Tuesday, June 10, 2008

Photo Books

Vanity, thy name is Artist.

Or something like that. Anyway, I have a couple of long-term projects I've been working on and I'm thinking about printing some short-run books, or at least a proof, with Apple's iPhoto photo-book service. (I use a late-model Mac, and I have iPhoto '08. I also have a WXP P4 PC, but mostly I play games on that because it has a REALLY nice video card. :) )


Laying out for a book is a very new experience for me. I have lots of print portfolios, but I've never tried to lay out for any audience but a model or a photography client. A book needs to tell a cohesive story, in a way that a portfolio doesn't. (Portfolios do need to have good flow, but that's a little different.)

Just trying to pick the cover image is harder than I thought. It has to be landscape, and I almost never shoot landscape. The book's landscape too, which means I can either put multiple images on each page, or have a lot of blank space on either side. I'd really like to do this, but it's kind of intimidating. Anybody out there have any suggestions?

M

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Considering your experience and the fact that you're consistently becoming better and better, you could easily shoot specifically for a cover before putting it together (which I'm sure will be a lengthy process anyway).

As for the landscape internal pages, I think two images per page including an info block about who the model is, where it was taken, when it was taken, and perhaps a short artist statement would be appropriate. Any more than two would feel crowded.