The cover of Steelers 2008

If there’s one thing that says fall and early winter, it’s football. As we wind down the fantasy football season, gear up for the play-offs in the NFL, and settle in to watch the bowl games, it seems like a perfect time to feature a football book created by Barbara Rodriguez, a parent of a youth football player.

Barbara used Inkubook to make a sports team photo book about her son’s football team. Books will be presented to each of the players at the banquet in January. Barbara captured all the hard-hitting action of the boys’ games, but she also took the opportunity to ask each player to reflect on his team and provide a little insight into what he likes best about it. We were very impressed with how Barbara laid out her book, so we asked her a few questions about the experience.

Q. What prompted you to make your sports team photo book with Inkubook?

A. I looked at a number of photo book sites, including MyPublisher, Shutterfly, and Smilebox…. Then I came across Inkubook. I had no idea of what I was doing. I wanted to talk to someone live. One day I stumbled into the sports book and found Quantity Orders. This was what I was looking for so I sent my info and Jessica [Inkubook's product marketing manager] called me. She was great and really worked with our needs. She actually gave me ideas for next year on how to help with the cost of the yearbook. The price was fantastic. I made an Ultimate Portrait hardcover for the head coach, and the Simple Square for the boys. I am already thinking about other books that I can do.

Q. What’s the age group of the boys on the team and how many played?

A. There were 25 boys ages 9 through 12.

Q. It’s funny that each of the boys had a nickname. How did those come about?

A. At one practice during the season after they all got to know each other, the coaches had the kids come up with nicknames for each other. The kids had to all agree. It was quite entertaining.

Each player had the opportunity to write a statement about his favorite things about being on the team.

Q. Why did you create the book?

This was driven from the head coach. He wants the boys to have memories. His family is very involved. They have five kids, so the first yearbook was done by his oldest son, who is now in college. The coach calls them his treasures.

Q. Did you take all the pictures in the book yourself?

A. I took all the pictures myself–my first time with a camera. I guess that’s how I was chosen to do the photo album. I’m glad that everyone went along with the online idea.

Q. What was your favorite part about making the book?

Looking back at the season. I also enjoyed choosing the layouts. I know the boys will love the books.

The book includes a two-page spread with pictures
and scores from each of the games.

Q. Do you have any tips that you’d offer to other people who want to make a team book like this?

A. With digital, there are so many photos to go through. Pick the top 10 photos after each game and set them aside in a folder.

Whether you have a family member on a football team, basketball team, gymnastics team, or la crosse team, a yearbook at the end of the season makes a perfect keepsake or coaches’ gift, so try starting yours today.

If you visit Inkublog occasionally or if you receive our newsletter, you’ve probably noticed that we sometimes refer to the surveys we’ve done to get your feedback about Inkubook. The speed and performance of the site is something that has been a bit of a problem spot, so we’ve been working hard to make improvements. We’ve made some fairly significant changes that have resulted in making things work noticably faster, and we’d like to take a little time to tell you about them.

Start Your Book Faster

Some of the changes we’ve made will help you get into Inkubook and get started on a book faster than was possible a few weeks ago.  Here’s what we’ve done:

1. Your user home page and the book editor will load more quickly on your computer. We made this happen by using smaller files and grabbing less data each time those pages load, which results in overall speedier performance.

2. We reduced the size of the background files that draw on your screen. Previously we had been drawing really detailed versions of the backgrounds both on your pages and in the dialog box where you select new backgrounds for your book. We discovered that we could get just as good a result with smaller files, so we downsized them. As a result, it doesn’t take nearly as long for the backgrounds to draw on your pages in the editor or in preview, and the Get More Backgrounds dialog box will show up more quickly, too.

3. We take bigger handfuls when we upload your photos. Originally we were uploading your photos one at a time. Now we upload photo files two at a time, which means the process goes twice as fast. If you’re the undisciplined sort who tends to eat potato chips two at a time then you might know how much more quickly your bowl is emptied compared to the dainty person next to you who eats chips one at a time. (Not that I speak from experience or anything.)

Finish Your Book Faster

We also have a category of improvements that will be noticeable to you as you’re building your book or returning to a book to continue working on it.

1. We aren’t using as much memory. This doesn’t mean that we’ve abandoned trying to remember what’s on our grocery list. It means that we’re storing fewer things in your computer’s memory so it doesn’t have to work so hard to pull things up. For example, we only store the high-resolution images needed for the pages that are right in front of you at any given time, rather than storing in memory all the high-resolution images in your whole project. We get what we need when we need it.

2. In general, we’re being smarter about how we load things than we used to be. We used to load all the thumbnail images for the book, then all the pages, then all the backgrounds. Now we load things according to the order that you need them. So that means that if you open your project and go immediately to page 12, we work on getting you what you need for page 12 before we get other things.

3. We’re storing things closer to where you are. This one is two-fold. First, the application files are stored locally on your computer so we don’t have to load them from the server every time they’re needed. We will occassionally need to retrieve things from the server (as when we’ve recently made updates that refresh everything), but the need to retrieve everything from the server will happen far less frequently.

The second part of this is that, before too long, we’ll be using a different server storage arrangement that will have your project files stored in a number of locations. That way we’ll be able to retrieve them from the place that’s closest to you geographically. U.S. locations include Ashburn (VA), Dallas/Ft. Worth, Los Angeles, Miami, Newark, Palo Alto, Seattle, and St. Louis. So if you live in Portland, OR and work on your book from home, we’ll get your files from the server in Seattle. But then if you visit your sister in Portland, ME and work on your book while you’re there, we’ll get your files from someplace much closer, like Newark.

There you have it: a (relatively) brief list and description of some of the things we’ve been working on to make the Inkubook experience better for you. If you think we’re going to stop there, fear not. We’re still on our path of continuous improvement. We just wanted you to know where we are right now. 

Make sure to stop by to see how much more quickly things happen. It’ll give you an opportunity to work on a book that’s been languishing or to check out our new calendars.

The strangest gift I’ve ever received was probably the Doodle Dog that my great-aunt and -uncle gave me for Christmas when I was about 16. In all honesty the Doodle Dog (a fabric-covered dog that came with a pen so I could have my friends sign it) was cute, but not exactly what you’d call a cool gift for a teenager. A cool gift (at the time) would have been a Swatch watch or a way oversized sweatshirt. Given the slight error in judgment with the Doodle Dog, though, perhaps it’s best that my aunt and uncle didn’t try to pick out a watch or sweatshirt that I would have liked. They probably would have still missed the mark.

Being able to avoid awkward gift-giving situations are one reason gift cards make such a great present. Sometimes you know generally what a person likes but not which precise thing he or she would most like to have. In those cases, a gift card allows you to let them know that you pay attention to likes and dislikes, but it gives the giftee the control of picking out the actual present.

Inkubook has just introduced gift cards to help make your holiday gift-giving easier and more creative. It’s the appropriate gift for nearly anyone who has a digital camera. Give an Inkubook gift card to a teacher who might want to make a book about her class (or about her last fabulous vacation away from her class). Give one to a relative who’s been talking about needing to start a scrapbook or photo album but just hasn’t found a reason to start. Give one to a teenager you know. I’m not a teenager anymore, but I have to guess that someone who is would think that being able to make a photo book with digital photos of friends is way better than a Doodle Dog. I would have, and surely teenagers haven’t changed that much.

Visit this page for more details about gift cards or this page to order one.