C.S. Lewis quote about Photo Books

This is definitely what will happen in the future.  When more and more photo books are made and more and more pages in each photo book this will be a reality.  In America though, we would probably say a cup of coffee. 

Imagine a photo book that C.S. Lewis would have made.  What a historical goldmine that would be!

Have you made your historical goldmine?  Do you like coffee or tea?

A bunch more photobook comics on our site! Click here!

Food A to Z: A New Photobook that will make your mouth water!

The other day I made a cool photobook on Silver Street Media about one of my favorite things! FOOD! I wanted to make the photos really ZING and I found them all on MorgueFile which came out really well. The printed content all came from Wikipedia (thanks!) which was really amazing to me since I had never thought that Wikipedia would have such inane entries like “APPLE” and “DONUT” but each entry is really fascinating because they use big scientific words to explain the most basic things that we take for granted. And actually even the most basic things like “FRENCH FRIES” and “NOODLES” have fascinating histories and back stories.

Anyway without further ado, here is our FOOD A to Z photobook! No drooling!

C is for Coffee: this one always makes me drool.

D is for Donut: I got hungry to I took a bite!

F is for French Fries: So bad but oooh so good.

M is for Milk: so good with a warm chocolate chip cookie.

N is for Noodles: So popular all over the world.

I had trouble though with letters Q and X.  My colleagues laughed at some of my suggestions!  Can you think of food starting with those letters?!  Comments and questions just post them below!

Father's Day: Does your dad like Baseball? This is the PERFECT GIFT!

If your dad likes baseball this is the perfect gift for him for Father's Day!

From his 1856 introduction to the then new game of baseball, Henry Chadwick became one of the prime movers in the rise of baseball to its unprecedented popularity at the turn of the 20th century. A newspaper reporter and a keen amateur statistician, he helped mold the public perception of the game, as well as providing the basis for recording team and player achievements in the form of baseball statistics.


Chadwick's many contributions to the game also included the cryptic method in which he recorded plays (the forerunner to today's scorecard) and the acceptance of the fly ball rule. Teaching by example, Chadwick's The American Game of Baseball includes early plays and players to illustrate the rules and the nuances of the sport. With these glimpses from the early days of baseball, The Game of Baseball is more than a manual. Iit is a uniquely important piece of sports history. Originally published in 1868. This facsimile edition is a must for baseball aficionados everywhere. Henry Chadwick (October 5, 1824 – April 20, 1908), often called the "father of baseball," was a sportswriter, baseball statistician and historian.

At Silver Street Media we've digitized this book and made it available again for all those who are die hard Baseball fans or those who are history buffs.

You can order the book on Amazon for the Kindle for your techie Dad or in hardcover for a more classic Dad!

Photobooks in the news: Don't Leave your Photos on the Computer!!

I scan the web for all things and everything about photobooks.  Recently I came across a great article from Dublin, Ireland on an online paper called The Independent and it was a great post about advice for taking family pictures and in particular about photographing kids.  The author, Bernice Mulligan, talks to a professional photographer who really shows her expertise when she mentions a specific piece of advice:

"When you’re photographing children, you have to remember the main law: ‘kids rule’.  When I’m photographing my daughter I stop when I can see she’s getting tired or bored. I don’t want her to get fed up of me taking pictures of her, so if she’s not in the mood, I don’t force it.”

I can totally identify with this because I'm constantly taking photos of my 3 year old son for a couple photo books that I'm making at the moment.  There's a length of time that he will smile, there's a finite period of time that he will act goofy for the camera, and when I reach that moment, heaven and earth will not make him pose the way I want again. 

The main reason though I wanted to point out this great article is because at the end the professional photographer gives a great piece of advice.  She mentions that the photos you take shouldn't be left on the computer. 

"Don’t leave your photos on the computer! I like to make storybooks of my pictures.  They look like coffee table books and are actually very reasonable these days. Instead of hanging millions of pictures on your walls, they’re a great way of having your favourite pictures there in front of you to leaf through.  A photobook can also make a lovely present for somebody.  You’ll find loads of online companies offering the storybook option. Just download the software to design the book yourself, and then they will print it and send it back to you. It’s great fun, completely addictive and a gorgeous thing to receive in the post."

Great advice.  I've had the situation too many times where I fire up the old computer to show people the photos I took last summer on my trip only to find out that the computer is so slow and they've lost interest after I find a virus on the hard drive and decide to scan for more.  ARG!

The other great idea she has is to make storybooks out of her pictures.  This starts many ideas running through my head!

If you have seen some articles out there about photobooks or photos or books post them in the comments because I'd love to read them! 

Photobook: Gould's Sugar House in Shelburne Falls, Massachusetts

I put this photobook together using Silver Street Media’s software, it took about 2 hours to get the layout just right.  I wanted to make sure that the pancakes were really accentuated; and they were good!!  I was really looking forward to getting it back, and wasn’t disappointed – the book looked great!  Loved how the paper made the printing pop, but was a little upset about the font style I chose.  Next time, Bold.  The entire package screamed quality pancakes.  This will be great on my coffee table!

This is the cover.  I wanted to shock people with the deliciousness of what they serve at Gould's.  I get hungry everytime I look at it!

Those are my fingers!  There's the pancakes all ready to go out to the customers!

I thought maybe all the employees would not like me taking photos but they were ok with it.  I got this great sequence of the cook pouring the batter.

There are so many fun pictures in the photobook because there are so many fun things to look at over at Gould's!  These are just some of the pages that I wanted to show you all!

So the front cover was the full pancake... this back cover is almost done!  So delicious and the photobook is such a great memory!

Want to know which company I used to make this photobook?  Go to our ABOUT page here.

20 Things you can get for Mom on Mother's Day: a Photobook

Come to SilverStreetMedia.com to make your mom a photobook!

I dare you to make a photobook!

“I want to issue you a challenge.”


“Uh oh.” I said.

“No no, just listen. I want to challenge you to make a photobook.”

“Oh, that doesn’t seem so bad.” I replied.

“I want to challenge you to make a photobook about your life. Your whole life. All the things that are great. All the things that are bad. All the people who mean something to you. All the people who have affected your life.”

“Oh.” I said. “That sounds a bit challenging.”

“Imagine years later when you look back at the photobook that you will create, imagine that you can look back at the time right now and see what was really important to you, see who was really important to you, see what you were going through right now.”

“Yeah, like a time capsule.” I mentioned.

“I challenge you to do this. You won’t regret it.”

“Ok. Where do I start!” I am excited now to get started. I started writing down ideas of who I would take a picture of and who I would include in the book. It was time to get creative!

How about you?  Is it time to get creative and make the photobook!?

7 Reasons Photobooks are better than Photo Albums

1. No Glue! Yeah, that’s right. You don’t have to glue anything when you make a photobook. Nice right? You won’t even have to worry about pages of the photobook sticking together like photo album pages sometimes do.

2. No re-arranging photos. Has this happened to you before? I used to do this all the time. I’m a stickler for order. And after I put in tons of photos then I will inevitably find one that should be in the second page. ARGH! So I have to take all the photos out and then put the new photo in and then put them all back. So annoying! Not with photobooks though!

3. Compact size. When I pull my photo albums off the shelf my friends groan. Because it’s so huge and bulky and I have to sit for a break after getting it out. There’s a ton of photos in the back that nobody will understand so I tell my friends to skip those. So silly. Photobooks are so much more compact and easy to look at. Pull it off the shelf and toss it to your friends who won’t groan at all!

4. Easy to bring to show family. I have a big family. We’re spread out all over the country. I want to show them my photos but unless we all get together at the holidays I can’t do that. Photobooks are so versatile that you could make a photobook and send it to your family members. The original photos are safe at your home while the photobook speeds its way to your family members.

5. No difficult to read handwritten captions or notes. I’ve seen many photo albums. Some are really old. Some photo albums have captions. Some captions have been written by people who have great hand writing but some have been written by people who have crazy hand writing. Some of the young people can’t even read some of the writing of the really old captions. That won’t happen in a photobook since you can use a variety of fonts to write captions and notes.

6. Photos won’t fade. Have you seen a photo album where the photos have been in there for so long the photos have lost their color or have faded significantly? I’ve seen this too many times. But with a photobook you have to find a company that prints their pages on a good quality paper and the ink is some of the best quality ink.

7. Books won’t fall apart. I have a photo album at home that I don’t look at anymore. Why? Because if I touch it, it will fall apart. I would love to see those photos again but I can’t. Photobooks will never fall apart like this photo album I have.

Photo Book quote from St. Augustine

The world is a photo book.  This modern interpretation is exactly correct.  Actually when St. Augustine said this I think a book was only words and few pictures and of course not photos.  And one of the most popular things that people make a photo book for is their travels.  St. Augustine seemed to be talking about photo books way back when...

What do you think?  Have you made a photo book of your recent travels?  Have you travelled the world?
A bunch more photobook comics on our site! Click here!

My Birthday Month Photo Book

Every year in April I take photos of myself each day of that month.  April is my birthday month.  This is perfect for photo books because the month is 30 days and at Silver Street Media you need 30 pages to make good sized photo book.  I mean you don’t need that many but they say that is the best size, more is fine but 30 page is a good number.

I’ve been doing it for a few years now.  Call me vain but it’s fun and it keeps my creativity going.  I’m a graphic designer so I also try to spruce up the shots using Photoshop.  I add other pictures to the one photo and also some words or squiggles that I heard that day or felt that day.

I also include pieces of news that happened that day.  It’s a great way of remembering what was happening the month of birthday on that particular year. 

Tell me what you think?  Is this vain or self important?