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October 7, 2008 |
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Created and Maintained by: The Photoimaging Information Council |
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As a nurse and a healthcare administrator, not much of my daily job intertwines with the world of photography. However as a new mother of a 2 month old baby boy, I can’t help but notice all the wonderful things you can do with pictures today. So of course when it came time to select Max’s baby announcements, I wanted to make personalized ones with a photo of my newborn, instead of sending out the same old 3x5 with a little blue border. I began by taking my photos to local printers and explaining exactly what I wanted. The quotes I received ranged from $250-$700 for 150 cards, which was a bit prohibitive for my budget. Instead of coughing up the extra dough, I hit the internet to see what the world of online printing could offer. My search was a bit frustrating at first. Google sent me to ‘online greeting card’ websites and not the ‘custom printed greeting card’ websites I was looking for. It took a few tries to get it right, but eventually I found several sites that offered printing services and greeting cards made from your photos. These sites varied greatly in their ease of use, turn around time, and cost per card. For my taste, I wanted a site that allowed instant gratification; a site that would allow me to design and preview the card immediately on line (which meant it had to be dummy proof to a non-graphic designer like me), would promise high quality printing, would allow me to pay for it all online, and would turn it around in under a week. I wanted color options for both the photo and the inside writing, and some funky options for dressing up the photo itself. I found all of this at www.ipads.com. When you jump on the site, you’ll find a wide range of products they offer, including 5.5x4.5 note size cards and 5.25 x7 standard size greeting cards. I selected the ‘create a greeting card’ option and the standard greeting card size. The next step was to select the photo. One of the great things about ipads.com is that they allow you to work from any type of file (PNG, TIFF, JPG, GIF, or BMP), so you don’t have to worry if the image is compatible with the software that the site utilizes. Another great option of this site is that they allow you to either upload your own photo, use a photo you’ve used previously, or select from one of their images if you’re just looking to send a quick card with a personalized note to a friend. I, of course, wanted to use one of my son’s photos and uploaded the chosen image. This part was pretty dummy-proof for me: all I had to do was click the ‘Browse’ button, locate the photo on my hard drive, CD Rom, or diskette and select the ‘Continue’ button. The site uploaded the photo, and even gave me the option to preview it prior to uploading to make sure the right photo was selected. If your image is on paper and is not digital, almost all photo developing shops will scan the image for you and store it on a CD or diskette for your use.  Choose Your Photos Next I had the options of cropping the photo. The site showed me a highlighted square over a portion of my image, which I could shift up, down, side to side, make larger or smaller, but it maintained the necessary proportions for the card automatically so that my finagling did not distort the image. After agreeing to the cropped image, I was directed to a screen where I was allowed to auto-correct, flip, or rotate the image, make it black and white, or add a multitude of special effects such as “angled strokes”, “diffuse glow”, or “watercolor”. I kept the image simple and sweet, and clicked the continue button once I was satisfied. © 2003 Jill Enfield The following screen allowed me to select a border for my photo and have writing on both the outside and/or inside of the card. I opted to keep just the photo on the outside and typed my son’s name, birthdate, height and weight, for the inside. Ipads allows you to select the color, font, and size of the text and then preview the card both inside and out. I selected a dark, rich gray, and a playful font. I needed to preview the card a few times and made adjustments to the font size until I was satisfied. Once done, I selected “Add to Shopping Cart” and that was it! I chose the # of cards that I wanted printed, entered in the billing and ship to addresses and my credit card information, and I had the cards within 5 business days. Labels Unfortunately Ipads won’t print your return address on the envelopes, but they do offer the option to print stickers that you can use for return address labels. The process is almost the exact same as the one for the card, including giving you the option to have a photo in the center of the sticker. I thought this added a true fun and finished look to the announcements and added a picture of my dog Georgia giving Max a kiss. In total, 150 high quality, full color photo cards, complete with return address photo labels, all taxes and shipping, cost me less than $250.  © 2003 Jill Enfield Outside Even if you don’t have a need for a large printing, Ipads gives you the option of printing just one card for just $1.99 plus s&h! (Most other sites I researched required minimum printings of 150-250 cards.) A personalized photo card from Ipads with whatever sentiment you want on the inside costs less than most Hallmarks today. I was very pleased with them and hope you will be with your photo cards as well! For more info on how you can get going on your photo personalized greeting cards, log onto Ipads.com. Have fun!
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