I started a Mixbook last night just based on it being mentioned here. Still have some work to do. At first I did automatic pic fill but when it did that lots of the pics got chopped off - that’s not helpful!
Anyone want to share tips/tricks/shortcuts with Mixbook? Or share what finish you got - glossy vs. not glossy.
I definitely don’t use auto fill. My books take a lot of time. My last one took about 6 hours.
My books are vacation books, so I first find a theme that best matches our trip. Then I review all my pictures and select the best ones that I might use and stick them in a folder. Then I import a days worth into mixbook. I see how many pictures I want to put onto 2 pages and then select a layout based on that number of pictures that best for the rotation of the photos. However, I usually have to size, move, and sometimes add more photo boxes.
I also now always add a text box about what I remember from the day, especially weird humorous encounters. Not all of my photos are pretty landscapes and posed family shots. I like lots of action shots - like our group hiking from behind. And also get things like pretty landscaped flower boxes. I even tend to put in things like our hotel and us getting off the shuttle bus or sitting miserably in an airport after the fifth delay. I also add the stickers and cute captions. I thought Shutterfly had more stickers to choose from, but the ones in mixbook worked great with my latest book. And it was easy to import a couple of my own.
I got the non glossy version and I sized it up. I thought it would be the same size as my Shutterfly, but it’s bigger. It must be 11x14 vs 8.5x14. But I love it. The quality of the book feels great.
Great hints! It’s good that you add text. My husband, who like Blurb (works well with his Lightroom photo app), made the first book or two without text. With my encouragement, he has started added text. That is helpful for our memory down the road but also as we show the photo books to friends.
Same here. My first books in 2013-2014 I didn’t use text. It’s just not the same. They are still nice, but it’s nice to have the memories attached to the photos.
I also used to have the kids create their own. It was interesting to see what pictures they chose to use and remember vs me.
My husband does lovely front and backcovers. When he opts for hardcover the spine title is very helpful (we store on bookshelf)… three examples:
First time I’ve seen this post, but I agree Shutterfly ruined a good thing. We called to complain and the customer service rep actually told us to write a formal complaints. Of course, they have all my pics now and it’s hard to switch.
Son had such fun looking through photos of our visits to Seattle while he was here this week. So I decided to make him a Seattle calendar as a surprise - spent several hours selecting and editing photos.
Then I tried out Mixbook - they had a code on their website for 50% plus 10% off plus free shipping “today only” (perhaps today only, one never knows). The calendar ended up costing $18.83 total, which I think is pretty good, and should arrive just in time for his birthday. The software was fairly easy to use although I didn’t put anywhere near the effort in design that I did with photo albums in the past. I thought of this late last night, and my objective was to get it done today. If it turns out well, I can use the company if I ever decide to make another album.
I don’t think I ever posted on here, but I did use Mixbook to make a girls weekend album back in the fall. Was easy to use - I liked some features here better than shutterfly, but some features were better on shutterfly too! Overall, my book here was a fast one - didn’t spend as much time as I normally do fussing with layouts and backgrounds. But the book did turn out great.
I did go back to shutterfly to order an older book and other gifts for the holidays. Need to complete a couple more books - will likely try mixbook again.
@Marilyn I’ve been loyal to Shutterfly making photo “memory books” for my best friend(s) and for myself when we travel (I’m the unofficial documentarian) until 2019 when Mixbook popped in with a coupon I couldn’t resist (I love a good bargain). The books came and they were super (I was prepared to dump 'em and go back to Shutterfly), and I ended up using Mixbook again.
My 2 longest known best friends & I have a holiday tradition that spans the length of our friendship (47 years in January) - a calendar. This year I branched out and made them each one (on Mixbook!) of the “best” watercolor paintings I did this year (with the ones they liked best on their birthday month pages). They were about $20 each, and I was trepidatious, especially whether they would be flimsy or cheap feeling/looking - I will say they came, and I am delighted! I’m not sure if I’ll ever go back to Shutterfly. They were great, but so far I’m impressed with Mixbook. I don’t think you’ll be disappointed. Sounds like you and I got the same deal.
Made a list of 22 things to make me happy for the coming year (thanks, abasket!) and one of them is to keep current on photographs! I struggled for the last 3 days with Shutterfly, then read MADad’s recommendation to use Mixbook. THANK YOU!!! So simple for even a tech challenged person like me. I am all caught up and ready for the coming year!
That’s impressive!
I’m bumping this up, because my question doesn’t deserve it’s own thread.
Because of this thread, I switched to Mixbook from Shutterfly. I’ve done a couple of books and thought they were great. However, I spent a LOT of time (probably at least 25 hours) on our Christmas vacation book. It was a very special trip for me, and this is my memory book and souvenir. I checked everything over many times.
Last week, I got the book and several of the pages look cropped or off center. On one page, a line of text was cut in half. Nowhere on the computer did I have an error message that anything was too close to the border to print. On another page, I had lace corner stickers added. One one side, they were partially cut off, the other side there was ~1/4-1/2" gap from the edge. So I took pictures and complained. Mixbook happily said they’d send me a new one for free. Yay!
And so I just got the new one in the mail. No text is cut off, though on one page it goes RIGHT up to the edge. But many (probably 1/3 of the 57 pages) the pages are just crooked. Most aren’t horribly so, but when you have several pictures with borders all aligned and the edge gap just grows/shrinks across the page, it is obvious to me.
Would you complain again, or just let it go? The book was $100 even after all the coupons. But now I have two semi-decent books. Ugh. I would have thought after I complained they would have take more care with this one. I’m just really disappointed with it. This was supposed to be my best book ever. 
$100 is a lot of $$ for a photobook - assuming you had a lot of pages.
Still, you have a product you are unhappy with. I would reach out and tell them exactly what you are saying - after 2 attempts your book is still not acceptable. If this is the best product they can give you, you’d like your money back.
Clearly you are not likely to go back to Mixbook after this. So they can either try and keep a customer…or not. But I personally would at least have the 2nd time discussion.
As you said, you had a lot of time invested in the book yourself. To get a less than perfect product.
Now that Costco photo is gone and Shutterfly took over their access… any tips for using Shutterfly?
Artifact Uprising is pricey but gorgeous, especially if you like to fiddle with everything. For everyday printing of simple formats, we use a SF small business called Social Print Studio
It is 57 pages. I think Standard is 20? There’s a lot of text with the pictures. It’s like a diary or a scrapbook. I just wanted it to be perfect and now it makes me sad.
But I also hate to be confrontational and H says 2 books for the price of one is good enough. I may call this time.
But I also don’t want to return it, because there is no way I would recreate it somewhere else.
I can’t imagine they would ask you to return it! You can clearly send pics showing the errors with it. And it would be odd for them to ask for a personal item like that to be returned!
Thanks. I probably will call tomorrow. Hopefully my voice will be a little better. I measured the first page. It’s a solid 0.15” off from one side of the picture to the other. The first page! But it’s also been a crummy month and I’m wondering if my disappointment also isn’t magnified because of that.
I would call customer service and say you want the book done correctly. I doubt they will ask you to return the photo book you have now as shipping costs money and it has no value to anyone else. Plus you have been inconvenienced by their errors.
FWIW when a photo book I ordered from Shutterfly was not quite right they asked me to send them pictures of a couple of pages that had the problem and then they re-did it with no issue.
I am very happy with Shutterfly. I’ve been using them for years. I take advantage of all the promos. I’ve given relatives all kinds of goodies, but I really stick with it for the photo books.
There have been a couple of mishaps. The screwed up a large photo book order once. I took photos of all and they immediately replaced everything, which came two days later. And a couple of times I have had trouble with promo codes. I call, they add the promo code to my account, and the codes work.
I’m sticking with Shutterfly.
