Blurb's Return Policy

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If your Blurb book was damaged in shipping or has a production defect (like banding or improper binding) Blurb will replace it. Simple email them a picture of your problem to start the process.
There are a number of things that can go wrong that Blurb can’t cover, which you can control by carefully checking a file before you upload it.
Here’s Blurb’s Return Policy.
Blurb guarantees your satisfaction with the workmanship of your book. On the off chance your book arrives damaged or with a manufacturing defect, contact us via Blurb’s Customer Support within 14 days of receipt. We’ll make things right. Please understand that Blurb does not provide refunds or cancel orders, and except for the cases expressly described in this return policy (i.e., your book arrives damaged, with a manufacturing defect or a defect in workmanship), Blurb cannot otherwise accept returns.
Please note that each book you order from us is individually made by one of Blurb’s top-notch professional book-printing partners. There may be minor differences across different prints of the same books and/or across books printed by our different book-printing partners, including, but not limited to, slight variances in color fidelity and binding type. While we work very hard to keep our product as consistent as possible, this variation is a normal occurrence and is not considered a manufacturing defect or a defect in workmanship and does not qualify for a reprint.
When Purchasing Your Own Book
Your book is all yours: Blurb does not proof, edit, or change your content in any way. This means it’s your responsibility to review your book before you publish, and fix:
– Typos, grammar, unfinished text, or other text errors
– Low-resolution images that may appear blurry in print
– Dark images that appear dark on screen (Blurb doesn’t lighten your images to match what you see on a backlit screen)
– Design issues, including book format, organization, style, color, and page layout
– Any other creative choices you made in Blurb BookSmart® or PDF to Book you want to revisit
We strongly recommend printing a hard copy of your book on your local printer for a final once-over. (You might ask a friend to look it over, too.) If you find changes you’d like to make, no problem. Just make them in Blurb BookSmart® or your original PDF to Book file, upload the revised book, and then order as many copies as you’d like.
When Purchasing a Book From the Blurb Bookstore
Blurb is not responsible for the quality of the content of any book in the Blurb Bookstore. Each book you purchase from the Blurb Bookstore is custom printed only upon your order, and we don’t warehouse books, therefore we do not accept returns or process refunds for any reason, except to the extent we guarantee your satisfaction with the workmanship of our books, as described above.
Learn more with my Bookmaking Lessons.
Learn more in my Fine Art Digital Printing Workshops.

Get Great Color in Blurb Books!

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X-Rite and Joe Brady offer this free 52 minute webinar on how to get great color in Blurb books.
video Step-by-Step Guide to Creating Your Book (37 Minutes)
Learn how to: create your book; work with photos, text, and layouts; upload your book; and more.
video Blurb BookSmart® Design Tips and Techniques (26 minutes)
For those who already know the basics of BookSmart, this intermediate session explores several design ideas you can use in your books.
video Using InDesign® to Make a Blurb Book (3:33)
A short three-minute introduction to using Adobe InDesign® to create compliant PDF files by using the Blurb PDF/X-3 Export Preset and the Blurb Templates.
Learn more with my Bookmaking Lessons.
Learn more in my Fine Art Digital Printing Workshops.

20% Off Books In Blurb's "Digital Photo Liberation" Month

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Make a Blurb book by July 31 and get 20% off. Blurb is declaring July “Digital Photo Liberation”. Liberate all those holiday/wedding/baby/you-name it photos locked away in your camera and on your computer. Set them free – get them out of the digital world and into the physical world – in a book made by you.
Simply type in the appropriate promo code at checkout.
–  USD $ coupon code: LIBERATION
–  GBP £ coupon code: LIBERATION1
–  EUR € coupon code: LIBERATION2
–  AUD $ coupon code: LIBERATION3
–  CAD $ coupon code: LIBERATION4
Learn more with my Bookmaking Lessons.
Learn more in my Bookmaking Workshop.

Blurb Volume Discounts

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With Blurb you can order one copy of your book or many. Volume order discounts begin on orders of ten or more copies of the same book. For orders of 1,000 or more, Blurb offers offset printing for better economies of scale. Your discount grows along with the size of your order.
What are the discounts?
10    – 199     10%
200 – 400    15%
401 – 999     Request a POD price quote here.
1000+          Request an Offset price quote here.
Find out more and get answers to these frequently asked questions here.
–  Do I need to order a proof book before I submit a volume order?
– Will my volume order books look like my proof book?
– How much is shipping?
– How can I get a price quote for a volume order?
– What is the total turnaround time for volume orders?
– Why do volume orders take longer to process?
– What are my payment options for a volume order?
Learn more with my Bookmaking Lessons.
Learn more in my Fine Art Digital Printing Workshops.

Blurb's Photography Book Now Contest

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Only two more weeks remain in Blurb’s Photography Book Now contest.
Blurb books must be submitted by 11:59 PDT July 15.
Categories include Fine Art, Editorial, and Portfolio.
The Grand Prize is $25,000.
Jurors include Darius Himes, Monica Allende, David Fahey, Michael Mack, Lesley A Martin, Susan Meisalas, Erin O’Tool, Martin Parr, Judith Puckett-Rinella, and Brian Smith.
Get the inside scoop from the jurors here.
What makes a winning photo book? Darius Himes (publisher)
Which photo books have been most influential? David Fahey (dealer)
What books should you read on a desert island? Brian Smith (photographer)
What are last year’s PBN winners are up to now?
Learn more about the the PBN Contest here.
Learn more with my Bookmaking Lessons.
Learn more in my Fine Art Digital Printing Workshops.

Blurb for Good – Make a book. Make a difference.

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Individuals, non-profits, and organizations of every size and stripe have raised awareness and funds for their causes with Blurb books.
You’ll enjoy many benefits when you join Blurb for Good.
An easy solution
No big budgets or massive production needed. Your expenses are merely the cost of a book, that’s it. We take care of the rest and give you everything you need to create, promote, and sell your book for your cause.
Fundraising mojo
Our Set Your Price program lets you name your book’s price and keep 100% of the profit for your cause. We do all the bookwork, from fulfilling orders to tracking donations and proceeds, to cutting checks and sending them your way. You’ll also get detailed revenue reports, including stats on books sold and the number of visits to your book detail page.
Contributions from Blurb
If you qualify, we’ll even pitch in with a charitable contribution for every book you sell. Simply apply to our charitable contributions program and we’ll pitch in with $1 for every book sold.
High visibility
Get the word out with free promotion tools like Blurb BookShow™, our new book preview widget, and Blurb book badges. Put your book in our Blurb for Good bookstore. And be eligible for our Staff Picks, features in our blog, and shout-outs on Blurb’s Facebook and Twitter pages.
A lot of flexibility
Print on demand means we print to order, one by one. No waste, no warehousing. Discounts to you start at orders of ten or more books. And if you’re thinking books by the hundreds, we can do offset printing for even better economies of scale.
So do some good and join Blurb for Good.
Learn more with my Bookmaking Lessons.
Learn more in my Fine Art Digital Printing Workshops.

Blurb's BookSmart – 10 Tricks to Impress Your Friends and Confound Your Enemies

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Looking for tips on how to use Blurb’s BookSmart software?
Chad Jennings provides useful tips on the Blurberrati blog.
Find 10 Tricks to Impress Your Friends and Confound Your Enemies here.
– Drag and Drop Images from Your Desktop
– Drag and Drop Images to a Page Thumbnail
– Hide Used Images
– Use Arrows to Nudge an Image
– Use Keyboard Shortcuts and Right-Click Menus
– Turn off Text Auto-Zoom
– “Copy and Paste Page Layout” is Your New Best Friend
– Paste Text to Match Style
– Save Headers and Footers Until Last
– How to be Considered for Staff Picks
Find 3 more tips in his updated post here.
– Lock Your Spreads Together
– Hang Your Virtual Shingle
– Show Unused Photos
Learn more with my Bookmaking Lessons.
Learn more in my Fine Art Digital Printing Workshops.

How To Make a Gorgeous Photo Book – Audio Excerpts

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I sat down and discussed many issues involving print on demand bookmaking with Brenda Hipsher of X-Rite before my recent Toronto Blurb Seminar – How to Make a Gorgeous Photo Book.
You can listen to three audio excerpts here on X-Rites blog.
Color Management and Bookmaking
Reproducing Black and White & Using BookSmart
Practical Uses for Blurb Books
Find books on bookmaking here.
Learn more about books with these online resources.
Learn more in my Fine Art Digital Printing Workshops.

Share, Promote, Sell Your Blurb Books

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Blurb offers a number of ways you can share, promote, and sell your books.
Once you print your book you can invite others to preview and purchase it, either with Blurb’s announce feature or with your own mailing list.
Blurb’s new widget allows visitors to preview your book online. You can show as much or as little as you like. You can install it on any webpage by copying the HTML code. The widget has one click social network sharing and purchase functions.
Keyword your book to make it easier to find your book on the Blurb store and on Google. All the text in your previews is Google searchable!
You can sell your book in the Blurb store. Anyone can find your books marked public. Only people you invite can find books you mark private. Blurb’s online service will track how many books are sold. You can even make a profit on your books by marking up the price and Blurb’s website will give you reports on your progress. Checks are sent to you monthly.
Blurb takes and fulfills orders for you. Alternately, you can order any quantity from them and take and fulfill orders yourself, which you’ll need to do if you want to sign or enhance (emboss, slipcase, include a print) your books, but you’ll have to pay for shipping twice (once to you and once to your customer).
Blurb’s combination of easy to use software and order fulfillment creates a combination of capabilities that’s unique among print-on-demand services.
Find my Blurb book Antarctica here.
Find out about my Blurb seminar May 15 in Toronto.
Learn more in my Fine Art Digital Printing Workshops.

Comparing Blurb's Quality to Offset

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In its few year history, Blurb’s quality has improved tremendously.
How does Blurb’s print-on-demand quality compare to standard web offset press quality? Blurb delivers better quality than most offset presses where careful attention is not paid to production. Blurb doesn’t meet the best carefully overseen offset quality.
Common problems with Blurb printing include printing dark with some shadow detail loss, inconsistent neutrality and graybalance, and slight banding. Blurb’s dot structure or line screen is average, which is somewhat coarse in comparison with the finest 300 line screen offset. Blurb offers slightly better saturation compared to offset, but not six color hi-fi offset. The problems you encounter with Blurb are all common problems with offset printing if it’s not carefully overseen, which is common.
Oversight is one of the challenges with print-on-demand paradigms. It’s not practical to proof a book of one. It’s not practical to proof it again six months later with the next order. It’s unrealistic to expect an extremely low volume run to compete with a high volume run. In a high volume run, time and materials are allocated to test press conditions, carefully proof content before final printing, and maintained during a run of hundreds or even thousands. That’s why offset runs are only cost effective if you’re making a lot of books and that drives initial costs much higher and per unit costs much lower. Blurb’s offers extremely low initial costs but higher unit costs.
The Blurb revolution makes some books, that otherwise might never have been made, a reality
So, how good is Blurb’s quality?
Good enough.
And getting better all the time.
Find my Blurb book Antarctica here.
Find out about my Blurb seminars in New York April 29 and Toronto May 15.
Learn more in my Fine Art Digital Printing Workshops.