How do I start?

I get this question often when first talking to people about Heritage Makers. They have a difficult time with the idea that they can make their own hardcover, professionally-published books with their own photos and as much text as they want to enter.

The website has tutorials that explain the process but I suggest organizing your photos first. Whether you have to scan them into your computer or download them from your camera, put them in folders on your computer that are easy to access. For instance, I had a vision of the family book I was going to do on my grandparents.

I scanned the old photos and made folders of them reflecting my vision. I would start with the town, then my grandmother's family, then two pages on my grandmother. I put all the town photos in a folder labeled "town." Then, since my grandmother's maiden name was Aenis, I labeled her family's folder "Aenis." You get the picture.

Now, if I were going to make a book about myself, and if I had enough photos, I would make folders of ranges of years. For instance, "birth to 2".

It depends on your vision for the book, but breakdown your photos into folders that have no more than 20 pictures - the fewer, the better. In fact, when I helped a client with a copy of her scrapbook, she had scanned each scrapbook page and saved the file as a page number. I created a separate photo album on the Heritage Makers website for each page. For instance, Page One of the scrapbook became Page 1 Photo Album. This helped me to put her Heritage Makers book together in the same order as her original scrapbook, which I did not have in front of me. Even though I ended up with 45 Photo Albums of one photo each, it saved me a lot of time when I put the project together.

Then after you have the organization on your computer, upload those folders into the Heritage Makers photo albums with the same title. This is quite easy. You first create an album title, then you click on Create, then the website takes you to a place where you can browse your folders to find the ones you want to upload to the Heritage Makers website.

If you have any questions, feel free to contact me at 920-203-3610 or email me at cadargevics@yahoo.com.

Blessings,
Carolyn
http://www.astorytohold.com/