Here is everything you need to know about designing albums with us!
The simple truth is that we photograph with the album in mind…meaning some of the shots we take we envision being placed a certain way in an album. A professionally made album is a beautiful heirloom that you will treasure for many many years. If you can put it in your budget, we highly recommend an album. While digital files and prints are very nice to have, we consider that albums are our real final products.
It’s one of the most beautiful way to present photos and there is something very special about tangible products that you flip through and relive the memories of the beautiful day!
Here is the truth: albums are expensive to make and thus are expensive! There are two elements that make high-quality wedding albums expensive: labor and manufacturing cost.
Just like many other customized products/services, the majority of the cost of making albums are labor cost. It can take a very long time to get to the final product starting from clients picking photos to be included in the album, designing the first draft, gathering feedbacks, revising the design, ordering the album according to the design and etc.. It’s an iterative process that can take several weeks/months to finish.
Depending on the studio and type of album offered, wedding albums range from a few hundred dollars to several thousands of dollars – And, yes, you absolutely get what you pay for. A common mistake we see brides make is settling on simply checking off a box on a photography package that includes an album – but remember, not all albums are created equal.
The modestly priced wedding books are press printed books similar to what you can order directly from, Blurb, Shutterfly or even through Apple’s iPhoto software – The books are great for what they are… simple books that make for great do-it-yourself family albums. The pages are thin, similar to a magazine or glossy paperback and printed using a four-color printing method and the cover choices range from soft covers to hardback with a dust jacket to a printed hardback. The colors will fade and the paper tends to deteriorate over time as well. There is little to no protection from the elements.
The more expensive albums are generally produced using actual archival photographic paper, some with metallic finishes. The spreads are usually seamless with a lay-flat binding design so when you open the book, you can see a panoramic shot of your ceremony go across the table… seamlessly. The pages are thick and sturdy giving the album a luxurious feel and make the page feel substantial. The covers come in a variety of finishes from genuine leather to silks to aluminum to acrylics and many more. The pages can be ordered with a protective coating to protect the book from the elements and most manufacturers guarantee their albums with a lifetime warranty.
We take great pride in every single book we produce… Usually spending several hours/days on the design alone. This does not include the countless hours for image selection and approvals. Once the design is complete, we send it off for approvals and take care of the final edits requested by the bride and groom.
Of course, you can! There are many services like Blurb, Shutterfly and etc. that allow you to make your own album.
To really create high-quality albums like the ones we offer, we (photographers) really need to master how to use album design software, purchase licenses for the software, do multiple rounds of color calibration/test printing to ensure that prints will come out great with the album company we are using and etc..
Moreover, these high-end albums that we offer are produced by companies who do not sell directly to the general public and hence are not available to the DIY audience. There is no product that we know of in the consumer market that can compete with these high-quality albums. This means that while a DIY bride can design and produce an album on her own, the end result will never equate to a well-designed luxe album from the studio. The base cost of these books tends to be much, much higher than the standard DIY books.
For us, these albums are meticulously designed from cover to cover, through to every single page, showcasing the story of your beautiful day in the most expressive and meaningful way possible. The end result (if done well) is a custom piece of art created just for you and your future generations to enjoy… This takes time, effort and talent to produce.
While it’s true that making albums can be very easy and you can probably do it somewhere online where you can drag and drop photos into various pre-defined templates, I am pretty sure that the designs that we offer are far more superior than those created using template-based web application. In recent years, there has been huge progress in album design software that allows photographers to quickly explore various layouts using a various group of photos in a very sophisticated way enabling us to create beautifully crafted albums that tell great stories.
We offer high-quality flush-mount wedding albums! Flush mount albums originated as high-end wedding albums that were custom made by boutique binderies. These ranged in price from several hundred dollars to thousands. Flush mount albums differed from regular photo books (press books) by being hand mounted on a thick inner substrate with real archival photographic paper, thus giving the book many desirable characteristics including:
We offer two tiers of flush mount albums:
They are both high-quality lay-flat flush mount albums but Premium albums offer better print and album quality plus there are many more cover options. Text Debossing is only available for premium albums. We can do “Painted Text” on Standard Albums though.
The design for getting discounted albums is described here.
Yes, we do! We offer good discounts at the time of booking. Occasionally, we have sales events (but it’s not certain when will we have one). Please note that we are offering full service when you are purchasing albums at full price — we will be revising the designs until you are completely satisfied.
For discounted albums, there are certain limitations. Basically, we allow two rounds of revision, small changes (add/remove/replace photos on each spread without disrupting the spread) on each spread and any request for additional designs must be requested during this phrase. You will need to make a non-refundable partial payment of the album when you initiate the design process. Also, to take advantage of discounted pricing, we are only accepting payment online via ACH / Quickbook or personal check — we won’t be accepting credit cards. The design process for discounted albums is described here.
It is likely that you will get the most discounts if you purchase albums at the time of booking. Usually, you will be able to finalize albums and still get discounted pricing before your wedding date. After the wedding date, we may not be able to offer discounted pricing — this will depend on whether we will be having album sales or not.
If you are getting a discounted albums, please refer to the design process and your wedding agreement. Usually, we will keep your original RAW images for 1 year after your wedding date, since designing albums require further processing some of your photos, we may or may not be able to design an album for you after 1-year anniversary date.
Approximately 4 weeks after we place the order (in addition to the time during the design phase)
Yes, we do! Please check the album brochures and pricing sheet for info. The most economical option is to get the 6×6 parent albums but this has to be the exact same design as the main album. If you are looking for larger albums, we offer additional discounts if you decide to get standard or premium flush mount albums as parent albums, please inquire us about pricing for these options. The most economical option will be if you are getting the same design as the couple’s but we can also partially use certain pages (and get discounted pricing for these pages) from the couple’s album and design new pages for parents.
This will depend on various factors including the number of photos you end up having from your wedding, what are you planning to include in the album itself and etc.. Read our guide here.
Actually, if you would like to get discounted pricing for the albums, you are required to pick “must-have” photos. Please refer to the design process for the requirement. For full-service design, we are more than happy to help pick photographs for you!
Definitely, here are some of our recent designs.
Of course, you can! If you are purchasing albums at full price (for full service), we will continue to revise the design until you are completely satisfied with the outcome. For the discounted album, we allow you to make changes by adding/removing/swapping photos in each spread after the first design is delivered. You may request to add additional spreads after receiving the first design, but the full list price (per spread) will be charged.
If you are purchasing albums at full prices, you will make the full payment when we are placing the album order for you. For discounted albums, note that there is a non-refundable partial payment.
If you haven’t got one already, please kindly email us.
© 2026 Nat Wongsaroj Photography · Washington, D.C. · Available Worldwide
