I read something this morning which has prompted me to write a little post with my thoughts on the matter. I was going my usual SEO checks, and came across a website with a blog post titled "Wedding Albums are a waste of time." In case you can't really be bothered to read it, this is the paragraph that stands out for me.

"Isn’t it about time that we all threw in the towel and stopped trying to sell wedding albums to clients. The phrase flogging a dead horse comes to mind. Printed images are a thing of the past anyway and brides just don’t seem receptive to the idea of paying an extra £700 or so on top of the fees for photography anymore. Who can blame them - Wedding albums are finished"

I'm almost positive I'm not alone in thinking there is something unbeatable about a photographic print. Whether it's an A3 masterpiece in a gilded frame or a little collection of 6 x 4"s, the tangibility of touching them and showing them at ease to others is something irreplaceable.  

In our house or walls are full of printed photography - dodgy disposables from festivals, high quality prints of my wedding images, instant polaroids, tons of printed images for the last 5 years. Every time people come over they comment on how lovely it is to have them all on show and we often ending up reminiscing about things that we got up to, provoked by images that otherwise would be sat on my hard drive.  I Providing digital files is essential too because it's easy to share them with friends and family, they can be backed up multiple times and because you can then go on to order prints with ease yourself. However, in my opinion, your wedding photos are not meant to just sit on a the computer. They need to be displayed and cherished; now, on your first anniversary and many more times in the future 'till you're old and wrinkled.

The albums I use are a thing of such beauty and, compared to a lot of other alternatives, are affordable too. The albums are handmade by a company based in Somerset, and then have the photographs adhered into them by myself. This means they aren't printed pages like many albums and books, which gives the nostalgic element of vintage "proper" albums. 

Although this is just one, random post that I've found about the subject, I'm part of a group of photographers online who have discussed this recently, and found that many of them have seen a decrease in sales of their albums this year. On average about half my couples opt for the album; most saying that if they don't do it now they know they'll never get round to it themselves! 

What are your thoughts; are photo albums becoming obsolete or do we say long live the print?