Not the general printing mistakes — those apply to anything. These are the failures that happen because the object is a large hardcover with lay-flat spreads, and they are ordered by how often they occur.
1. Sizing up to fill the format
The commonest by a wide distance. An album feels like it should be substantial, so people choose 60 pages holding 240 images when they have 130 usable ones.
Padding is more visible here than in a magazine, because the format’s promise is that images run large. Half-empty spreads read as unfinished rather than restrained.
Fix: count usable photographs, divide by four, round down. Album page counts →
2. Faces on the fold
A portrait placed dead centre of a spread lands on the hinge. Lay-flat binding reduces the gutter; it does not remove the fold.
Fix: keep the subject off the centre line. Centred portraits are single-page images.
3. Choosing the format last
Square and A4 lay out completely differently, and every spread is built to the proportion. Deciding after design has started means starting again.
Fix: decide format before sending photographs. Square or A4 →
4. Full spreads that cannot carry the size
An A4 spread is roughly 16 inches wide and wants about 4,800 pixels. A compressed image placed there is soft across sixteen inches of paper, which is as visible as printing gets.
Fix: send originals as documents, and flag which images you want across a spread. Photo resolution for printing →
5. Not labelling anyone
Fine now, fatal in thirty years. An album is the format most likely to be inherited and the one most often made without a single name in it.
Fix: full names and years, at least on the key spreads. Albums as heirlooms →
6. Ordering one copy when three households want one
Recoverable for seven days after dispatch, while the files exist. After that, a second copy means starting again.
Fix: count the households before design starts, then ask for the extra copies on WhatsApp when the proof arrives. Copies of the same design cost less than the first and go out with it. A second copy for another household →
7. Giving a heavy album to someone who cannot hold it
A 100-page album on an elderly relative’s lap is tiring, and they will not say so.
Fix: smaller album, or a magazine. How heavy an album is →
| Mistake | Caught by |
|---|---|
| Sizing up | Us, before design starts |
| Faces on the fold | Us, at layout |
| Format chosen late | Nobody. Decide first. |
| Low-resolution spreads | Us, before printing |
| No names | Nobody. This one is entirely yours. |
| Too few copies | Arithmetic, seven days later |
| Too heavy for the recipient | Nobody but you |
Before any of the seven: ordering before the photographs exist
One problem sits upstream of the whole list, and it is specific to the occasions albums are made for. A wedding album is often ordered in the glow of the wedding — and the photographer’s edited files often arrive weeks or months later.
An order placed before the photographs are gathered simply waits. The designer can only start once the photographs arrive, so the Monday it was aimed at comes and goes, and the pressure moves to the moment the files finally land, which is when mistakes one, three and six are made in a hurry.
Gather first, order second. Get every file into one folder — the photographer’s delivery, the family’s phones, the guests’ best frames — and count it. Then choose the page count from a real number and order. The same applies to a family history waiting on a relative’s cupboard, or a baby’s first year waiting on the first birthday.
If there is a date to meet, work backwards from it with the photographs already in hand, not from the day you plan to start collecting them. Ordering for a fixed date →
What we catch and what we cannot
Files too small for their placement, counts that do not fit the size chosen, faces landing on the fold — all flagged before design, and again on the proof you approve.
What we cannot catch is whether the right people are named, and that is the one that decides whether the album survives being inherited.
Reading an album proof for these seven
A proof is where most of this list is caught or missed, and an album proof needs a different kind of attention from a magazine’s, because it is read in spreads.
Look at spreads, not pages. Turn your phone sideways or open the proof on a laptop, so each pair of facing pages is on screen together. A spread that looks balanced one page at a time can put two faces nose to nose across the fold.
Run your eye down every centre line. Twenty spreads, twenty checks, a minute in total. Anything important sitting on the fold is mistake two, found before it prints.
Count the thin spreads. Pages holding a single small photograph surrounded by space, one after another, are mistake one showing itself. Better to say so now than to own a book that feels stretched.
Read every name aloud. Silently, the eye corrects spelling; aloud, “Malhtora” sounds wrong. It is the only reliable check for mistake five’s quieter cousin, the name that is there but misspelt.
Nothing prints until you approve, and approving promptly keeps the album on its Monday. The design proof →
When the fault is in the parcel, not the design
Everything above is a decision. Occasionally something goes wrong that nobody decided: a corner crushed in transit, or a genuine printing fault.
Film the unboxing. A clear, unedited photograph or video of the parcel being opened, sent on WhatsApp or by email with the order number within 24 hours of delivery, is what a damage claim rests on. Without it there is nothing to check. For an album, the parcel is heavy and worth opening carefully on a table rather than in a doorway.
What happens then. We check it, and a genuine fault gets a free reprint, made within 48 hours and sent with the next Monday’s dispatch.
What a reprint does not cover. A typo in text you supplied, or a low-resolution photograph you sent, once the proof carrying it was approved — nor small natural variation in paper tone, or the normal difference between a backlit screen and ink on matte paper. Returns and refunds →
Frequently asked
What is the most common album mistake? Choosing more pages than the photograph count fills. Padding is more visible in an album than in any other format.
Why should faces not be on a spread’s centre? Lay-flat binding reduces the gutter but there is still a fold, and a face on it always looks wrong.
Can I change the format after ordering? Not after design starts. Every spread is laid out to the proportion.
How late can I order a second copy? Within seven days of dispatch, while the files still exist.
What can you not check for me? Whether the people are named. That decides whether the album means anything in thirty years.
Part of our guide to hardcover photo albums. See also: choosing an album cover and how to brief an album.
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