Monthly Musings
This post is sponsored by Artifact Uprising.
[dropcap2_large]A[/dropcap2_large]s a professional photographer I’ve always been an advocate for making your photos tangible. They say a photo is worth a thousand words, but I’d add that it does nothing for you if it’s hidden away all the time. Today I’ve partnered with Artifact Uprising to share some of my best tips for making a photo book.
Tips to Create a Photo Book
Over the last 5 years I’ve been increasingly passionate about teaching myself through various trial and error to photograph the moon. Here are some tips to help you along the way, but please keep in mind that these are not extent of what you can learn. I am still learning more about taking photos of the moon.
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Choose a subject you love.
You should know by now that my moon photos are close to my heart, so when Artifact uprising offered to print them in a photo book, I was over the moon. You might not love the moon as much as I do, but their photo books are perfect for photos of your family, home, poetry, and everything in between. I’ve been planning to make one to combine my kids lives a few years at a time instead of using a traditional baby book.
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Quality always matters.
The quality of their books speak for themselves, but if I have to gush, my hardcover photo book is stunning, measuring in at 8.5″x11″ with a fabric hardcover and a full print dust cover. The interior pages are 100% recycled with a smooth matte finish. I chose smoke, a warm gray, as my fabric color. My book came in at around 44 pages but they can hold 40 to 200 pages.
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Use high resolution images.
Using the highest resolution images you have will ensure that the photos printed in your book turn out as good as they can be. When designing my book I used images sized with a long edge of 30 inches and a 300PPI resolution. If some of yours are not as large, you can choose to give that photo a smaller image spot so that the lower quality isn’t as noticeable.
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Plan ahead.
You can autofill your layout, or you can choose to tell a story. There are plenty of templates available so I varied mine by height and placement. Images I liked more I gave larger spots because I wanted them to be more of a focal point. I broke my book down by the phases of the moon. I flipped through the design preview as if I were reading a book to make sure that it flowed and told a story.
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Don’t forget to include text!
Even if you don’t have a lot to say or if your photos speak for themselves, it never hurts to have some descriptive text to help set the tone. I chose to have a title page, dedication, table of contents, descriptive text about how I got started photographing the moon, and a little blurb about each phase of it throughout the book.
To say that I’m excited is an understatement. I’ve always wanted to have a book of my moon photos and now I do. If you want one of your own, please visit Artifact Uprising and use the code HEJDOLL15 for 15% off. If enjoyed this post, you might also enjoy my other photography tips. I share lots of behind the scenes and moon photos on my instagram account.
Have you created a photo book before? Any tips to add?
This post is sponsored by Artifact Uprising, a company I’ve loved and supported for years.