However, there are some people who are more than satisfied in having a digital version of their photo book that can be shared with others more easily. While some online photo book builders allow for this, what you may not know is that thanks to Microsoft Office the digital photo book of your dreams can be put together surprisingly quickly and effectively. PowerPoint might not be as robust as a bespoke tool for creating photo books, but you’ll be surprised at how achievable this is with the program.
A slideshow turned photo book
Whether you are a regular PowerPoint user or just someone who uses the software occasionally, it is a well-known fact that this software is the number one option when it comes to putting together a slideshow. It allows for important options like the ability to add pictures, text and funny embellishments, making it very doable to customize the appearance of the final photo book to your liking.
Sounds familiar, right? Indeed it should, since essentially photo book builders allow the same functionality; our fondest photographic memories are often accompanied by captions and colorful embellishments. As an unusual metaphor, these online builders can be interpreted as PowerPoint presentations printed out, before being made into a book with a cover and size of our choice.
Admittedly, comparing a physical photo book created in an online photo book builder to a digital slideshow is cheating a bit, but it’s true that using PowerPoint is more than enough to put together a ‘presentation’ customized in such a way to appear similar in layout and design to an actual photo book.
Now the real question is: how does building a photo book with PowerPoint work and does it hold up against specialized photo book solutions?
Creating the photo book with PowerPoint
From scratch
The easiest way of building a photo book with PowerPoint is to do it from scratch and then share the final masterpiece with others via email. Starting from Office 2007 all PowerPoint versions have a photo album icon, found under the “Insert” tab that – when clicked – opens a dialogue box, the soul of PowerPoint as a photo book builder.
With this box the program fetches all the necessary pictures from your computer – even from within folders – and lets you determine their order or appearance. Additionally, the chosen photos can be rotated, turned into black and white, and have their brightness and contrast adjusted.
Aside from these, the only remaining setup options are the number of pictures per slide, the frame the pictures are put in and whether you want to include captions or not. It’s good to know that the theme of the slideshow can also be chosen in this dialogue box, though it can be modified later on by going into the “Design” tab.
With a premade template
If you don’t fancy the default designs that come with PowerPoint, then there is always the option to get one from the 28 professional-looking templates from Microsoft’s website. One huge advantage of this option is that most templates can be downloaded to the computer and used with the desktop version of PowerPoint. However, in certain cases the templates can be used in PowerPoint’s online version as well, which saves presentations to OneDrive and provides the option to share the finalized slideshow with others right away.
To print or not to print?
Although PowerPoint will never provide the same customization options as an online photo book builder – since the program is not designed to be a photo book builder to begin with – it is still one of the best alternative methods to create a digital presentation in a photo book-like fashion.
However, when it comes to printing, professional photo book editors win by a mile: granted, it will cost some money, but being able to look back at your most cherished memories by flipping through a quality photo book is an experience that PowerPoint presentations can never compete with. It’s the binding, cover and quality paper that make a professionally printed photo book stand out, and it’s exactly that level of quality and finish that you can’t achieve with your home printer and craft materials. And if that’s not convincing enough, most photo book editors also provide the option to share your photo book digitally with others. Just like online photo book builders this gives you the chance to let others contribute to your photo book.
Zoltán G.
Adam B.
