What photos do you put in digital photo albums?

[Anonymous]

There was a thread recently about the best sites for creating digital albums.

I am wondering how people make albums. Do you make a digital album for one event - e.g., 5th birthday party or summer beach trip - or do you make an annual album? Do you just throw some pictures together and let the website make the album for you? Any suggestions on good blogs or DIY posts on how to make a cute digital album?

I guess some of this assumes that you actually like to fool around with pictures and have time to do so. But, I am often pressed for time and find myself staying up late for several nights to get an album together. I have mixed feelings about it. It's sort of fun to go through photos, but there are also many other things I could be doing instead (sleeping for instance . So, I guess any organization tips welcome, too.

[Anonymous]

Digital albums are such a nice idea, but we really prefer physical books to page through. And really--who needs more than 2-3 pictures to remember a birthday party, anyway?

I hate putting together albums, and rarely have time. We try to do one every year, though. I prefer bigger albums--even 40 pages isn't so fat for a photo book.

Every time I download pictures from my camera (or phone, or whatever), i upload the best of them to the photobook site we use. Then when I'm getting ready to make the book, I have all the pictures right there waiting for me. Usually takes me another month or so to actually place them all on pages, but I am able to convince myself to actually do it because the worst of the legwork is already done.

You could probably use a similar process to create digital albums, and then combine for an annual physical album.

[Anonymous]

I would flag photos that you like. Not sure, which system you use, but I have a Mac and use iPhoto. It's easy to crop, remove red eye, etc. which you really should do if you're going to bother putting them into an album. Then upload them to whichever album maker you choose.

You can do this piecemeal as you have the time. Also, I know someone who assembles all her different albums through out the year, then waits for the site's sales to have them printed out.