When looking for a stylish and creative way to display your photographs, a photo book can be an excellent alternative to the more traditional photo album.

With photos printed directly on the page, photo books are more permanent than albums. This means you’ll have to be much more selective and thoughtful when designing your book, as you can’t change a decision after the fact. We’ve put together a few rules that you should follow to make the best photo book you can. Check them out.

Pick the Right Book

Let’s say you’ve just come back from a year abroad; you’ve taken hundreds of digital photos and now you want to get the best printed into a book to help you commemorate the experience.

The first thing to do is to pick a book, which is easier than it sounds. What layout do you want? What kind of binding? These are decisions you’ll need to make before choosing the book for you. Check out the photo book maker offered by My Social Book to get an idea of the options available. They have a wide range of styles and formats and can compile a book directly from photos on your social feeds.

Curate your Photos

Right, you’ve finally picked your book of choice. It’s hardcover, landscape, A5, just what you were looking for. Now all you need to do is decide what photos are going in it, easy, right?

Maybe not, your book has 52 pages, but you’ve got nearly 300 photos. Thankfully, you’ll be able to reduce this number quickly, some shots might be blurry, overexposed, or simply boring. It’s once you to the 60-70 mark that decisions will get tough.

The key here is to be ruthless. Is your beautiful sunset snap slightly out of focus? Discard it. Is there a stranger walking across your haunting shot of an otherwise isolated beach? Bin it. Remember, your choices are permanent. You’ll thank yourself later for excluding shots that might annoy you further down line.

Consider the Order

Ok, you’ve picked your book and painstakingly curated the photos you’re including. That’s it, isn’t it? Not quite. Now you’ve got to decide what order your photos will be in. Before you despair, there’s a lot of fun to be had here, how you order your pictures can work to complement the overall theme of the book itself. Was your trip an insightful journey of self-discovery? Consider chronological order, a literal and figurative reflection of where you started and where you ended up. If your trip was less existential, perhaps grouping photos by locations you visited would work better. There are no hard and fast rules here, go with what you feel works best for your book.

Conclusion

Whether your photobook is to celebrate a trip, a wedding, a birthday, or any other life-event, following these simple rules will ensure your book is the best it possibly can be, and that it will be a treasured possession for years to come. 

Published by HOLR Magazine.