Matted albums used to take hours to design, and they always had to be designed using boring templates or tedious software. That has completely changed. Now you can design a matted album without templates in just 15-20 minutes. Learn to design matted albums from these three album companies that are breaking all the rules.
You can design the albums below just like you would a standard flush mount album, then let the album company do the hard work for you.
GraphiStudio Matted Book
This gorgeous Italian-made book is affordably priced and is probably the easiest album to design. Simply put a thin black stroke around every photo and the automated mat cutter cuts an opening for every image. All you need to do is follow the spacing rules to make sure you have enough space between photos, as well as the edge of the page.
For a complete step-by-step, see this blog post.
Finao NextONE
This is a hybrid matted album, meaning that you can mix flush mount pages with matted pages. Your images can even bleed to the side of this matted album. Finao has taken an easy technical approach: if your photos are far enough apart from each other or the edge of the page there will be mat. If not, it will look like a flush mount album. So how does the mat cutting machine know? Right before export, Finao has you place a bright pink/purple color as the background so you know exactly where the machine cuts the mat.
For a step-by-step, please see this blog post.
Queensberry Matted Album
Queensberry albums are made the classic way – by hand. You can design your album in Fundy, export the spreads as JPEGs, and send them over to Queensberry. They will then transfer your design into the proper version for their mat cutters, and begin the process. These albums are made with immense attention to detail, and are proven to stand the test of time.
Mats Made Easy
The only real difference between designing a flush mount album and a matted album is the spacing requirements. If the mat between photos is too thin they can tear over time. So pay attention to the spacing specifications, set up your album according to the instructions, and soon you will be able to design a matted album in the same time it takes you to design a flush mount album.
