Those using it for the first time, will of course always create a new photo book.
Apart from vendors where a software download is required for the photo book design there are other online sites where
photo books can be created from within the web browser. Obviously the editing features are limited to what can be delivered in a web session through a browser. Another burden is that every image has to be uploaded in full resolution; with hundreds of professionally shot photographs, this can be a frustrating and time consuming process. For good reasons most photo book services in Britain, like FotoInsight und Printing-1 offer a free software tool download.
The application interface of the photobook software of the providers mentioned above (and most others follow this layout, too) is divided into seven areas: the main menu bar, the menu tree, thumbnail images, the photo book list, the photo book page view, the toolbar and menu. A novice photo book designer can open the folder containing the images to be included in the photo book. In the case of a wedding photo book, this should be all the pictures of the wedding that should go into the
wedding photo album. The images now appear in the "thumbnails" field.
Layout - complete freedom
To start a photo book, one thing to be decided from the start is the book format and type of cover. Printing-1 allows to change the page size at any stage of the design process, however, computers aren't perfect at resizing individually laid out page designs. So it is best to stick to the page size once the design has been started.
Clicking on the "layout" tab allows you to choose the number of images and text fields per page and how they should be arranged. During the design process sets of pages can be added as required. The page layout can be created, chosen or changed for each individual page in the book at any stage. To pick a layout, simply click in the "storyboard" on the double page to be changed and the layout section to pick the desired layout. The program will do the rest.
By now the photos have been chosen and the book format has been defined. Clicking on the "thumbnails" section on the "apply" button, the
Printing-1 software imports the images into the photo book. With FotoInsight Designer, the "PHOTO BOOK Assistant" is activated by clicking on its icon (bottom left), dragging the thumbnails for the book form the preview into the selection box and clicking "Create Photo Book". Voila! The result can be seen in edit mode on the "Storyboard" or displayed as something closer to the real book in the "Preview".
Of course, both applications also allow to place photos individually at any location or angle in the
photo book instead of having them laid-out automatically by the software. This works simply through "drag & drop", i.e. clicking on the desired picture in the "thumbnails section"; hold the left mouse button and then drag the image to the appropriate place in the photo book. Once all images have been positioned in the photo book, it is a good idea to check all the pages to ensure no layered picture is covering any important elements of a background picture and that all images have sufficient resolution for their size. If an image has a barely adequate picture quality, a yellow warning light flashes on the screen. If the picture quality is insufficient a red warning will appear; making the image smaller usually resolves the problem.
Finishing touches - image editing
As a finishing touch, images can be improved. In the FotoInsight Designer software any image can be edited through a double click and in the application from Printing-1 image editing tools can be reached through the toolbar. The applications from FotoInsight and Printing-1 offer under icons like 'page', 'new image' 'text', 'processing', 'layout adaption', 'rotation', 'frame options', 'zooming', optimization etc and includes numerous design, text and image processing tools. E.g. there is a tool to rotate images freely or in increments and another one to add text, but make sure that you select an appropriate font size. Images can also be converted from colour to black and white.
A
wedding photobook becomes most interesting taking into account a few design tips: A photo book is basically about telling the "story of your wedding" through photographs. For this it is best to create chronological chapters, like preparations, civil wedding, church wedding, the party etc. Each chapter might be introduced by an overarching main picture, for example, a photo of the church for the chapter, "church wedding".
Once happy with the design of the wedding book, it is easy to order it online. Clicking on the 'order' icon in the 'main menu bar' starts the checkout process in which the address details and print data will be transmitted to a
photo lab. The wedding book will be professionally printed, bound and delivered by post within a few days.
System requirements:
FotoInsight Designer 4.5.9 - Win, Mac, Linux
1 Ghz processor
512 MB RAM
Windows 2000, XP, Vista; Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard, Linux Kernel 2.6, glibc 2.6
Printing-1
Windows and MacOS
Articles for free publication:
"
Factsheet" about FotoInsight Ltd. and Printing-1
Labels: albums, from wedding, photo album, photo books, photobook, printed, wedding, with pictures
# posted by Geruman @ 10:13 am
Today FotoInsight launches a new version of FotoInsight Designer with new lines of photo albums on photographic paper, new features like fading frames and festive templates and the addition of Linux and Mac OS versions.
Cambridge, 20 August 2009. - Europe's most popular photo book software is now also available for Linux and Mac OS. Against an ever growing number of photo book services, FotoInsight is increasing its technological lead with the introduction of version 4.5 of FotoInsight Designer. The application is available as a free download on the photo service's website and it can create a 130 page photo book lay-out in under three minutes. The new release of the order software adds photo albums processed on thick, lustre finish photographic paper pages. The new photo paper album styles ranging from 26 to 82 pages (in steps of eight pages) are only available in the FotoInsight Designer software.
In FotoInsight's new Photo Paper Album each page lies flat
FotoInsight states that the book bulge in the new photo paper albums disappear, as the pages lay flat when the book is opened 180 degrees wide. A new binding process is being used for the album pages, which are thicker than pages in CEWE Photobooks. This allows the pages in an open photo paper album to lay flat, rather than bowing or arching up towards the spine. Flat pages make it easier to view images which spread across a double page. FotoInsight's Managing Director Klaas Brumann states: "The new printed photo album's thicker pages provide a premium feel over traditional coffee table style photo books. We expect the new photographic paper books to be popular with professional users and for wedding photo books!"
New Photo Albums on photographic paper:
- Photo Book Square (21 x 21 cm) from € 29.95 / £ 24.99.
- Photo Book Large landscape, (28 x 21 cm).
- Photo Book XL (30 x 30 cm)
Mac OS and Linux, too
Compatible with Windows XP, Linux and Mac operating system 10.5 Leopard and above, version 4.5 of the FotoInsight Designer software is now available to download from the FotoInsight website. The software upgrade sees greater functionality for editing, sorting and arranging photos, as well as for creating personalised photo gifts that preserve photographic memories.
Image layering and blend-in image masks
According to FotoInsight: "layering images in any order or position has been one of the outstanding features of its Designer software for photo books. With the new software upgrade a range of different shapes or blend-in image masks can be used as image frames. There are also plenty of new frames and clipart to decorate photo gifts for Christmas, school, wedding and other themes.
Back to school promotion.
FotoInsight offers photo gift products to equip children in the new school year with notepads, animal key chains, messenger bags, aluminium water bottles and other product with own photographs. The firm is backing up it's back to school promotion with a three for the price of two offer on spiral bound photo notepads. The voucher code is BACK2SCHOOL (valid until 31 August 2009).
Information about FotoInsight
FotoInsight Ltd was founded in Cambridge in 2003 and runs an easy to use digital photo processing service for Windows, Mac OS and Linux users, offering an extensive array of award-winning photographic print and photo gifts as well as the photo books, photo poster, photo calendars and photo canvas print. Prints ordered through FotoInsight are developed at five state of the art photo labs in three countries. The online photo service has grown year on year faster than the photo processing industry and has expanded its services in five European languages in 32 countries.
Contact
FotoInsight Ltd.
Catalina Martinez, Head of International Communication
Cambridge, CB4 1ZP, UK
Skype fotoinside
Tel. +44 (0)8700 114911
Fax +44 (0)8715 601675
Email: pr (at) fotoinsight.com
Labels: Apple, CEWE, develop, Linux, Mac OS, paper, photo album, photo book, photo books, photobook, photographic, print, software
# posted by Geruman @ 5:40 pm
The digital age has improved the access to information and the speed of information distribution dramatically. Are we failing to preserve histories, images and pictures for future generations?
When the author of these lines tried to transfer some information from an eight year old computer with no W/LAN to a current PC recently, she failed. To some surprise, the only possible device the eight year old machine could write to was a 3 ½” floppy disc, a device winch looks to children like an ancient storage system, as they are not likely to ever have seen a wobbly 5 ¼” disc. Current Windows XP machines tend not to have floppy disc drives. This raises a fundamental question: What will happen to all the CD-ROMs, DVDs,
memory sticks and SIM-cards and mp3 players we use to store music and pictures? Will
future societies have devices which able to read current data, image and music archives?
Museums and history departments boost records of ancient
books and correspondence, lovingly decorated with frames and illustrations and transferred from generation to generation as historic documents. Today, applications like
SmartPic from Abelssoft help to decorate emails with clipart and Smileys, expressing the writer’s mood. A nicely laid out and decorated message is much more likely to be preserved by the recipient, but in any case only as long as the hard disk survives. Some other recent product releases illustrate the trend towards ever faster flows of information across ever bigger networks. Software developer “euris 4c” recently published “4c”, a thumbnail previews plug-in for Internet Explorer. The application replaces website description text with quick previews, allowing the user to view a thumbnail size preview of a page before clicking onto it. If 4c is active on the system, it also starts a special windows administration as soon as two or more browser windows are open. The window administration displays previews of all browsers. A mouse click on the preview is sufficient to access the website. Kai Bonfigt of developer “euris 4c GmbH”: “Parallel surfing with several browser windows open is now a child’s play.” Multiple site browsing previews clearly accelerate the information flow.
The software developer Somebytes has released tools which for little money enable
Microsoft Outlook users (and therefore most personal computer users) asynchronous synchronization of Outlook folders through email. Anyone working in teams on multiple sites or across time zones will immediately understand the benefits: - appointments, contacts, tasks and notes from a home PC or office PC can be updated with defined users at any location and in any time zone to allow any colleague, family or club member access to the same schedule or information (access can be defined individually). While this certainly makes current life easier and speeds up the information access it makes any paper based time planner incompatible and redundant. Future generations of historians and archaeologists will gain access to current digital records only if hard disks will be preserved and readable. As it stands this is unlikely.
The trend towards traceless operation is well illustrated by the award winning Buyertools Reminder. This free software handles multiple bids on the virtual auction site eBay, placing the bid at the last minute before the end of an auction. This increases the chances to land a bargain, as it reduces the time other interested parties have to outbid the offer. This is followed by some electronic communication completing the process. Apart from the goods acquired on eBay everything else is fully automatic and digital. No paper receipt, no tangible traces.
According to a recent report by
Ipsos Insight digital cameras held steady for the third year in a row with 22% of US consumers planning to buy one in the next three months. 22% of US consumersplan to buy an MP3 player in the next 3 months, up from 13% from 2004. The music industry is suffering from another gift season enforcing the trend towards the mp3 format. Acon Digital Media, developer of some affordable and easy to use music software tools has released a new application helping consumers to convert any piece of music into a real music ring tone in less than three minutes, available from "My Ringading". The application called “My Ringading” makes creating truly unique ring tones and transferring them to a cell phone a child’s play - infrared, cable or Bluetooth as well as cost effective WAP uploads are all available at a mouse click. Storing music on hard discs and mobile phones is converting essential cultural expression into a throw away item. Though at only EU€16.90 / US$19.90 for the software this at least reduces the amount of money ring tone consumers tend to through away on this. Even the greatest trend in puzzles and saviour of newspaper sales, Sudoku becomes available by thousands of games generated by Sudoku software on CD-ROM like “embalado’s Su Doku elements”.
Klaas Brumann has recently written a dissertation paper on the growing trend of online networking, which has been supported by new developments in social software (see Linkedin and Xing). Online networking has been expanding during the year 2005 into research and higher education with the knowledge network academici. This online network provides instant access to any information published and asynchronous communication in specialist subject groups across fields of research and academic disciplines across the globe, 24/7. Once the servers are switched off our society will return to be as advanced as the last
book printed. In our present time however, interactive networking for business and academia will become essential.
The only product reviewed recently that bugs the trend and carries memories into the future is the
printed photo album, like FotoInsight's
photobook. The great thing about processing or printing photos is that all those digital treasures languishing on hard drives could finally see the light of day. Getting nicely laid out, perfectly
printed photo album preserves photographic memories and converts digital images into
gifts and pieces of reference. FotoInsight reports that in the first month it already made 12% of its revenues from
photobooks alone with traditional photographic processing down sharply over the previous year.
A culture failing to preserve memories will vanish without trace. Computer users should not assume that their children will be able to read or access in any form the information currently being accumulated on memory sticks, CD-ROMs or DVDs.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Contact:
International IT Marketing Limited
London, United Kingdom
E-mail: cm (at) IITM.info
Tel. +44 8700 114911
Fax +44 8715 601675
USA +1 202-470-3242
Labels: academici, Acon Digital Media, BuyerTools, eBay, future, memory, Microsoft Outlook, MyRingading, photo album, printed, Reminder, Smart Pic, software, somebytes
# posted by Geruman @ 6:48 pm
Mac OS and Linux, too
Back to school promotion.