How to Create Your Own Wedding Photo Album on a Budget

Traditionally, married couples will showcase and preserve precious images from their big day in a photo book. Thanks to modern technology, printing companies can create a photo book in minutes, but what if you’re on a budget? Can you still get a beautifully designed photo book?

Yes, but that isn’t the only way you can enjoy your photos. Whether you want to print a photo book or design a photo album from scratch, there are inexpensive ways to do both.

A photo book is a book that’s carefully bound and includes photos that are printed on paper. There are two ways to design your photo book: hire a graphic artist or design it yourself by processing all photos with the photo layer editor.

Not all of us would consider ourselves creative, and that’s okay! If you know you want your own wedding photo book, but you’re not sure if you can create one yourself, we recommend trying a service like Mixbook. Sites like Mixbook allow you to make photo books using templates.

However, you’re not just limited to the colors and designs on do-it-yourself photo book websites. You can mix and match hues, fonts, and photo sizes until you create a photo book that best represents your wedding day. You’ll receive your photo book in the mail in a few business days.

Hiring a freelance graphic artist can be pricey, but you may want to go that route if you want something specific. But an online photo book service should give you what you’re looking for.

If you don’t want to use templates, that’s also okay as long as you’re competent with Photoshop and photo editing software. You could design your photo book and send it off to a printing company, but a high-quality printer can save you time unless you want your book bound.

We recommend using 8.5 x 11 photo albums, as it’s the most commonly used paper size. Either slip your finished designs into a photo album or bind the paper together with string and a hard leather or wood cover. Protecting your album with plastic sleeves will make it last longer.

Unlike a photo book, a photo album takes a scrapbooking approach. Since none of the photos are printed directly onto the page, you’ll need a bit of creativity to make your album shine.

After receiving your photos from the photographer, you can get them professionally printed and glossed so they look great in a high-quality lay-flat style album. You can fill the entire album with photos and/or place photo-size memorabilia or objects to spruce the album up a bit.

Since this approach is the most minimalistic, we recommend splurging on the photo album cover. You’ll want to select a cover that offers a lot of protection, like leather or thick plastic. Get your cover custom-made if you don’t want to use a simplistic design, color, or pattern.

If you really want to flex your creative muscles, try scrapbooking. A scrapbook photo album will cost about the same as a plastic album unless you want to purchase scrapbooking paper. But it’s better if you stick with items from your wedding, like dried flowers, to fill up your album.

A scrapbook also gives you the chance to tell your entire couple's story up until the wedding. For example, you could grab old tickets, love notes, or photos of each other when you were dating and engaged. You could also use maps and circle locations where you’ve both been.