Photos

[Simster]

In the good old days of having your photos developed, it would be fairly routine to stick your photos in an album just as soon as you found time after getting them back from the developers. Nowadays of course, the urgency is no longer there because you have the pics as soon as you click the button on your camera. I'm guessing I'm not alone, therefore, to assume that the whole album routine has slipped by the wayside and instead you just have a bank of them on a hard drive somewhere, only referring to them if you want to stick them on the wall in a frame.

However, it's my wife's 40th in three weeks, so I have decided to get some of our better photos all albumed up. Expensive and time consuming, but worth it I think.

I'm just curious, are there others on NSC who remain disciplined enough to put their photos in albums, or are there more like me who keep meaning to getting round to building their albums, or do most simply not care for albums any more, considering them a waste of space? Genuinely interested...

 

[Seagull on the wing]

Still have a few Albums from the Navy and oil rig days but now inclined to put photo's on disc.What makes a nice present is your favourite photo enlarged and put onto a canvas like it was an oil painting and framed. I think the canvas pic will be about £25 then there's the frame,but they do look good.

 

[Simster]

I must admit to being tempted by the canvas option, except that the wife is very FUSSY about where to put centre piece photos! This is one of the reasons why our walls have remained too bare for too long, so now I'm just overruling her, putting pics up, and she can change them if she can be arsed!

 

[Notters]

Slightly at a tangent, but I think a lot of people don't realise how unreliable digital storage is. I wouldn't mind betting that the vast majority of people don't have their photos backed-up and a huge number of peoples' childhood memories, holiday snaps, etc, will be lost forever.

 

[Dick Knights Mumm]

My nephew was given like a coffee table style book of photos - it looked really very good. Lovely finish, and it is more likely your wife would want it in the living room. Better for the kids to look at as well.

 

[Mendoza]

I still go old school and get photos developed. I do love a good photo album, just photos in general

I just got a load of photos developed from my 30th last year. Going to make a bit of a montage, frame it and hang it on a wall in the new flat

 

[Napper]

it's a right bastard if you don't stay on top of it all. Have hundreds of albums and one day I sat down to do as you said. I gave up after 2 hours. Good thing to do though.

I remember the old way with fondness , getting back from holiday wasn't quite over until you had been up boots for the 1 hour photo service. Normally what followed was dissapointment with numerous blured and black photos. The lads holidays were always worth a giggle though.

All so manufactured for the perfect shot these days

 

[Seagull27]

Certainly among the younger generations, putting photos in albums has been replaced by uploading to facebook now I guess. Still the same effect, you can look through all your old photos in different 'albums', just not with a hard copy.

 

[Cheeky Monkey]

Have to say I'm completely old school, don't do digital and still buy £4 disposable cameras when going on holiday etc. I was bought an expensive digital camera six or so years ago or so as a present and I never used it once.

 

[Grendel]

I've had photos developed for my last two holidays and put them in albums. Out of around 200 pictures from our most recent holiday we got rid of about 160, tidied the rest up in Photoshop a bit and then took advantage of Truprint doing 40 free prints for new accounts.

 

[Rowdey]

Haven't Apple got some iphoto/album thingy which lets you send photos to them and they send it back in a nice book ?
Could be worth look ?

 

[Brovion]

My wife is still very much a photo album fiend; at this very moment she is down at Boots picking up a set of prints she ordered. She takes everything on the digital camera, gets hard copy prints and then downloads the camera onto her laptop. Periodically I backup the laptop for her onto DVDs. (We don't use online storage although I use my own website space for some stuff)

So yes, traditional photo albums are still very much alive and well in our house, we've got about two complete shelves of the buggers. Oh, and I DO mean 'traditional' i.e. the ones with corners, not the ones where you slip them under plastic sheets (she doesn't like them). They're actually quite hard to get hold of now.

EDIT: Just to add that my wife prints EVERYTHING that she takes, and those photos that aren't deemed 'album-worthy' get shoved in boxes in the loft.

 

[Bold Seagull]

In the good old days of having your photos developed, it would be fairly routine to stick your photos in an album just as soon as you found time after getting them back from the developers. Nowadays of course, the urgency is no longer there because you have the pics as soon as you click the button on your camera. I'm guessing I'm not alone, therefore, to assume that the whole album routine has slipped by the wayside and instead you just have a bank of them on a hard drive somewhere, only referring to them if you want to stick them on the wall in a frame.

However, it's my wife's 40th in three weeks, so I have decided to get some of our better photos all albumed up. Expensive and time consuming, but worth it I think.

I'm just curious, are there others on NSC who remain disciplined enough to put their photos in albums, or are there more like me who keep meaning to getting round to building their albums, or do most simply not care for albums any more, considering them a waste of space? Genuinely interested...

Photobooks are definitely the way forward, and very good value. A lot of professional photographers use these now as the printing is great and the books are shop quality, and they are surprisingly affordable.

Some of these allow you flexibility with various book templates to choose from where you upload your shots and design the layouts yourself, whereas others are more rigid.

http://www.albelli.co.uk/
http://www.snapfish.co.uk/snapfishuk/photo-books/
http://www.myphotobook.co.uk/?gclid=CMj-3Zew8akCFYpB4QodhW67Xg
http://uk.blurb.com/

note: all these have good reviews from pro photographers.

 

[Simster]

Haven't Apple got some iphoto/album thingy which lets you send photos to them and they send it back in a nice book ?
Could be worth look ?

Lots of firms do that, but it's quite expensive. Also, I like the idea of being able to choose the albums myself and add other keep sakes in amongst the photos.

Incidentally, looking at ebay there are literally about 8,000 photo albums for sale and most of them are well under the price you might pay for a new one in WHS or Boots. I'm thinking I might buy about ten different albums, and make up some albums from our collection...


[MENTION=16159]Bold Seagull[/MENTION] - it seems we posted simultaneously, but I'm not a fan of photobooks for the reasons I outline.

 

[clippedgull]

Slightly at a tangent, but I think a lot of people don't realise how unreliable digital storage is. I wouldn't mind betting that the vast majority of people don't have their photos backed-up and a huge number of peoples' childhood memories, holiday snaps, etc, will be lost forever.

How true that comment is! I can't stress enough to my relatives how important it is to keep backups of important stuff. You should always keep a copy of anything you backup off site as well! (Burglaries, Fires, etc). Cloud storage is a pretty decent option too. As an example, I keep copies of my best photos in my Googlemail account. (Google will be around for ever!)

 

[Bold Seagull]

[MENTION=16159]Bold Seagull[/MENTION] - it seems we posted simultaneously, but I'm not a fan of photobooks for the reasons I outline.

Point taken, a photobook by it's professional nature is appealing in that regard, but loses that flexibility you mention. Some of them do allow you a lot of creative flexibility like adding scanned pics such as kids drawings, as well as added text and descriptions, but not quite the same as getting a decent new album out on the dining room table with a load of photos scattered all around you...

 

[Bold Seagull]

How true that comment is! I can't stress enough to my relatives how important it is to keep backups of important stuff. You should always keep a copy of anything you backup off site as well! (Burglaries, Fires, etc). Cloud storage is a pretty decent option too. As an example, I keep copies of my best photos in my Googlemail account. (Google will be around for ever!)

FlickR is another good place to keep and share you shots, plus allows you to group photos under different tags.

 

[Bold Seagull]

EDIT: Just to add that my wife prints EVERYTHING that she takes, and those photos that aren't deemed 'album-worthy' get shoved in boxes in the loft.

Either she is an excellent photographer or a poor editor! I'm a keen amateur togger with a few lenses and a dslr, but must delete 40-60% of the shots I take if I think they are either not in sharp focus, or poor composition etc.

 

[Seagull Steve]

My daughter is about to start art college and she needed a SLR camera, because they have to learn how to use the camera and develop their own photos. I think it's a great idea that they do this before they move on to the digital world. She needs to build up a portfolio, so she will be getting photo albums soon. I found a nice SLR on Amazon (yes I did buy through NSC) and it does take some very nice photos. Cheers Simster, you have given me a great idea for a present for her, by getting some of her work blown up and put on her bedroom wall.

 

[Bold Seagull]

My daughter is about to start art college and she needed a SLR camera, because they have to learn how to use the camera and develop their own photos. I think it's a great idea that they do this before they move on to the digital world. She needs to build up a portfolio, so she will be getting photo albums soon. I found a nice SLR on Amazon (yes I did buy through NSC) and it does take some very nice photos. Cheers Simster, you have given me a great idea for a present for her, by getting some of her work blown up and put on her bedroom wall.

If your daughter is looking for any advice, or help, this site is excellent and very helpful for all sorts of things photography related. http://www.photography-forum.org/index.php