Picturia Press - Creating Books authored by you -->

So you’d like to produce a book. Regardless of whether it is a portfolio of your work, an event or wedding album, a blog, a cookbook, or a novel, the first decision to make is should you do it yourself, or should you hire a professional?

The most important thing to consider is the time and effort put into creating the book versus the desired outcome of the finished product. Time is always something we are short on, and trial and error in designing your own book can be time-consuming, costly and frustrating. Hiring a professional book designer can simplify this process for you. This way you work with a designer to establish the look and feel of the book, and the designer then implements and/or enhances your vision.

Professional designers do this for a living and therefore understand the technology and the graphic design layout process a book requires. If your desire is to create a professional portfolio, or a book that is personal and emotive, a designer will know how to convey your concept.

Additionally, their skills in designing allow them to provide creative input such as use of color, use of design elements, typography and photo editing. All of these skills not only add to, but enhance the look of your finished book.

In preparing a quote for a client, it isn’t as simple as quoting a set price and going from there. There are many things a professional designer will need to know from you in order to establish a base cost. Let's review some of the things you'll need to know about designing your book before you hire a designer...

Take some time to think about your book before selecting a designer. This process will really help you establish what exactly you want to create and will also enable the vendor to give you a quote based on your true needs and not on a “guesstimate”. And keep in mind that hiring a vendor to design the book does not in most cases include the cost of purchasing and shipping the book. Be sure to verify that with any vendor you hire.

What format shall my book be in?
Blurb.com has several book size selections to choose from as follows:



Blurb books come in soft cover, hard cover with a dust jacket and hard cover with an image wrap. (An image wrap allows you to print an image directly on the front and back of any hard cover book.

Deciding right away on the size of your book is important to begin the design process. You may already know what you want, or you can consult with your designer to determine the best size suited for your project.

Blurb offers great flexibility with ordering your book when it is completed, you have the choice of either soft covers or a hard covers. However, for design purposes, you will need to know if you want the book to have the option of a hard cover with a dust jacket or a hard cover with an image wrap. The reason for this is the designer will need to “lay out” the inside flaps of a dust jacket, and will also need to meet specific design parameters if the cover is to be image wrapped.

How big will my book be?
This can often be a question you find hard to answer and the book designer understands that. However, you may have an idea of how many pages you would “like” the book to be, or you know how many pictures you have or pages of text. This will help enormously when asking a vendor to give you a quote.

What are the elements in my book?
This is important to know for the designer to determine the needs and time required for designing. While your concept can change, a basic understanding of what materials will be included will help the vendor determine pricing.

Most importantly, know what is the content of your book – is it photographs, text, or a combination of both.

Photographs
Know approximately how many images you have.
Can the vendor use a selection of the images, or must they use them all.
Indicate if the images are in digital format or printed format.
If not, will you require them to be scanned by the vendor.
Do the images required editing (such as color enhancement, editing background).
How many of your images require editing.

Text
What format do you have the text in now. (i.e. a Word document)
How much text will you have. (Is it captions for the photographs, quotations, dedications, or the entire book consists of text.

Timeline
It is important as a client for you to convey any deadline for your project. In most cases this determines if and when a vendor can take on your project. Do not assume that because the vendor is a professional, your book can be completed in two days. Be sure to allow enough time for the designer to create a design for you to review and revise and deliver a polished finished product. Most vendors can and will work with you on your timeline but may need to charge you a “rush” fee if it falls outside of the normal time it takes to design the book.

OTHER PROFESSIONAL SERVICES
Not all vendors offer additional services, but here are some to consider.

Additional Design Elements
Enhancing your book to complete your vision may require additional photography, illustration, or text. For example, you may wish to add quotes to the book, or customize a front cover. You may desire specialty design treatments, such unique backgrounds or typography. These things require additional time and services from the vendor.

Color profiling. This assures your images will get a truer contrast and more accurate color consistency in your printing. For most individuals, this is not a service you will require. Usually, a professional photographer wanting to assure absolute color consistency would use this process.

ISBN Code.Will you require as ISBN Code. If you are unsure if you need an ISBN code or not, please read my post. If you need an ISBN Code for your book, you can either do this yourself or ask if your vendor can perform this service for you.

Picturia Press had the pleasure of working with noted artist, Jerry Gotkin on his latest project, a book of photography and artwork for Hospice by the Sea in Boca Raton, Florida.

It was an absolute pleasure to work with an artist such as Jerry and his images were so beautiful it was actually difficult to choose from all of them! I wish all projects were challenging in that manner. The book is beautiful to view and is a wonderful tribute to the people who do such good work at Hospice by the Sea.

This is the first of several books Jerry is putting together to showcase his art and his talent and we look forward to being able to work with him on his next project.
Click here to view the book.

It's been some time since I've posted on the blog. But that's not because there aren't any books being published! In fact, quite the opposite! The most recent book published is "Enduring Impact". This was a book we created for Mr. Michael Dunn, the CEO of Prophet, a San Francisco based branding agency.

Michael is celebrating his 10 year anniversary at the company and his associates collected anecdotes, letters, quotes and pictures to put together this book. A very big book I might add, weighing in at a whopping 58 pages!! Seems like he is very well loved and respected. Hope he enjoys the book as much as we did making it for him. Congratulations Michael Dunn.

The most challenging (and rewarding) part of this project was that there was very little imagery and a great deal of text. Taking this into account, we used plenty of typography and color to make the book more engaging and visual.

Click here to view this book

Don't we all love surprises? This one is a good one, no make that a great one. I was contacted by a gentleman who wanted to surprise his daughter by publishing a book she copyrighted in 2002, but never managed to get published. Dads are great aren't they?

My client had done his homework before he even approached us. He had all the copyright information, he had already obtained the original manuscript and converted it to an electronic document and he had contacted an illustrator to create the illustrations. All this done before he even contacted us to do the layout and design!

The important thing to remember when creating a book that requires illustrations is the time frame. Illustrations take much longer to create than photography or graphic images. Sometimes it can take months depending upon the number of illustrations you require. This book used 13 illustrations and I believe he waited about 4 months for that end of this project. If you have a specific time line, you will need to take this into consideration. It's also recommended to have the book designer work with the illustrator so you are sure to get the images sized properly for your book.

I plan to write an article shortly on "Working with Illustrators for your next book". Until then, I'm just going to take time out to appreciate the release of a new book by Picturia Press. Click here to view the book.

This is a follow up to my recent post "Understanding ISBN numbers and UPC Codes". I felt I needed to add a few more bits of information about getting the ISBN Numbers and UPC Codes and their costs.

Bowker is the U.S. broker of ISBN numbers. This is the place to go to get your number. Usually, Bowker sells numbers in blocks of 10, for approximately $250, or a cost of $25 per book. This price also includes the UPC Code (Bar Code) which you will also need. If you don't wish to purchase ISBN's in blocks of 10, you can purchase a single ISBN. However, it's not as easy, and not as cost effective. You have to call Bowker directly at 877-310-7333 and request a faxed application for $125.00. I haven't yet been able to find the form downloadable from their site. Additionally, this cost is for the ISBN number only and you have to purchase the bar codes separately for a cost of $25.00.

You don't have to purchase the bar code from Bowker though, there are other options available. If you want to do it yourself, there is a whole list of ISBN software available online for generating your own codes, or you can try companies such as Bar Code Graphics that will create the bar code image for you for about $10.

On a final note, you may also want to consider registering your book with Bowker's directory "Books in Print". This is their master list of all books available. Oddly enough, when you buy your ISBN number from Bowker, you aren't automatically registered into the master list.

I had the pleasure and fun of recently completing a book for an associate of mine. Fun because it was a book about two of her best friends, her dog and cat. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m a big animal lover, so this book was something I was looking forward to working on. It’s going to be a gift to her mother for Mother’s Day.

What made this more interesting is having the opportunity to work with and play with typography. Something I enjoy just as much as graphic design and they go well together. As you can see, using typography in some of these pages can make a simple image come alive. It can add sentiment that the image alone might not convey. Treatments like these are emotive and add to the quality of the overall presentation.

When designing a book, consider working with and trying out different fonts, different sizes, and different colors. Images tell a story, but so can typography. The images above were not taken by a professional photographer, but as you can see, they didn’t need to be. We converted the image to black and white and then added the appropriate text to convey personality.



Bear in mind that when you hire a designer, there are additional costs and time to create these types of pages for your book. But, as with everything, they are well worth the cost when you see the end results.

Click here to view the book

You know you are doing something worthwhile when the NY Times decides to write an article about it. I've been an advocate for self-publishing for over two years now and as the demand and the desire grows, so does the market. That means publicity and that's good for business.

Peter Wayner just wrote an article for the New York Times, "Turn Those Bytes into Books" about the blossoming market for self-published books. Picturia Press was interviewed for the article a month ago and only recently was contacted asking if I could have my picture taken for the article. Unfortunately, I was out of town during the time this was going to print, but we're all proud to have the article in print anyway.

We have a lot of customers inquiring about if they need an ISBN number and Bar Code for their books. The answer to that depends upon your needs. Let’s start with the ISBN Number. You are not legally required to have an ISBN number. It simply depends upon if and how you are going to sell your book. So if you are selling your book through workshops, direct mail or through the Internet, you most likely will NOT need an ISBN number or Bar Code.

If you plan to sell your books through retail chains, and specialty stores and catalogues, (Borders, Barnes & Noble, Amazon, etc.) you will most likely be required by the reseller to obtain an ISBN number for your book for inventory and general ordering purposes.

An ISBN number identifies a book title or edition from one specific publisher and is unique to that edition, meaning that it can never be reused. This also means that if you sell both a hard copy and a soft cover of your book, you must have two unique ISBN numbers.

The ISBN itself is a 10-digit number that is divided into four parts separated by hyphens. The first part of the ISBN is a group or country identifier. The second part is a publisher identifier. The third part is a title identifier. The last digit is a check digit used to validate the ISBN. In other words, the ISBN is a code that identifies your book around the world. You can apply for an ISBN number by contacting Bowker, who is the U.S. broker for ISBN numbers.

Now for the Universal Product Code (UPC), also known as the Bar Code. This is a computerized product identification system. The ISBN is not the same thing as your Bar Code. Most retail chains require both a ISBN Number and Bar Code. However, the ISBN Number can be translated into bar code format. When you purchase your ISBN number through Bowker, you can also purchase the Bar Code, or you can find a list of UPC Code (or Bar Code) suppliers here.

A common issue we frequently handle with photographs we receive is the dreaded "red eye". It's unavoidable, one out of three pictures a client gives us inevitably has one person or more in the picture with red eye. Most professional photographers know how to avoid it, and at the very least, know how to correct it in post production image editing. The point here is how much money you can save in book production/image editing costs if your designer doesn't have to do this work for you. But let's face it, not everyone has the know-how to fix their photographs.



News comes down today in the New York Times that now anyone can go online, upload their photos and fix red eye easily. It is has been a long time coming, but it's finally here. Online photo editing in the form of Adobe Photoshop Express. Of course, it's in beta right now, so I'm sure there are some glitches to be smoothed out. But generally, the service offers storage of your images, easy editing for removal of red eye and other options that range from the useful (cropping, exposure, etc) to the slightly tacky and quite unnecessary graffiti. Personal choices for everyone I'm sure. Even more useful is the "UNDO" feature for those of us who might get carried away.....

Save the difficult image editing and effects to the pros, but red-eye? Adobe just made that easier for you.

One of the challenges a designer faces is that sometimes (well, more than sometimes....) we have less than perfect images to work with for creating the client's book. That's where image editing can take a good picture and turn it into a great picture. And honestly, from a designer's standpoint; the better the image, the better the book.

Often all that an image requires is a little retouching. That can be something as simple as the removal of red eye or perhaps turning a color photograph into a black and white image to provide a more visual impact. Then there are the bigger challenges like removing background "noise" (i.e.: items or individuals) from a photograph.


This is an example of a picture the client had of her parents at her wedding. Of course this was a photograph that had to go into the book, but every time the client looked at the image, she saw those pesky uninvited people standing in the background. They would just have to go! Figure B reflects the image editing we did so that we could use this picture in our client's book.

Another example of making an image work is the one below. The client had a picture with her newborn baby. Again, this was a must have in the client's book. But as you can see....it was too dark to use (see, or not see Figure A).


Fortunately, editing the image enabled us to brighten it enough to use the picture (see Figure B) and actually the end result made this one of her favorite pages in the book.

Unless you are blessed with being a professional photographer, you can assume that a percentage of images you provide us with will require some kind of image editing. The end result will be well worth the investment.

Have you gone outside today? Spring is definitely in the air and the cherry blossoms are out. Well, at least in Washington, D.C. they are. And that's a really big deal! They have a festival to commemorate the gift of 3,000 cherry trees given to Washington, D.C. in 1912 by Mayor Yukio Ozaki of Tokyo. It didn't stop there either, the US and Japan have been exchanging/gifting trees to each other for sometime now and in 1999 a new cutting from a Japanese tree, reputed to be over 1500 years old was gifted to Washington, D.C.

To commemorate the big festivities (two weeks worth of events!), Lulu.com is holding a photo contest to create a beautiful calendar for 2009. So all you photographers, get out there and shoot some cherry blossoms, then submit them to the contest.

When you are all cherry blossomed out, let us help you create a beautiful book with the rest of your festival photos!!

Just finished another great book that was lots of fun to design. I know, I know...I say that about all the books. This one is going to be a one year anniversary present from a wife to her husband. I really had fun working with the client, as it appears from working with her, she must be as organized as I am. All the digital images and files were transferred to us separated in folders by sequence of events. Remember my post on how organizing images makes life easier for the designer? Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!

It was a "Good Thing" (as Martha Stewart says...) that my client took the time to organize the files, as we were working on an extremely short deadline if she was going to be able to give it to her husband on their anniversary. My client was very creative with her ideas and open to suggestions from us on how to make it the best book it could be. I think we were both satisfied with the end results. I'd sure love to be there when he sees it.

Click here to view the book

There are so many POD’s (Print/Publish On Demand) services cropping up daily because they now have the book production technology to finally provide self-publishing authors with a way to get their books into print without costing them an arm and a leg.

More exciting than finally getting that novel of yours printed, is the other avenues that have opened up because of POD’s. We might not all be blessed with writing skills, but for sure we’ve all got something to say or something to share.

Like it or not, there is a mass appeal to be able to publish your own cookbook, how-to book, family photos, a tribute to your pet, or book of your photography. Now that POD’s are flooding the market, you can easily get your book printed for under $50, and have it look like something you bought at Borders. Provided of course, you hire a talented book design agency such as Picturia Press to do the layout... And just like that, you can tell your friends you are a “published author”. And who doesn’t find an appeal to that? I bet you’re digging out your old photographs as we speak. Honestly, who can truly deny the lure of ego gratification at a cost we can afford?

Of course many people have ambitions (perhaps delusions?) that they will sell millions of copies of their books. Who’s to say that won’t happen? Some people are just targeting a narrow niche, like a fund raising cookbook. Others are just content to have a beautifully produced book to sit on their coffee table, or perhaps just give as gifts to their friends.

The beauty of it all is that we now have another channel to express our individuality, creativity and words. And the good news is, the window of opportunity just swung wide open.

Deadlines are looming but the good news is I am passionate about my work. Some days it seems like an effortless engagement other days I need to take a time out and detox from my computer. But it seems that even when I take time away from my work, I'm still at the computer looking at what everyone else is doing. Now, the great thing about that is what you can really stumble upon. I really like author Tim Ferriss, and his book, "The 4-Hour Workweek". Even more so, I like his blog, here's just one of his recent entries: -21-day-no-complaint-experiment. Read this article and it may just change your life..... I'm only on day two.

Now back to my work in progress. and on the schedule for this week.

Wedding Album

Baby Blog Book

I am actively seeking photographers who are interested in having a book created by us to be submitted and reviewed by renowned experts in the field of photography. Blurb is hosting an international symposium and a competition for photography books. The deadline for submitting books is July 14, 2008. Please email me if you are interested in this photo competition.

Today I made a customer happy by completing the design and layout of his new coffee table book. He was a lot of fun to work with and we became on such good terms that he's invited me visit him whenever I'm in his neck of the woods!


The client takes pictures for a hobby, but I must say he's got a very good eye and I really loved some of his pictures. The challenge here was getting the high resolution pictures from him to us and explaining why a low resolution picture can look good on your computer screen, but not in print. That is a common problem customers have....

By the end of the project, by George, I think he got it. I also worked with him to understand the FTP (file transfer protocol) process. Typically Picturia Press works with clients to receive their files this way rather than having them email photos (forget about it, impossible!) or mail CD's<(too time consuming/expensive). I recommend CuteFTP or Fetch as a free FTP program.

Click here to view the book!

We've just finished an amazing book this week. Yes, another one. This was a blog that a client wanted converted to a 10 x 8 book. The good thing about using Blurb software for blog books is the "slurping" feature they offer. The process of getting all the images and blog text from a person's blog downloaded to your computer and imported to the software. This makes life much, much easier.

My customer had been keeping a daily blog on her children's every day life for a year. Details, commentaries and pictures to go with each entry. Wow. This is a great gift to give your children when they grow up and it is her desire to create these books for each year. Can you imagine? Think about all the little things we miss or forget over the years and you could just pull one of these books off the shelf and read about yourself at age 9!! I love the idea.

Blog books are invariably more complicated then say just a book of photography. There's quite a bit of editing required, and the correct layout of images with text and captions. Our client's book ended up being around 118 pages. Be prepared when creating a blog book for a long design turnaround time.
Click here to view the book!