I found the templates they have there for digital scrapbook pages, cover and spine. I was just wondering if after uploading anyone found they should have done something differently or the templates work perfect. Thanks for any tips.
#1 Website for Digital Scrapbooking and Hybrid Crafting.
I've never used Shutterfly before, but there must be Shutterfly customers here! Come on y'all!
I would definitely look for comments even via Google. I have never used Shutterfly but I have read about issues with I believe it's called the gutter or something like that. Hopefully someone will respond here.
@Kat: I think Beatrice is correct. I believe I too remember issues about the binding area and/or the print "bleed" which is where it cuts off some of the edges on a true 12x12 at 300dpi. I would try to research on google too if no ones gives their advice or experience in this thread.
Now with that said. I have used shutterfly THREE times for personal photos where I just put my pics into their premade pages and was impressed with the quality of those books. They weren't photograph type prints/pages. They were more like a child's book you read... for a lack of a better way to explain it, but a very good quality. I thought I got a good bang for my buck in the ones I did with them that way though.
Thank you for the replies, I will do some searching. @Shawna thanks for the feedback about your books your books.
I've used Shutterfly a couple of times, and I've been happy with the results. You do have to watch the edges of your layouts, don't put anything around the edges that's important because it may get cut off.
@Kat, please do post if you find any info on this. I have used a couple other photobook printers in the past, and I've managed to find the approximate dimensions to add to my pages to prevent unpleasant cropping. I am thinking of switching to Shutterfly, and I'm interested to know what this info would be for their cropping measurements.
Lady Phillippa, It looks to me like they have built in warnings when you are going over the line for printing safely. A red line will appear when you are at risk. I had an instance like this before where there was no place to find the actual dimensions for printing so I just contacted their customer service and it was there on their page but not easy to find so she directed me so I would just contact their customer service for their dimensions for printing and they will either tell you and you can size your layouts accordingly or just let their warnings guide you. Hope this helps somewhat. Sorry I have not used their service. I am a Mixbook Fan. http://www.mixbook.com/family-photo-books I have had about 10 books printed through them and have just loved them one being a 50 page book for my family history and it was great. Just have to watch for their 50% off specials.
@Brenda, thanks! I've used Mixbook before. I may go back to them since I know the dimensions they print.
I did find a couple of things, one said Do Not select Vivid Photos on Shutterfly photobooks or the photos will come out looking burned. I found some discussions where the reviews were mixed, -good experience/bad experience with Shutterfly.
This review on this list talks about how if you don't use their template for the cover, you may loose part of your image by it being cut off. There is lots of good stuff on here about other sites too.
https://thedailydigi.com/12-different-photobook-printer-reviews
Here is what I found, you can see a bleed and a trim dimension on the template examples here, so the designs outside that dimesion is where it will get cut off:
http://www.shutterfly.com/digitalscrapbook/scrapbook-design-specs.jsp
Kat
Thanks for sharing, Kat!
You are welcome
I have used Shutterfly a lot for photobooks. Some were just putting my photos into their templates using either Simple Path or Custom Path. With Custom Path, one can really adjust the photos as desired and also add embellishments and text boxes. There are quite a few choices.
A lot of my Shutterfly books are completely digital scrapping. When viewing the photo book options, choose Custom Path, choose a size, then on the Choose a Style screen, click on All and scroll all the way to the bottom and select Digiscrap. With this style, all the pages are full bleed single images. I usually choose 12X12 books and then just load up my high-resolution jpg of my scrapped page and drag it right into the page. I make a lot of 2-page spreads 12X24. When I upload these 2-page images, I hover the mouse over the image in the Photos tab, and it displays Use as Spread below the image. Click on Use as Spread, and the image will be placed on the two facing pages.
For covers on Shutterfly books, I have used templates I got from this website: http://simplyyin.blogspot.com/ Yin has several free downloads of templates including covers if one scrolls down, looking on the far right. She also has a store at http://yindesigns.blogspot.com/
Hope this helps.
Oh yes, in the Album view, I always go to Edit, Apply Effect, and Don't Apply Automatic Corrections for all my digital scrapped pages as well photos that I have edited in Photoshop.
Thanks so much for adding those tips @Sharon, when I get closer to making my book to print, I will give that a try. I am still in the creating pages stage.
I was going to say be mindful of the borders (bleed), too! Other than that, I've not really had issues with Shutterfly!
Hi, I also use actions for re-sizing my pages before downloading them to Shutterfly, it helps to make sure you will not lose important information in the bleed areas - Studio Wendy http://shop.scrapbookgraphics.com/Wendyzine-Scraps
This is what Sharon said in an earlier post:
I have used Shutterfly a lot for photobooks. Some were just putting my photos into their templates using either Simple Path or Custom Path. With Custom Path, one can really adjust the photos as desired and also add embellishments and text boxes. There are quite a few choices.
A lot of my Shutterfly books are completely digital scrapping. When viewing the photo book options, choose Custom Path, choose a size, then on the Choose a Style screen, click on All and scroll all the way to the bottom and select Digiscrap. With this style, all the pages are full bleed single images. I usually choose 12X12 books and then just load up my high-resolution jpg of my scrapped page and drag it right into the page. I make a lot of 2-page spreads 12X24. When I upload these 2-page images, I hover the mouse over the image in the Photos tab, and it displays Use as Spread below the image. Click on Use as Spread, and the image will be placed on the two facing pages.
For covers on Shutterfly books, I have used templates I got from this website: http://simplyyin.blogspot.com/ Yin has several free downloads of templates including covers if one scrolls down, looking on the far right. She also has a store at http://yindesigns.blogspot.com/
Hope this helps.
What Sharon says here works perfect for me. Plus when I make my pages I have guides on my pages and NEVER put any words, elements, pictures closer than half an inch to any border.
This link gets you to the part of their site that is geared toward making Scrapbooking Album
Shutterfly digital scrapbooking link
http://www.shutterfly.com/digital-scrapbooking
Also they do have templates for the covers and binding.
I have ordered a few books from Shutterfly and the quality has always been very good.