Fundy’s Everything Albums – How to Design High End Albums Quickly

Two weeks ago, with ALTf, we discussed how we create, simple, clean, high end designs. ALTf spoke about how he chooses a main image for a layout and then adds complementary images to that layout, to draw focus to that main image. At Left Turn Studio we do something similar. I’d like to take this opportunity to show you how we create our designs. We target an elite clientele that, we hope, is interested in classic designs that will hold the test of time. We want our albums to focus on the images over the design. We have a simple, methodical process that gives us consistent results. I’d like to share that system with you here. Caveat: this is our system and is in no way related to or approved by AltF.

Here I’ll be demonstrating by using my own Fundy Album Builder, but I hope that you can apply many of the same techniques using the album design program of your choice.

  1. I organize my album by separating images into folders named with page numbers. Here you can see my folder structure. I simply have a group of folders zipped together and I unzip a group every time I need to do an album design. You can download my folder groupings here. In a folder, for example 02-03, I’ll only have the images that will go on pages 2 and 3. This saves me an incredible amount of time while designing because instead of being presented with 100 of my wedding favorites, I’m only presented with the images for that page.
  2. Next I choose the main image and decide where I want it to go on one of the pages.
  3. Then I decide on a layout for the remaining accent images.
  4. Finally, I decide on the treatment for each image. If I choose to go BW I’ll just select those images and batch apply my favorite BW action. If I want to do something more complex, I’ll pop out those images, do advanced retouching and return them to the layout.

I then simply repeat these steps until I finish the design. By following this simple workflow, I’m able to design very high-end looking albums without spending days on the designs. Here is an example:

First, I organize my images into a folder like this. This saves an incredible amount of time:

folders

Next, I go through each folder and design spreads. Now, when I open a folder, I’m only presented with images for THAT design. This little technique has probably cut my album design time in half.

folderofimages

Next, I choose the main image and design around it. All of these images are extremely strong and I went back and forth on whether to choose the bride or the couple as the main image. Here is the blank design before inserting images.

blanklayout

Now I’ll add the images.

filledlayout

In my final stage, I’ll change any images to black and white or run any special actions on them. I’ll use my action palette for this. Here is a screen shot of how this is accomplished in my own software. Many other programs allow something similar.

retouchoption

I’d like to thank my studio partner Kevin Focht, creative director of Left Turn Studio and Left Turn Creative, for use of his images. I hope this helps you in your workflow. We want to spread our love of album design and of making albums an integral part of our studio.

If you want to play around with the Fundy Album Builder we have a free 14 day trial you can download here. For more learning I teach an album design class in conjunction with PPSOP and Adorama.

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