User Guide

How to use Sunslider Albums

From your first upload to a shared album in minutes. Here's everything you need to know.

Sunslider Albums turns your camera roll chaos into a beautiful, shareable album using automated curation. This guide walks you through every step — from creating your account to sharing your finished album with the world.

Creating your account

Getting started with Sunslider Albums is free and takes less than a minute. Your first album is included at no cost — no credit card required.

How to sign up:

•Click 'Get Started' on the homepage and fill in your username, email address, and password.
•Check your inbox for a verification email from Sunslider and click the confirmation link.
•Once verified, you'll be logged in automatically and taken to your dashboard.
•Your free album slot is ready to use straight away.

Logging in

Log in at any time using the email address and password you registered with. Your username is shown on your published albums but is not used to log in.

Prefer not to use a password?

You can also log in with a magic link — just enter your email address on the login page and select 'Magic Link'. We'll send you a one-click sign-in link that logs you straight in, no password needed. Magic links expire after one hour.

Forgot your password?

On the login page, click 'Forgot password?' and enter your email address. If an account exists for that email, you'll receive a reset link. Click the link in the email, choose a new password, and you'll be logged back in automatically.

Your dashboard

The dashboard is your home base. From here you can see all your albums, create new ones, and manage your account.

•Album slots: Shows how many slots you have and how many you've used. Your free account comes with 1 slot. Purchase more at any time.
•Your albums: All your albums are listed here as cards with a thumbnail, title, photo count, and quick actions to view, edit, or delete.
•Account button: Opens your account page where you can update your details and see your album balance.

Creating an album

Click 'Create Album' on your dashboard to get started. You'll be asked for a few details before uploading:

•Album name: Give your album a title — this will be shown to anyone you share it with.
•Event date: Optional. Useful for keeping track of when the photos were taken.
•Photos in final album: Choose how many photos you'd like in your finished album: 30, 50, or 100. Our automated curation process will present a selection of great shots from everything you upload.

Free accounts are limited to 30 photos in the final album. Purchase a single album or a 6-album pack to unlock the larger 50- and 100-photo albums.

Uploading your photos

After creating your album you'll be taken to the upload page. Drag and drop your photos or click to select from your device. You can upload in batches — there's no need to select everything at once. (Trying to send us 300+ all in one go can sometimes be tough, depending on your device and connection speed.)

•Free albums: upload up to 200 photos
•Paid albums: upload up to 400 photos

Don't worry about duplicates or blurry shots — that's exactly what the curation step is for. Upload everything and let Sunslider do the sorting.

Automated curation — how it works

Once you've uploaded your photos, click 'Curate My Album'. Sunslider will analyze every photo and automatically select the best ones for your album.

Our curation algorithm is built entirely in-house. It evaluates and scores each photo, detects and removes near-duplicate shots, and ensures your selection has real variety across different scenes and moments.

Curation typically takes 30–60 seconds, depending on how many photos you've uploaded. You'll see a progress screen as the machines are working.

Editing your album

After curation you'll land on the edit page, where you can review and adjust the album selection before publishing.

•Swap photos in or out: The edit page shows your selected photos and your unselected photos separately. Click the red 'X' on any photo to move it out of the album, or the green 'Add' button from the pool below to move a photo into the album.
•Add captions: Click the caption field below any photo to add text. Captions are shown on the album grid and in the lightbox.
•Reorder: Drag and drop photos in the selected section to change the order they appear in the published album.
•Add more photos: If you haven't reached your upload limit yet, you can add more photos to the album from the edit page and then recurate.

Customising your album cover

Every album has a cover that appears at the top of the album view page. You can customise it from the Cover Editor, accessible via the 'Cover' button on your edit page.

•Cover photo: Choose any photo from your album to use as the cover background. Scroll through the strip and tap to select.
•Cover title: By default this matches your album name, but you can set a separate title for the cover — up to 80 characters.
•Style theme: Choose from four overlay styles: Classic (dark gradient from the bottom), Minimal (soft white fade), Bold (full dark overlay with centred text), or Bright (no overlay, text directly on the photo).
•Title color: Pick any color for the cover title and username text. Use the color wheel for full control, or tap one of the quick-pick swatches for common choices.
•Font: Choose a font for the cover title from a selection of styles — from clean and modern to expressive and decorative. A live preview updates as you pick.

Cover changes are saved separately from the rest of your album. Hit 'Save Cover' when you're happy — the preview updates in real time as you make changes.

Album settings & recurating

Open Album Settings from the edit page to make changes to the album itself:

•Rename album: Change the album title at any time, even after publishing.
•Change photo count: Switch between 30, 50, or 100 photos for your final album (paid albums only). Changing this and recurating will give the curation algorithm a new target to work with.
•Recurate: Run the curation again on your uploaded photos. This is useful if you've added new photos to the album or changed your target photo count.
•Enable photo likes: Once your album is published, you can allow visitors to like individual photos using the sun button. Toggle this on or off from the publish section on your album page. Likes are visible to everyone viewing the album.

Recurating without adding new photos or changing the target count will likely produce a very similar selection to the original — the algorithm is deterministic and works from the same set of photos.

Publishing & sharing your album

When you're happy with your selection and captions, publish your album to make it shareable.

•Publish: Click 'Publish Album' from the edit or view page. This generates a unique public link for your album.
•Share link: Your album link works anywhere — text it, email it, post it on social media. Anyone with the link can view your album in their browser, no account or app required.
•Unpublish: You can unpublish an album at any time, which immediately makes it private again. The link will stop working for anyone who had it.

How your album looks to viewers

Published albums are displayed as a clean polaroid-style photo grid. Viewers don't need an account to see your album.

•Photo grid: Photos are displayed in a polaroid-style grid with captions visible below each image.
•Full-size view: Clicking any photo opens it full-size in a lightbox overlay.
•Captions: Captions appear below each photo in the grid and in the lightbox when viewing full-size.
•Lightbox navigation: Move between photos using the on-screen arrows or your keyboard arrow keys. Press Escape or 'X' to close.

Downloading your curated photos

If you've purchased a 6-Album Pack, you can download the curated originals from any of your published albums. Click 'Download Album' on the album card in your dashboard — a zip file containing all selected photos will be prepared and downloaded to your device.

Download access is account-wide once unlocked by a 6-Album Pack purchase. It applies to all your albums, including any you created before purchasing.

Album slots explained

Sunslider Albums uses a slot-based system rather than a subscription. Here's how it works:

•Every account starts with 1 free 30-photo album slot, yours to keep forever.
•Buy a Single Album ($5) to add another slot to your account and unlock higher upload and album sizes.
•Buy a 6-Album Pack ($18) to add 6 slots and unlock download access.
•Important: Deleting an album does not restore its slot. Slots are consumed when an album is created, not when it is deleted.

Managing your account

Visit the Account page (accessible from your dashboard) to view and update your details:

•Username: Your username is displayed on your published albums. You can change it at any time from the Account page.
•Email address: Update your login email from the Account page. You'll need to verify the new address.
•Password: Change your password at any time. If you've forgotten your current password, use the 'Forgot password?' link on the login page.
•Slot balance: Your Account page shows your total slots, how many you've used, and whether you have download access.

Need help?

If something isn't working or you have a question that isn't answered here, get in touch — we're happy to help.

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