When I learned about Blue Friesian and the personalised covers and magazines that they allow you to create, using not only your own photos but also personalising the text, I thought this was a really fun and unique review opportunity so I jumped at the chance. I decided to use the recent photos from Christmas and New Year to create a magical reminder for the girls, but they would be absolutely brilliant as a really unique wedding souvenir.
You can create a number of spoof celeb magazine covers, including Hallo!, Rev'd, Enquire and Cheat. There are covers targeting girls, boys, men, women, dogs, sporty people - the only thing possibly missing is a baby-themed one. But what makes the company really unique is that you can also create a complete 8 or 12 page magazine. This gives you oodles of scope for creating a really unique souvenir of a wedding, holiday, hen party or family gathering, with room to record all the important information for posterity or create hilarious texts to accompany the pictures.
My one gripe would be the software which really tests your patience ! It is soooooo slow ! For uploading the photos but also just for general clicking around. It was so bad that I actually got out my book and started reading at the same time ! I had time to read two pages in between each photo being ready to use ! The other disappointing thing is that you can't resize or centre your photos once they're uploaded, so if it's slightly too big and cuts off part of somebody, you have to resize your photo in a separate programme (I used Paint which does the job just fine and is included on most computers by default) then upload it all over again. I also had a few error messages so it did turn into a bit of a chore in the end. To complete the whole 12 pages, I spent an entire week "working" on it for on average a couple of hours a night. But the good news is, the software should be being upgraded very soon so hopefully it will all be a lot less painless then !
Once you've created the magazine, you can choose to print it yourself or have it delivered to your door. I was given enough credit (£25) to receive my magazine and it made the whole creation process worthwhile. I love it, but I knew exactly what was in it because I was the one who made it. Seeing the look on my daughters' and husband's face, as well as the grandparents', friends' and anyone else they've been showing it to, was absolutely priceless ! The paper is lovely high quality glossy paper which really gives it the feel of a proper celeb magazine.
You can have a sneaky peek, because they also send you a link to share your finished creation online with your friends and family. Click on the bottom right corner to flick through the pages.
A single cover costs £10 but if you order 50 of them, the price is just £50 so you can get them for a measly pound each. The 8 page magazines cost £20 and the 12 page ones cost £25 but, again, the price goes down the more you order so if you order 50, they cost just £2 or £2.50 each. As a truly unique wedding souvenir or a school outing album, for example, that makes them really good value.
As an added bonus, there is a competition on Blue Friesian's Facebook page at the moment where you can win a personalised cover every single day - and if you say you came from Madhouse Family Reviews, you'll get a bonus entry each time ! Good luck !
star rating : 5/5 for the product, 2.5/5 for the current software !
RRP : £10 for a cover, £20 for 8 pages, £25 for 12 pages
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