Page 1 of 2 12 LastLast
Results 1 to 10 of 16

Thread: Need advice on workflow for a book

  1. #1
    mortensen's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jul 2009
    Location
    Copenhagen, Denmark
    Posts
    451

    Need advice on workflow for a book

    My India project is about to start in its book form and I need some advice to make it smooth and hazzle free... lets see:

    I have 300+ Imacon scanned 4x5's on my hard drive. They are of course scanned on different scanners with different monitors and different (ie. inconsistent) profiles... so I guess I've already made my first f***ups...

    In the end it will hopefully be an offset printed book around 150 pages in a format slightly smaller than A3 landscape stuffed with full size color plates.

    But how should I approach all the work in-between in a manner suited for print? I will do all my adjustments in LR3, spotting/cleaning in PS and book design in ID. Everything is scanned @ 2040spi 16bit, so I'll work on my files with much bigger prints in mind than those for the book. Ideally (I think), I would downsize and 8-bit them in the last breath before printing.

    Should I use specific color profiles? DNG's? Should I have calibration done for my monitor? As you can read, I'm close to completely blank on this subject, although I've already made three photo books.
    Any advice or hints/links to useful articles or the best (short) book on the subject will be greatly appreciated, thanks

  2. #2

    Join Date
    Jun 2002
    Posts
    9,487

    Re: Need advice on workflow for a book

    Obviously you need to calibrate your monitor, although I never felt the need to get obsessive over it. Grey should be grey, black = black, white = well, white is never truly white... we never really dull our monitors down to the density of paper so you still have to use your imagination.

    You can do the InDesign layout with high-resolution RGB "master files" until you get the book into final form, or at least the photo selections made.

    Then "Export" for publishing and collection all of the chosen 150 images, fonts, and other components into an InDesign Export.

    Toss away everything in this folder except for the images.

    Manually open each image in Photoshop and downsize to 100% of print size and to the printer's optimal resolution. Convert, not Assign, the proper recommended CMYK profile.

    Either remove the master images files out of sight of InDesign (onto a separate drive) and do an auto-update, or manually insert the new press-ready images. Pay careful attention to size and position -- I use a consistent size and X-Y location (or a series of them based on a grid) and this is tedious, precise work.

    Also pay attention to having a consistent caption location and not having any edges too close to the trim lines, since a tiny error in trimming will look worse if the image's edge is only a few mm away.

    (I think most book designers ignore the width of the gutter and focus on the outer margins, but really you should determine how close to the gutter you can handle having your images and make other decisions starting there.)

    In the end you can export a press-ready PDF to the printer's specifications or send them the collection of InDesign and image files. Talk to your printer about the image resolution and color profiles they recommend. In the USA, I usually use 360 dpi and a SWOP/"uncoated or coated paper, offset or web" standard profile for general work sent to generic printers. (Better printers are more specific.)

    Frankly not everyone is suited for the precise pre-press, production work and you need to be disciplined here, more than most "artists". But in the end, it is simply careful grunt work that needs to be done by someone....

    The hardest work -- and most creative -- is in the editing and sequence, as you know. There are a lot of ways to tackle this but it is often nice to work out the sequence with smaller work prints laid out on the floor or tacked to a workroom wall. It is tempting to try to do it all on screen, and I have, but I also made a lot of proofs and alternative versions to test.

    Finally, now that one-off publishers like Blurb will print from PDFs, it might be good to run off a few cycles of Blurb books to get a good mock-up to handle.

  3. #3
    mortensen's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jul 2009
    Location
    Copenhagen, Denmark
    Posts
    451

    Re: Need advice on workflow for a book

    Thanks, Frank - much appreciated. So if I get it right, monitor calibration is first thing in my schedule. Afterwards I should continue to work with everything in RGB (DNG/TIFF/whatever) and wait with CMYK conversion till the end where I have the printer's desired profile as target?

    I have no problem with the precision work and consistency (apart from my scans...) when preparing the book. Thats all good. And yes, you're right, the selection, sequence and editing is by far the most difficult... and fun. Good idea with smaller prints to test arrangements and various sequences. I've usually done everything on screen, but thought that now was the time to get physical prints done... and yeah, blurb mock-ups must be the way to go.
    Thanks again! here's a couple of the shots:








  4. #4

    Join Date
    Nov 2007
    Posts
    295

    Re: Need advice on workflow for a book

    I gave my final book file to the printer this morning. The editing/sequencing process took me eight months; 234 pictures were cut to 72 (admittedly I have a part time job and a full time toddler at home, and another project on the boil). I thoroughly recommend you get some 4x6 or 5x7 prints done on the cheap and start to play with the order/sequence. Are you having prints on facing pages or blank left-hand pages?

    What I then did was start to play with the design in ID, and printed the results occasionally, in PDF, (at work - on colour laser printers) and made, eventually, 4 dummy versions of my book. The last dummy was made just 8 days before the file went to the printer and significant changes were made to the book even this late in the stage (2 pictures were eliminated completely to make way for a new double page spread shot only last Thursday)

    The dummy books are really worth doing. Do them 1:1, buy some cardboard and tape/glue the thing together, it will give you a great idea of how your book will be experienced. I clamped the pages together, drilled them with a tiny hole and tied them with fishing line, then gaffa taped that bundle to the scored cover.

    Get all this started before worrying about calibration etc. You don't want to waste time imaging pics that aren't going to make the cut. Once you know the edit and sequence start your final imaging.

    I had a friend set up another, final, ID document that I used to build the book once I knew exactly what was going where. I'd made so many changes/versions of the book that the file could easily have developed some quirks. My friend set up a "library" so that when I had a page with a large vertical on the right page, for instance, I would select the Vert_L_Right geometric shape in the library and choose 'place item'. This would ensure the box holding the pic went into the right place. It was quite quick to build the final book using this method.

    Ask your printer about bleeds and profiles etc and get all this sorted prior to doing the final build. Mine is to be digitally printed (Indigo machine). My printer has been fantastic. Always spending time explaining options to me and happy to run tests. I tested 3 papers, I did sharpness tests (same file - different levels of sharpness - remember to annotate). We tested a special orange colour for the title page.

    If you know someone familiar with ID I'd enlist their help, or maybe even pay someone to set up the file with master pages etc. It's worth having this all chicken-soup before you begin.

    Editing your own work is probably the hardest thing. Show the dummy books to people whose opinion you respect and ask them to be critical. Take what they say on board but ultimately trust your gut. It's your project.

    Hope this helps, your timing is spot on.

    Jon

  5. #5

    Join Date
    Jun 2002
    Posts
    9,487

    Re: Need advice on workflow for a book

    It looks like high quality work - good luck!

  6. #6

    Join Date
    Nov 2007
    Posts
    295

    Re: Need advice on workflow for a book

    Preview of my book here (requires flash)
    http://www.sharperstill.com/predominantly_orange/

  7. #7

    Join Date
    Jun 2002
    Posts
    9,487

    Re: Need advice on workflow for a book

    Haha I saw the title and groaned and then was really pleasantly surprised! Nice job.

    OK the back cover is a little busy but the layout is good too.

  8. #8

    Join Date
    Nov 2007
    Posts
    295

    Re: Need advice on workflow for a book

    Yeah, the back page has actually changed since then. It's all been tweaked to fit under the pic by my designer friend. I just couldn't be bothered re-exporting the PDF. I should do I suppose, or omit it from the preview....

    Did you groan at the title or description? I didn't realise until last week that the title is also the name of the Denver Broncos blog ! First three pages of google results were all about the broncos...

  9. #9

    Join Date
    Jun 2002
    Posts
    9,487

    Re: Need advice on workflow for a book

    I just thought it would be too cute and/or boring but it is very cool instead.

  10. #10

    Join Date
    Nov 2007
    Posts
    295

    Re: Need advice on workflow for a book

    Thanks Frank. Title came from the 2009 Manual for Uniform traffic Control. Fascinating document. It's weird. I never really set out to make it a major project. I just started seeing them/shooting them. Couldn't stop then got too much encouragement from friends to do a book. Getting a copyright royalty check a little while ago, for nearly the exact amount of the book and exhibition production costs, helped too..

Similar Threads

  1. advice on sinar f1
    By toby in forum Cameras & Camera Accessories
    Replies: 12
    Last Post: 1-Aug-2011, 14:29
  2. Book Release Announcement
    By Greg Miller in forum Announcements
    Replies: 1
    Last Post: 4-Oct-2008, 21:45
  3. The Worst Advice (in ANY format)
    By Kevin M Bourque in forum On Photography
    Replies: 50
    Last Post: 19-Aug-2007, 09:32
  4. Al Webers Book about time!!
    By Gustavo in forum Announcements
    Replies: 15
    Last Post: 8-Jan-2007, 16:46
  5. Good book on lens design for photographers
    By Edie in forum Lenses & Lens Accessories
    Replies: 4
    Last Post: 25-Aug-1999, 18:46

Bookmarks

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •