Tips for making photo calendars

Build a "year in review" calendar to show off your favorite photos from the year.

Use a theme throughout your calendar, like “baby's first year” or travel pictures. The possibilities are endless!

• Collect seasonal or holiday relevant images from the past year and populate in corresponding months for the upcoming year. (Show photos from last Mother's Day in May or last Easter in April.)
• Commemorate any special events, like a family reunion or wedding.
• Try something more abstract, like fine-art photos of leaves for fall or snow-laden trees for winter.

The HP Photosmart G4050 photo scanner will quickly scan a shoebox’s worth of photos.

Don’t limit yourself to recent photos. This is a great time to take out those boxes of photos in the back of your closet.

• Gather photos of your family from previous holidays
• Create a calendar documenting the family's history

Many scanners, like the HP Photosmart G4050 photo scanner lets you scan up to four 4" x 6" photographs at a time. That will make quick work of those boxes of photos in the back of your closet.

Some year-at-a-glance design templates only require a few photos.

You can add 24 photos (two for each month), plus a cover image, to this calendar design template.

Once you've decided on a theme, begin gathering pictures to include in your calendar.

• You will need anywhere from 1-30 photos, depending on the calendar template and layout.
• Some photo calendar designs can incorporate several photos on a single page.
• Other year-at-a-glance design templates only require a single picture or a few photos.

Now it’s time to arrange your photos.

• If it’s a 12-month calendar, for example, put the photos into the order you'd like to see them, choosing a picture for each month.
• Put the photos for your calendar into a new folder on your computer. This makes the photos easier to locate for uploading.

Use the touchscreen on the HP Photosmart 6510 e-All-in-One to fix red-eye and other photo flaws—PC free.

Keep in mind that most pictures can be improved with a little editing—especially cropping and red-eye removal.

Many HP Photosmart printers (including the HP Photosmart 6510 e-All-in-One) make it easy to do some quick-and-easy last-minute editing like cropping, auto fix/red-eye removal and more—right on your printer’s touchscreen.

You can also apply a color effect (like sepia for an antiqued look) or add photo frames. Perfect for a collection of treasured family photos!

Personalize your calendar with reminders of family holidays, birthdays and other celebrations.

Personal greetings will make the calendar even more special.

• Take time to add text, captions, clip-art or humorous messages to increase personalization.
• Don't forget to highlight dates, like birthdays and other important events.
• Double check all details before printing or placing the order.

A nicely designed calendar printed on standard printer paper will look less polished and may not last as long.

The paper you choose for your calendar is as important as the design you select.

• Choose a heavy paper like HP's Brochure and Flyer paper.
• You can print your calendar on glossy photo paper for a photo-finished look.
• Matte paper has a look and feel that says 'stationery” rather than 'photo paper'.

You can take your calendar to a print shop for a spiral binding, or bind it yourself with ribbon.

If you are creating a multiple-page calendar, you’ll need to bind it. Yes, you could just staple the pages together, but here are some solutions for a more polished look:

• If you only need to make a few calendars, visit your local print shop with your printed calendar pages in hand and ask them to punch and bind them for you. It doesn’t cost a lot and the results are very professional.
• You can also add a homemade touch by creating holes in the top of the calendar with a paper punch and fastening calendar pages together using ribbon, brads, raffia, or other binding.