Producing a photobook through Mixam (and learning how to use Adobe InDesign)

I decided that I wanted to create a photobook as part of my Final Major Project, I had a look at various companies, such as Lulu Book, Mixbook and Blurb, but found that they were either too expensive or were not able to print the book my desired size. After discussion with my tutor, I decided to use a company called Mixam. Through them I was able to print my book at a larger scale, on desired materials, and at a more reasonable price.

In order to produce my book through Mixam, I had to create the pages and cover of the book as to scale PDF’s. At first, I found this was a challenge as I hadn’t produced a photobook before in this way but decided I would create each page individually on Adobe Photoshop. This worked fine up until realising that I would need a bleed for the cover. After some research I realised that I would need to use Adobe InDesign to create the cover, as a PDF, with bleed. I had to learn how to use InDesign as I had not used it before, but after reading an online tutorial, I was able to teach myself how to use the rest of the functions in order to create the cover pages with the required bleed.

After three days of trial and error, using different systems and having to learn new software and techniques, I successfully created my proof and was ready to send my book off to be printed. After two tutorials with tutors to double check and proofread everything, I sent off my books for printing.