Have you made a photo book? If you haven't then SoFoBoMo 2011 might be the perfect way to start: "SoFoBoMo is short for Solo Photo Book Month - a group event where a bunch of photographers all make solo photo books start to finish in 31 days."
This is a nice way to get started, as there is no pressure to perform, but plenty of support from others who are taking part. In 2011, SoFoBoMo runs from 1st July to 31st August. Already 23 people have pledged to take part.
I have taken part twice, in 2009 and in 2010. Last year I finished three photo books, which was a surprise as I wasn't originally sure I could make one. I wrote some practical instructions on how to make both a good-quality pdf file and a printed book with Blurb, using the Apple Pages software (and Ghostscript to generate pdfs and jpegs).
Here is the list of photo books which I have done in 2009-2010:
- Summer in black and white squared (SoFoBoMo 2010; 14 MB PDF file)
- Blurb version available
- Impressions of Midsummer's Eve (SoFoBoMo 2010; 4 MB PDF file)
- Blurb version available
- Filling the square: play and dream (SoFoBoMo 2010; 6 MB PDF file)
- Blurb version available
- A Walk in Copenhagen (SoFoBoMo 2009; 8 MB PDF file)
- Blurb version available
- Wetness of Spring (1 MB PDF file)
Of these, I like best the Midsummer book, which was done in two days: 12 hours to take photographs and a couple of hours to do the typesetting. It is rough, but also spontaneous.
And this reminds me of the recent discussion about themes. I thought about this in connection to photo books, and there the idea of a theme is most natural, and in fact the key to making a photo book in the first place.
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3 comments:
Juha, thanks for mentioning it - I am buried in work and would most certainly have forgotten.
This post's image works well for me: dynamic, and the strong light source at the end of the (mounting) diagonal form a positive exclamation mark.
Well, there is still plenty of time to prepare. (Or maybe not being prepared is the better approach...)
I have to admit I am glad that there is some time to go until it starts - at the moment my workload is really high (but interesting), and there are quite a number of days where I don't make a single picture...
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