Anybody done a book with Blurb?

*PeterAM* · 03-20-2009, 10:29 AM

I'm toying with the idea of doing a book (for my own gratification;not necessarily for sale) and the resource that comes up most often is Blurb. If anyone has done a book with them I'd appreciate your comments both pro and con. My areas of concern (I've never seen one of their books) are:

1. degree of difficulty re the layout process, using their software
2. success relative to matching your photos (color and B&W)
3. overall quality; paper, printing, binding
4. anything else

Thanks.

*YJD* · 03-20-2009, 11:03 AM

I won't mind knowing either. I wan to make a book for my parents showing some family pictures and some of the places we've been.

*Wheatfield* · 03-20-2009, 11:17 AM

Originally Posted by PeterAM

I'm toying with the idea of doing a book (for my own gratification;not necessarily for sale) and the resource that comes up most often is Blurb. If anyone has done a book with them I'd appreciate your comments both pro and con. My areas of concern (I've never seen one of their books) are:

1. degree of difficulty re the layout process, using their software
2. success relative to matching your photos (color and B&W)
3. overall quality; paper, printing, binding
4. anything else

Thanks.

I've done two books, one my own, and I co-published the 2008 PDML annual.
Make sure that you download their most recent software.
The supplied software is big button easy, but their templates are somewhat limited.
For my next book with them, I will probably create my own page template and drop image/text into that and then do full bleed pages.
Pay attention to your pixel counts, they have to be precise, and I wouldn't take on a book unless I was running a calibrated and profiled system with a good (not TN film) monitor, but I'm a little anal that way, as I have a bit of a graphic arts background.
I believe they will supply profiles for their printers so that you can soft proof your images in Photoshop.
They have a known issue with printing from scanned film files, I don't know why, but they sometimes get a lot of artifacting, especially with B&W scanned images.
The physical quality of both books I've received have been absolutely top notch. The paper is good and the binding is very high quality.
Overall, I recommend Blurb very highly.

My book:
A Day at the Beach | Book Preview

The PDML Annual:
PDML Photo Annual 2008-2009 - Premium Paper | By Mark Roberts (Editor) | Blurb

emalvick · 03-20-2009, 05:22 PM

I did one book with them.

The software is easy. I like that the software works off your own computer and that you can upload the book at the end. I found them through Smugmug, which had two options, but the other option was fully online.

I did find the templates a bit limiting, but nothing that I wasn't able to make do with, and perhaps I'll get creative and work out my own templates and go with the full bleed options. You do have to realize that when you do options like the full bleed that you will lose some edges and such to cropping... I think they did a good job of explaining it.

I think they did a great job with colors. The only fault with my one book was my own doing in that my photos were of dark, back-lit subjects that are backlit when on the computer screen but not in print. That being said, I think I got exactly what I should have expected. I will use them again. My wife has basically said that a Blurb book is a glorified scrap book for photographers.

The Book: Chihuly at the de Young photography by Erik Malvick | By photography by Erik Malvick | Category: Arts & Photography | Blurb

wasser · 03-20-2009, 06:29 PM

1. degree of difficulty re the layout process, using their software

I did one book with them. The pictures came from my Fuji P/S. Using their software and service is extremely easy. Download it and try it out. You basically just point the software toward your images, pick your layout, and then drag them in.

When I first started out I used their software and was pretty happy. However, I found the templates to be too restrictive and not what I wanted, so I just created a two page layout template in Gimp, arranged my images and text as I wanted, and then cut the pages and added them to Blurb as my images. The nice thing about doing it this way is you get have images of every page of your book (independent of Blurb software). If you name them to go in order then you can just load it to blurb and then auto fill the pages.

And using full bleed doesn't have to result in losing any of your image (or at least you can limit it). Just create a template with edge guides for the crop. Iirc, Blurb doesn't give exact dimensions for the crop. I used this guide to create my template and things turned out perfect. You can see her book, and she also has some info about how to use the templates.

2. success relative to matching your photos (color and B&W)

I didn't calibrate or anything. I just took the plunge. I'm guessing I got lucky and everything turned out just fine. All my photos were color.

3. overall quality; paper, printing, binding

I ordered my book with imagewrap and the premium paper. I was extremely happy with the heavy paper and the quality of the print. The binding was extremely stiff and I was a bit concerned about it, but we've had it for 3 months and it's had no problems. It's just a photo album of a family trip and it's been heavily used by friends, family, and our two small children, but it has held up just fine.

4. anything else

Unless something better comes along for the price, I definitely will and plan to use them again.

If I did it again I wouldn't waste my time using Blurb's templates. In my book I had to redo 30 pages I'd done in Blurb, but it was a good learning experience.

*indytax* · 03-20-2009, 07:11 PM

I agree with the assessments above. I've done one book (in December '07) and I was pretty pleased with it. My family and friends were very impressed with the quality of the final product.

I hadn't calibrated my monitor, so the pictures came out a little less vivid than they should have. That's my fault, and I highly suggest getting a SpyderExpress or something similar to calibrate your screen first. But that's true with any printing company, frankly (I now calibrate my monitors and I just did a quick and dirty book on Shutterfly for free after coupon; I was more pleased with the results).

The software is very simple (too simple?), and my only real complaint is the simple layout templates. But if that bothers you, just layout our pages in PS or a similar program as suggested above.

Overall, I was pleased and am looking forward to doing more (they just take time, whcih I don't have enough of). I've even given some thought on redoing my first book post-calibration.