Homemade Album Vs Commercial

I have recently returned to stamp collecting and decided to make a change. I have always bought my albums, but this time I decided to make my own. Instead of always having a nearly empty album, now I have a full one and generally of the stamps that I really like. Here are a couple of my pages. I will gladly accept any suggestions and/or constructive criticism. The preview looked a little fuzzy. These are scans of my pages uploaded using Irfan View.

Very nice!!

Even though I don't make my own album pages, I prefer seeing home-made albums compared to commercial albums. There's variety and a personal touch to home-made albums that is completely missing in commercial albums. It's like the difference between seeing a museum stamp collection and an entry into a stamp show competition. The museum stamp collection may be impressive and contain stamps you will never own or may never see again, but the stamp show entry shows you not only the stamp/cover/history, but the heart and joy of the collector.

A collector is not complete without his/her collection. Likewise, a collection isn't complete without the collector.

Just a thought.

k

Yaakov "The chosen one"... Very nice. I too make my own album pages. Its nice when you have 3/4 of the pages full, versus 3/4 of the pages empty

Yaakov,

Uncluttered, clean pages with useful information below the stamp. Very nice!

What program do you use to make the pages? Making my own pages is something I've always wanted to try. I am computer literate but artistically challenged.

Dan

Very nice. Like Dan I've been thinking about doing my own pages and just got Adobe Pagemaker. I'm also interested in what software you use.

Wish I could post more, just back home from surgery and fading now, so have to get off. Probably shouldn't be here

Balf

I would have to agree with the others, Yaakov. The pages you've exhibited are very nicely done.

The beauty of a homemade album is that today, because of computers, it doesn't have to look "homemade" -- it can be easily of the same quality as the commercial albums in existence, and be very professionally done. The advantage is simple: only as many empty spaces as the maker wants there to be, as well as inclusion of the formats only he/she wants.

Take as a comparison to your pages those included in the Harris Liberty album, which seems to be the closest to what you're doing. Yours look much less clutted than the Harris version, and the stamps really "stand out".

I think that this really goes part in parcel with the one country album, but would be difficult to accomplish in a world-wide album situation, although anything would be an improvement compared to what is being currently offered in world-wide albums, where all they seem to have for illustration these days is a row or two of fairly recent stamps, and have only one page (or less) for most countries.

Taakov's page layout is very professional, and I admire the effort. When I returned to collecting about ten years ago I purchased the American Heirloom albums from Mystic Stamps. I've been very happy with them. Not only the layout, but I plan to pass them on to one of my grandchildren, and whichever one it is may not be too swift on stamps. The descriptive pages about the related stamps will be very helpful to whoever gets the albums. I know in many cases the descriptions helped me.
Allan

khj: Thanks and I agree with you. I guess I wanted to have a little control of what I am doing. I look at this as art in a way...always remembering that "a mistake well covered is art in its highest form." So now my album is more mistake proof by design.

bobgggg: Thank you also, I like not having to turn 20 empty pages before I get to a series that I want to show someone. Most people don't need to know how many stamps are missing between decades...LOL When you have time please post some of your pages if you haven't already. If you have please direct me to where they are posted.

danstamps54: Thanks. Believe it or not I am using an old version of CorelDraw. Now I am more involved with my collection. I have to think and plan all the time. It was really a good decision for me. I will be glad send you my template if you would like to take a look. E-mail me if you are interested.

MmmmBalf: Thanks. I am glad your surgery is over and hope you will be feeling better and able to post as often as you care to real soon. Adobe is the high end so you have better control and more options than I do. It also has a steeper learning curve, but well worth the hike uphill. If I collected other countries Australia would be at the very top. My son has noticed how beautiful Australian stamps are.

WpgLwr: Thanks. I collect US and my son collects everything else in the world. I suggested that he specialize if he wants to create his own album pages. Fortunately, I am able to spread out and re-arrange my collection to suite me. I have never really read about each of my stamps, but I am doing that now and including the information that I think is interesting.

abutt1: Thanks. I looked into American Heirloom and the Liberty. I was really close to buying the National Kit ($400+ from Amos), then I thought "how many stamps could I buy for $400?" I figure if I come across something unusual, I could break out my catalogs, research it, and if I like it, buy it, and create a page for it...LOL

I hope I didn't miss anyone...thanks again to one all.

One other thing...I decided to use my wife's scrapbook stickies and Showgards. I only have stamps on one side of the page. I really like how that is working.

Yaakov....from the Steiner album pages

That is very nice...what is "Steiner"? What program are you using to create your pages?

Superb pages!

I would love to have the time to do that. I'd probably be too lazy even if I had the time, but I'd like to find out.

Thank you. I say go for it....it couldn't hurt.

Steiner creates simple pages for all worldwide stamps. It's a good and inexpensive alternative to the professional album pages.

http://www.stampalbums.com/

Print on demand. Sheet music publishers have used it for years to survive. It's something that Scott should have done long ago. Now Amos is paying the price as they watch album sales drop like rock. Their solution, reduce their line of albums! Which turns away more album buyers, which reduces their sales, which reduces their album line, with turns away more album buyers...

k

Steiner's pages are VERY simple. But you can customize them with the right software. The attractiveness of Steiner's pages is primarily the completeness, low cost, and print on demand. Beyond that, the stamp layout is often far too cramp for my tastes. I like a larger separation between stamp rows, as that is where I often scribble my notes.

I like your pages better.

Thank you...I had not heard of Steiner pages. As my intro stated I am coming back after a 30 year absence so there are a lot of things I need to caught up on. It was far simpler in 1959 when I started collecting. Thanks again.

Yaakov - there are thousands of new stamp collecting related products to separate you and your money!