Your wedding will be unique and personal. Start it off that way with a photo wedding invitation. On this page, we'll show you how!
We'll walk you through each step of the process and very soon, you'll be creating your own photo wedding invitation. Of course, once you learn how, you can create all kinds of photo cards, including wedding thank you notes, Christmas cards, and more. Browse around the rest of our site for lots of great ideas to creatively use your photographs.
Don't want to make your own? Read on...
What you'll need to create a Photo Wedding Invitation: (Don't worry - I'll go into detail on each of these below.)
1) A digital photograph or photographs of the two of you. 2) A color printer (or access to one). 3) Greeting Card or Graphics Software. 4) Good photo-quality card paper.
1) Digital Photograph(s):
If you already have some great photos of the two of you in a digital format (on your computer or on a CD,) you can skip down to step 2. If you want to use a printed picture you own but don't know how,
click here to learn how to scan photos.
If you have a digital camera but don't yet know how to save the photos you've taken to your computer,
click here to learn how to retrieve digital camera photos.
2) A Color Printer:
If you don't yet have a color printer, and don't know anyone who will let you borrow theirs, you might be happy to hear that you no longer need a fancy Laserjet printer to get good photo-quality prints. An Inkjet or Deskjet will do just fine.
Another option, if you don't have or want a color printer, is to create your photo wedding invitation at home and have a professional printing company do the printing. Don't be surprised if you end up paying enough to cover the cost of a printer or a custom-designed photo wedding invitation and it's printing by a company specializing in wedding invitations.
3) Greeting Card or Graphics Software
This is the step that will most determine whether your invitation-creation will be an enjoyable experience or a nail-biting, hair-pulling one. With the right software, you'll create beautiful invitations, in just a few hours, that your friends and family will rave over and you'll want to use your knowledge again and again for Christmas Cards, Birthday greetings, Birth Announcements, and many other photo projects.
There are tons of greeting card and graphics software programs available and we've tried out many of them. One of our favorites is
Photo Explosion Deluxe.
Another good product is
Greeting Card Factory Deluxe,
especially if you want to print other kinds of "canned" greeting cards. Photo Explosion's focus is exclusively on Photograph cards.
4) Good photo-quality card paper. This is one of the most common mistakes beginning card-creaters make. We know because we've done it ourselves. In our quest to find the cheapest photo-quality card stock paper, we've tried MANY brands and varieties. You wouldn't believe the difference in the print quality!! Low quality paper will make your photo wedding invitation look amateur and the photo(s) poor. We feel so strongly about this that we won't even recommend a brand until we've tested thoroughly enough. Until then, we suggest you buy small quantities of several brands and thicknesses, and try printing your invitation on one sheet of each. The paper that doesn't perform as well can always be used for simple greeting cards or party invitations later.
Now that you have all of the necessary items, the way you'll create your wedding invitations will vary depending on your software. Follow your software instructions and see what ideas it offers, but don't let the software encourage you to create your invitations in a style that's too busy. Remember that with wedding invitations, the K.I.S.S. rule applies and a simple design is just about always better. The most fun thing about creating your own invitations is that you can try out several (or many if you're like me) different design ideas and see what your friends and family think before you settle on your final design.
Most importantly, make sure the design is uniquely the two of you and you'll be sure to be proud of it.
See other people's photo wedding invitations (and how they used their wedding photos AFTER the big day) on this
"What Have You Done With Your Wedding Photos?" page.
Share your own finished product or just get ideas for your current project. Then, of course, come back and share it when you finish! Get helped now and then help future brides and grooms.
