Matisseo Photo Book Publishing Service

Project Background

Matisseo is a popular French photo book publishing service. With Matisseo, a user can create, share and purchase photo books online.

In 2008, when Matisseo’s founder turned to Sibers, the service was already three years old. Our collaboration began with the implementation of sharing features within the existing website; seven years on and we’re now providing Matisseo with a full range of IT solutions that actively support the service’s growth and expansion.

When we started working with Matisseo, the service’s setup required downloading a Windows-only desktop application that generated a PDF, which was then automatically sent to the company’s server. This made it impossible for the user to preview how the photobook would look, or share it on the website with friends and family members.

Since a large part of Matisseo’s user base was (and still is) composed of photographers, the no-preview, no-sharing limitations were a huge obstacle which hampered Matisseo’s long-term growth. Another obstacle was the absence of Mac support, the favored platform of photographers worldwide.

Solution

Sibers provided the client with four solutions: in-site photo book sharing and preview functions, an online photo book editor, an order processing system, and prepress automation. To ensure optimum performance, HTML5 was heavily employed in the development of the album preview functionality. As a result, users got the opportunity to review their albums and share them within the platform or via email.

Developing an easy-to-use photobook editing web interface was essential for expanding the project’s audience. Most importantly, Matisseo had to offer several features that were platform-agnostic. Sibers’ solution allows a user to choose the photo book size and layout, upload photos and background images, and add different headers and signatures. In short, everything a user could want!

Order processing used to be a manual chore completed each morning — but Sibers’ solution has reduced manual labor by 20%. Also, within the business automation task we built a console application, intended for PDF imposition, which solved a combinatorial problem of optimum substrate fill.

In addition to all of the above, we improved other website components such as implementing new album attributes and related calculating functions (i.e. slip-over), revising the discount and coupon system, implementing a partnership program, building an internal bonus and incentive system, rebuilding the site on MVC and, the cherry on top, refreshing the overall design.

With time the range of Matisseo products included mugs, water bottles and USB drives. In 2018 clients decided to separate business flows and target audience: Matisseo remained a premium photobook maker for b2c customers, and Matisseo PRO would be a special instrument for professional photographers.

Matisseo PRO allowed professionals to implement a full cycle all the way through: to make and edit photos, then create and send albums to their own clients by themselves. The range of the materials and services became wider — wooden covers, leather and wood embossing, wooden boxes for albums and USB drives. The top quality of printing and the feature of detailed customization are highly valued by Matisseo PRO users because it gives them additional advantages over the competitors.

Tech highlights

• Microsoft .NET Framework (C#)
• ASP.NET
• ASP.NET MVC
• ASP.NET WebAPI
• Microsoft SQL Server
• ADO.NET
• Entity Framework
• log4net/iTextsharp/Ghostscript
• HTML5
• CSS3
• JavaScript
• jQuery
• CoffeeScript
• Backbone.js
• Underscore.js
• Flash, ActionScript

Results

With Sibers help, Matisseo is now a huge multifunctional publishing platform available on myriad devices. The company’s new online editor provides designers, professional photographers and casual picture-takers with access to a powerful, best-in-class package.

The backend applications have reduced handwork, errors and enhanced the production effectiveness at least 5 times.