Archive for the ‘Photo Books’ Category

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A Scrapbooker Shout-Out

December 13, 2007

Kim Guymon over at ScrapBizness gave RocketLife a huge shout out today. Kim’s a serious scrapbooker and her blog is really at the heart of the industry and the craft.

I have to admit that I find it really interesting that so many scrapbookers (of the die-cut and special glue and fancy markers and stickers genre) are really digging RocketLife photo books. I think it comes as such a surprise to me because I thought a scrapbooker really enjoyed the careful, time-intensive part of their creations (much in the way that I prefer to knit my own scarves - wipe that surprised look off your face! - versus buying them at the store). It’s the handmade factor - the love and care that goes into a project that makes it that much more special to you.

But Kim makes a really good point - there’s so much customization (and love and care!) that CAN go into making a photo book with RocketLife. Here’s what she had to say about some her favorite RocketLife features that let her really get creative with her project as a scrapbooking girl in a digital world:

Smart Arrangement technology (their Secret Weapon) - their program snatches the photos from your computer file and auto fills the book. The cool thing is that it pretty much knows which photos to group together. The result is a really fast book! You could literally order it in 5 minutes. You don’t have to upload them all to their site first and then drag them over to your project.

BUT! Being a scrapper, I need to rearrange things and add journaling. But, even that is easy. You can just click a button and it will change the layout on a page several times rearranging the photos each time. Then, add some journaling and a drag and drop coordinating graphic and away you go!

You can change up the backgrounds within a theme by clicking the button that lets you use other options in the theme. You can go deeper into it and change the color of each background. Basically, you can do as much or as little as you would like to do to each page.

You can order the same book in different sizes without having to re-size the pages by hand. Shoot, you can snatch a page and order it on a mug or puzzle without doing anything but ordering it. So, you create ONCE and can order a variety of products. Cool!

What do you guys think?  Are you a scrapbooker who thinks making a photo book is just as fun?  Or do you still prefer the traditional way, but like making other photo projects on the side?

And, if you’d like to share some of your creations with us here at the RocketLife Blog, please don’t hesitate to send them - just click here to email me some screen shots!

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Make a Photo Book in 2 Minutes or Less

November 15, 2007

I know, I know. You’re reading the title of this post wondering how it is even remotely possible that you could ever make an entire photo book in 2 minutes. If you’ve ever attempted one before with one of those other sites (you know, the kind where it takes eighty-nine million years to upload your photos), you probably got irritated and frustrated and decided that you had better things to do with your time than upload and rename and rearrange your photos for hours on end. Which is why you’ll probably be amazed when I show you how to make a photo book in as much time as it takes to, ahem, upload a handful of the aforementioned pictures.

So here we go - start the clock!

Step 1: First I launched RocketLife and selected my photos. I’ve traveled quite a bit in the past year, so I thought it would be cool to make a photo book of all my travels. Within The My Pictures folder on my computer, I had set up another folder labeled Travels with about 60 of my photos in it, so I selected that folder. Then clicked Add Photos. This part is super fast - like maybe 20 seconds. So fast that you kind of wonder why it takes so long to do that on the other sites.

Choose Your Pictures

Step 2: Select the project. In this case, I picked the photo book (the cool thing is that my own pictures show up on the preview of the photo book) and then clicked on Customize and Order.

Select Photo Book

Step 3: This is the really cool part. After I clicked Customize and Order, my book was created for me (it’s that nifty Smart Arrangement Technology again). Just like that. All 26 pages were laid out beautifully with that one click. I love that RocketLife somehow knows the right way to lay out all of the photos. It’s the way I would have done it if I had arranged them myself.

Book Layout

Step 4: If I want to, I can further customize my book - change themes, rearrange photos, add placeable graphics, edit photos. But I can also click the Order button and call it a day.

So there you have it - a beautiful photo book in 2 minutes. And just think of all the cool books you could make - family vacations, weddings, baby showers (or a baby book even!), an anniversary gift or a collection of photos from your first year in college. The possibilities are truly endless.

Now it’s your turn! Give it a try and tell me what you think!