Unibind has kindly sent us their new PhotoBook Creator for review. With the Photobook Creator you can bind photographs, preserve and present printed documents and artistic creations within seconds.
Company information:
Below is a profile of Unibind that you can also find on their website.
Corporate Information:
MISSION STATEMENT
As an innovative company it's our mission to provide customer friendly premium products and services which contribute to the improvement of communication between people.
GOAL
To be a family company, recognized as the world leader in printed presentations.
To encourage professional development of our employees and business partners.
VALUES
Our main values are integrity, fairness, loyalty, accountability and respect for all human persons and the environment.
With a presence in over 100 countries, we provide our clients with a revolutionary binding system and a complete range of accessories for their presentation needs. Our binding, laminating and presentation products are the result of more than 25 years of research, development, and client feedback.
On the next page we will go over what's inside the package...
What’s inside the Package?
On this page we will take a look at what the Unibind PhotoBook Creator came shipped with.
Package Contents
Package Contents:
- Photobook Binding Machine
- 1 Black Linen Hardback Landscape Photobook (our review sample came with one extra Photobook)
- ArcSoft Collage Creator Photo Layout Software
- 90 day Manufacture Warranty registration card
- User Manual
Test machine:
For this review we will be using a computer with the following configuration:
Hardware:
- Motherboard: eVGA / Jetway 939GT4-SLI
- Processor: AMD Opteron(tm) Processor 165 @ 2.7GHz
- Memory: 2x 1Gb G.Skill Extreme Series 2GBZX @ 250MHz
- Video: ATI X600
- Display: Samsung SyncMaster 710N 17” LCD
- Sound: Onboard AC97
- Hard disks: 320GB Seagate SATA-II
- Operating System: Windows Vista Ultimate x32 is installed on this machine.
Software set-up:
The Unibind PhotoBook Creator come with ArcSoft Collage Creator software.
ArcSoft Collage Creator CD
After inserting the ArcSoft Collage Creator CD we were prompted to install the software.
Install Language selection
Destination Folder
Installation in progress
Installation complete
On the next page we will take a look at PhotoBook Creator's features and performance.
Features and Performance:
Now that we have our ArcSoft Collage Creator installed let us see how some of the features work.
When we first start up ArcSoft Collage Creator we are prompted on what paper size we would like to use for this project. We will be choosing Letter size and picking a white back ground. We also have an option for choosing Portrait or Landscape.
Now we are presented with a well organized display, here we can choose to import a picture, make our own with the built in tools, or a combination of both.
Here we can simply drag some pictures into our work area; we can move them around, rotate and crop the images.
Our next tool is the Shape tool, as you will notice we have a large selection of designs to choose from.
Now we can create titles or descriptions with these premade letters, it is a simple drag and drop process.
If you have a more creative side, you can make your own custom graphics using the Doddle Maker. These are simple to use drawing tools anyone can use to add a bit of flair to your project.
We have completed our first project, so now is a good time to save our project.
Now that we have our project saved it's time to print. We have a few options to choose from, we can change our print settings for a different type of paper, number of copies, or multiple prints per page.
We have now printed out our project, along with some other photos on both standard every day printer paper and on premium photo glossy paper we are ready for the binding process.
Next we need to stack our printed sheets neatly and stick them into the spine of our Photobook. Now we are ready to bind our Photobook.
The process is simple, all we needed to do was plug in the Photobook Creator and it's ready to use, no on/off switch. After we filled our Photobook with up to 25 printed pages, we place the book on the heating element spine down to activate the machine. We know the machine is running because the sensor light will turn red. This will take about 90 seconds to complete the heating process.
After the light turns green, we need to leave the book standing in the machine until it has fully cooled (60 seconds) to ensure the resin has hardened; this will prevent pages from slipping out.
In this picture we are holding the pages and letting the rest of the Photobook hang down, the pages are very secure and don't show any signs of coming out. This whole process took about 5 minutes and was very simple.
On the Next page you will find the Conclusion...
Positive:
- Simple to use
- Comes with easy to use Photo editing and printing software
- Binds any type of paper
- Photobooks are very high quality
- No computer required
- ArcSoft Collage Creator software works with Vista x32
- Binds a Photobook within minutes
- Photobooks can be purchased in many different sizes
Negative:
- Only a 90 day warranty
Conclusion:
The Unibind PhotoBook Creator is an all in one binding unit that is so easy for anyone to use, with it you can literally bind photos and documents using any type of paper within minutes. The included ArcSoft Collage Creator software is simple to use yet has enough features to add extra flair to your pictures or documents. This unit doesn't require a PC and that can be a real benefit for a relative or a business that needs to bind photos or documents of any size as it can be done anywhere. Finally the price as tested was $99.99 USD.
Please feel free to comment in this thread.
To sum this unit up in one sentence… “The Unibind PhotoBook Creator is an extremely easy to use binding unit that will give your photos and documents a professional look ”.
Special thanks to:
We would like to thank Unibind for providing the PhotoBook Creator used in this review.
Special thanks to Karen Thomas of Thomas PR for shipping the review sample.
