Chances are, if you’re reading this, you know what we’re all about and you’re here because you love what we love: scrapbooking, digital photography, arts and crafts, DIY projects and making creative photobooks, photo albums and photo gifts. And if you didn’t know that, now you do!

Welcome the newest addition to the Coverbind family

Whether you’ve been reading our blog, browsing our photo and scrapbooking products or already trying out the personal binder, we’re glad you’re here. What you may not know is that we haven’t been here that long. This company idea has been in the works for some time, and while we have a long history of professional binding experience thanks to our parent company, Coverbind, the CoverbindDirect company and website, as you see it now, is still a baby.

Help us celebrate the new scrapbooking site online...

Like any new parent, we’re proud of our addition and excited to watch it grow. To celebrate our new arrival, we’re asking you to take part in this joyous occasion and enter to win a free binding machine and starter kit, complete with everything you need to get acquainted with our little bundle of joy.

OK, so maybe the metaphor starts to break down right about here, but we’re still giving away a bunch of Photo Starter Kits as part of the site launch. Each kit includes your very own personal binder, the Corel®  Photo Album 6 Photo Fun Software, one hardcover photo album or scrapbook, four photobooks, four themed photo greeting cards and enough photo paper to print and bind nine photo albums, photobooks or scrapbooks. Or, get really creative and bind something completely unique.

...by wining a free personal binder and photobook kit!

That "unique idea" is what we’re looking for in the contest: tell us why you want a personal binding machine and photo kit so badly, and what cool stuff you would bind with it. A baby book for the bundle of joy in your life—be it a car, a pet or a piece of an office equipment; a scrapbook full of exes you can’t quite bring yourself to part with; a book of poetry so awful no publisher would print it?

Whatever you feel the need to bind, a CoverbindDirect personal binder can help you make it your own. Just tell us what it is you’d like to see in print and you’re entered to win!

Now, to continue playing the role of the proud parent, we feel obligated to show off on Flickr, Facebook and YouTube, so check out our photos, profiles and videos and add us as a friend. Once you get a personal binder, feel free to upload photos of your project to Facebook or Flickr and tag them with “CoverbindDirect” and join the fam.

One of the downsides of the huge push from 35mm film to digital photography is the dramatic decrease in photo albums. People still frame their favorite shots—after having them digitally edited and enhanced of course—but gone are the days of big, overstuffed coffee table photo albums big enough to cover your lap. There are digital photo albums online, and thumbnail galleries in cameras themselves, but clicking a mouse or scrolling a wheel lacks the concentration and connection of actively flipping a pages and studying the faces that stare back.

Camera companies touted the memory capacity and editing capabilities of digital photography as the two major draws to consumers, and they were right; being able to take a lot of pictures without changing film, easily storing them on a computer and having the tools to edit photos yourself are huge selling points. But what no one anticipated were the side effects of these advances.

What do we really see in digital photo albums online?

Photos now remain locked in cameras for months because there is no immediate need to develop them. Both physical and digital photo albums are filled with picture perfect (excuse the pun) shots because we can see crooked smiles and closed eyes before it’s too late to pose for a second shot. We have lost the excitement of waiting for your birthday, vacation or baby photos to come back from the lab because we can see them uploaded to digital photo albums online almost instantly. And there are no longer funny faces in “outtake” shots to laugh at because we can review and call “do-over” within seconds.

The result? A loss of connection to photos, and a generation who doesn’t appreciate photo albums and the memories they represent. Today, we post photos to Facebook and similar digital photo albums online instead of anxiously waiting at the one-hour counter to see how they came out.

Bridging the gap between dinosaur development and digital photo albums

These developments in technology are not bad; in fact, if anything, they are helping people share more memories. Still, nostalgia kicks in when we think back to the old days of messy negative strips kept in boxes and hours spent stuffing less-than-perfect shots into plastic sleeves. It’s not that we’re against digital photo albums; we’d just like to see the photo albums online displayed at home as well.

Obviously, we’ve embraced digital photo technology: we’re on Flickr, and Facebook, and our products are a celebration of what you can do with a little imagination and a computer. We’re just hoping that digital photo albums aren’t the only way of the future, 'cuz we’ll always have a soft spot for the weight of a real album on our laps.

Scrapbooking has been a favorite pastime of arts and crafts lovers, photo junkies and memory keepers for years and years, and will continue to be in the years to come. There’s just something about seeing memories—photos, mementos, souvenirs and decorations—put together in such a touching and personal way that you can’t help but remember little details about the day that would have otherwise been lost. Whether you make them for yourself or as gifts, scrapbooks can’t help but show the importance of the people in the photographs.

Scrapbooking kits, companies and conventions

There are entire companies and industries dedicated to scrapbooking products, tips and techniques. Scrapbooking, once a somewhat personal project regarded as silly by some, is now a huge social endeavor, spawning countless scrapbook conventions and scrapbooking retreats across the country every year. Scrapbookers of all ages and skill levels meet to discuss their favorite scrapbooking kits and brands and get first peek at new scrapbooking products and companies.

Scrapbookers do much more than place photos in an album; they strive for a three dimensional effect that incorporates more than just images. Ticket stubs, ribbon, pressed flowers and a variety of scrapbook embellishments adorn each page, making scrapbooking so much more than a photography project. As such, many scrapbooking fanatics were concerned about the advances in digital cameras and the impact that would have on their “old school” hobby. When you can upload all your images to the web and share them with hundreds of friends (not to mention strangers) instantly, without every having to print, who’s going to appreciate the time and effort that goes into actual scrapbooking? Turns out, plenty.

Digital scrapbooking: the way of the future

As digital cameras, photo sharing sites and digital photo lab kiosks took off, scrapbooking companies adapted to the shifting market and developed new scrapbooking kits geared more toward the younger, “hipper” generation, as well digital scrapbooking products. Scrapbooking is bigger and better than ever, thanks to digital scrapbooking kits and products that bridge this older pastime with the new media and technology.

New scrapbooking products for a new kind of scrapbooking

Digital scrapbooking products can be downloaded online and used to create digital scrapbooks that exist entirely online, or hybrid scrapbooks that are put together online using online scrapbooking kits and embellishments in conjunction with photo editing software, then printed and bound like a traditional scrapbook.

Our hardbound photo albums and photo books provide an alternative to the old screw-post scrapbooks and are the perfect complement to a digital scrapbook. You can design the pages using our PhotoFun software, add digital embellishments, print and bind your pages and then add finishing touches for a personal, professional scrapbook. It’s the perfect hybrid of digital scrapbooking technology and time-honored tradition.

To get you started, here are a few digital scrapbooking sites we like:

• Free Digital Scrapbooking
• ScrapWow
• Shabby Princess
• Scrap Girls

Happy scrapping!