Photo Book Service Reviews

With a huge selection of options from hardcover or softcover to magazine-style or classic leather or linen cover, Photo Books come in dozens of sizes, styles and prices to suite a variety of purposes. What a great way to display your wedding photos, baby pics, vacation photos or other special occasion pictures. Instead of getting individual prints made then spending hours manually inserting them into a photobook or cutting and pasting a scrapbook, a digitally prepared photo book is the way to go.

I tried out a variety of photo book sites and found several that stood out from the crowd.

• For sheer variety of photo book sizes and creative options (you have the option to upload PDFs of photo pages you created with your own software package) and especially price, Viovio shines. Viovio also has a great online community for sharing your creations. Read full Viovio Photo Book Review.
  
  
• I found the easiest site to use with excellent creative options was SmileBooks. After downloading their free software I could customize my photo book, which resides on my hard drive; I didn't have to upload each individual photo. Their templates are completely customizable to move and resize. Plus, Smilebooks has an interesting collection of page backgrounds with real photographs. You can even use your own images as page backgrounds. Smilebooks also has the thickest paper of the sites I visited: 135lb compared to a standard 100lb. Read full review of SmileBooks.
  
  
• Polaroid My Memories Suite is a top notch, easy-to-use photo album software program for creating photo books, scrapbooks, DVD slideshows and greeting cards. Crossplatform - works on PC and MAC. The standard suite includes a set of themed designer templates on separate discs - Holiday Designer, Travel & Wedding Designer, Family Times and Kids & Sports. The deluxe package also includes a large, hardbound personalized photobook (up to 26 pages) and four personalized greeting cards. Read full review of Polaroid My Memories Suite
  
  
• Of the mainstream online photo services I found that Shutterfly stands out for its ease-of-use and fast service. Most people use Shutterfly's basic photo books templates, which unfortunately are not customizable. However, Shutterfly also gives you the option of uploading jpegs of pages you created with your own software (such as Photoshop Elements) and placing them into photo books.
  
  

All companies reviewed produce high quality photo books on acid-free archival paper with a variety of cover choices from hardcover casewrap to leather and linen.

Below is a chart featuring major photo book services listing major features and ratings. Next to come are individual detailed reviews of each service.

Photo Book Services Rankings COMPANY SmileBooks Viovio Polaroid My Memories Shutterfly Snapfish PhotoWorks Kodak Gallery RATINGS (out of 5)               Quality 5 5 4.5 4.5 4 4 4 Ease of Use 5 3.5 4.5 4.5 4.5 4 3.5 Features 4.5 5 4.5 4 4 4 3.5 Customer Support 4.5 4.5 4 4.5 4 4 4 Prices            Promo Discounts         PHOTO FINISH OPTIONS               Glossy Matte           Digital Silk Paper             White Borders     Acid-free archival paper   Extra thick/Heavy Paper 135lb             SIZES 5.5x5, 8x8, 8x11 , 12x12, 16.5x12, 11x14 2.5x3.75, 3.5x3.5, 5x5, 5.25x3.5, 5.5x3.5, 5x7, 6x9,7x9, 7.75x5.75, 8.5x8.5, 8.5x11 9x7, 10x10, 11.5x8.5, 12x12, 12.5x10, 14x11 6x6, 8x8 8.5x11, 11x8.5, 12x12 4x6, 5x7, 8x8, 8.5x11, 12x12 2x3, 4x6, 5x7, 7.75x5.75, 8x11,12,12 4x4, 7 1/8x6 7/8 11.5x8.5, 12x12 5x5, 5x7/4x6, 10.25x9 14x12 COVER STYLES               Casewrap     Leather Linen         Velvet             Softcover Hardcover Spiralbound           Cover picture window             Removable Dust Jacket                FEATURES               Web Software       Free software download       Templates Choice of Background Colors Text-only layout     Full Bleed layout     Use Photo as   background         minimum pages 26 none 26 20 20 20 free photo album sharing   Photo   organizing hi res uploads photo gifts   sHIPPING               ave. processing time 2-7 bus. days 4-14 days min. 7 days 3-5 bus. days 3-5 bus. days 5 bus. days 3-5 bus days in-store pickup         overnight delivery 2-day delivery   canada delivery   international delivery *  CUSTOMER SERVICE               money back guarantee free reprint phone support email support online chat       FAQ online user guide   user forum             Password protected Account * SmileBooks has sites in the UK and Germany for international orders