formatting pdfs of family reciped into bound book?
I have created a folder of pdfs of recipes (6.2MB) and I'm trying to find someone who will create a "book" format and also get it bound -- I realize that this could be a DIY project but I would like to find someone to whom I can email the folder and they will then send me a finished physical book. I used TaskRabbit for this a few years ago but they are now limited to household tasks. Thanks in advance for sharing the name of anyone you might know who is available for this small project.
Nov 16, 2024
Parent Replies
Depending on how much you care about the aesthetic and how much you are willing to do some work to get it to look how you want, blurb might be a good choice. I had a giant pdf and I was able to use their (somewhat janky but totally usable) program to drag it in as a text file and it automatically formats it to a book. I was also able to add some pictures. Then you can order as many or as few copies as you want for a pretty low price. I did mine as a trade book. I think it was ~60 pages and I was able to get 10 copies for around $7/each. https://www.blurb.com/trade-books I would say I spent around 2 hrs on the project and it came out great but I did NOT care a ton about layout and visual appeal since it was mostly just unformatted text.
I have used https://www.lulu.com/ to create a family recipe book that has a laminated cover, spiral binding, etc. You just need to upload the PDF and create a cover. Good luck with the project!
Not sure where to ask, but just an suggestion that you or anyone you get to help you do this can make it a photo book on MixBook, Shutterfly, or some other service. You could add nice pictures - or even photos that you request from family. Here is one example: https://www.shutterfly.com/make-a-cookbook/
You might have to convert the files from pdf to another format (png or jpg?), but that's not hard.
I just wanted to advise against shutterfly for this project, unless they have a newer, better binding option for your book. I did a similar project about 15 years ago with a small group of recipes (~ 20), and I gave it to family and kept one for myself. Because they were my favorite recipes, I personally used the cookbook pretty regularly. I found within a couple of years that the pages were falling out of the binding from being opened/closed so much. Shutterfly bindings are great for family photos because you usually are not thumbing through them weekly (I have many photo travel books I made around the same time as the cook book, and they are in great shape, but I only look at them occasionally!)
Original poster here — I wanted to share my success story — Lulu.com will make a spiral bound book but their formatting requirements were too confusing for me. I found a formatting service called Fiverr and paid approx $100 for formatting and revisions on my 45 page assemblage of recipes. I uploaded the finished book pdf to Lulu and the book itself will be about 10$/ copy, on their high quality paper. Success!