I'm planning to have some calendars made as gifts. I'm looking for something about 8-1/2 x 11, spiral bound, with a separate photo for each month of the year. Anyone have experience with these and a recommendation for an online lab that does a good job with them? I've used a copy center in the past, and last year I think I used Mpix. Looking for suggestions. Thanks in advance. --Russ
Russ, I'm in the same boat. I need some calendars made up, and downloaded the Mpix software, but I have questions, and they have no phone number, and don't seem to return any e-mails.
How did you like the quality of the Mpix calendars? Did you do full bleed on the images, or "matted" as default? Do you know the size dimensions of the "matted" version? What DPI is recommended? I wish Mpix would answer my questions....
(I sooooooo wish WHCC made calendars: you can actually CALL them and ask them questions....)
John: I can't answer your questions because I don't remember. It looks like the software has been updated, so the full-bleed vs matted might not have been an option last year. I'm sure I would have uploaded high-res photos, so 300 dpi. I'm sure I never communicated with their customer service.
Quality was good.
I've done a bit more exploring and it looks like Costco is another way to go. They have design options that actually allow for up to three photos per page. Looks interesting.
I've used www.lulu.com in the past, and although it was the cheapest I've found anywhere ($11.29+ship) the quality could be better. They're not full bleed, and the prints are not really photo quality, IMHO. My wife said this to me, also, as a casual observer...
I'd be interested in seeing what others have done. We were hoping to send out family calendars again this year but we are not sure from where.
I have used shutterfly and like them. They also have collage calendars that can hold multiple pics per page. Ebay shutterfly on ebay and you can get a coupon for five calendars for around $20. Shipping would cost you another $15.
My wife just did one at Kodak.com for our families it was 19.99 but you can search discount codes kodak on line and find 20% off too. The little books you can make there are super too.
I ordered a calendar from Vistaprint to try out, it's spiral bound and about the size you're looking for. All in all OK. The covers are a bit flimsy but paper is glossy and photo quality not bad.
Thanks to all for your input. For the moment, I'm giving Costco a try. There's some risk involved, but the options available are kind of neat. Not only are there different photo designs to be applied to each month (1-3 photos per page in various combinations of vertical and horizontal), but you also can put photos into individual days/cells of the calendar. Quite a bit more work to create than the basic one-photo-per-month calendar (I'm probably at close to 50 photos), but more fun as well. Most amazing is that it's $9.99 for 8-1/2 x 11.
