Although in the past I haven't given Blurb great reviews, I keep coming back to them. And this time, here is why: Getting an ISBN number for your book and Set Your Price program

So now Blurb allows you to set your own prices in order to make a profit off your books that they sell and print for you. Awesome. And they have given some info on their blog about getting an ISBN number assign to your books. Within that posting they give a link to another blogger's entry concerning how to get that number. Even better!

The guide on how to get that ISBN number suggests buying only one. To me this seems like a lame idea because the US authority will sale it to you for $125 whereas 10 will cost you around $250. I don't know about you, but the 10 for $250 seems like a better deal. "But I'm only publishing one book" you say. That may be true today. But what if you want to sell the book in paperback and hardbound? That'll require two different ISBNs. Say you want to revise the book. Yet another ISBN. Say you enjoyed writing and publishing your very own book so much you want to do it again and you have this great idea. Those ISBNs add up and so do the fees. Either way, I strongly suggest getting the number yourself so that YOU are the publisher not someone else selling them at $55 each. You went through the work so claim the credit.

For anyone interested in flower photography...

I recently picked up a book on the subject and I have to say I really enjoy the photographer's work within. Instead of taking the typical landscape photographer approach when photographing flowers, the author/photographer of this book approached flower photography that resulted in a much more interruptive, creative, and abstract images. This is the approach I myself strive to take with my own work and the images found here on my web site. I'm not much of a fan of what I consider the "documentary photography" approach to photographing flowers. Not to say that approach is wrong or lacks skill, its just I particularly don't enjoy the product of that approach.

Anyway, for those interested in flower photography, I recommend checking out "Photographing flowers" by Sue Bishop. My recommendation is mainly set on her approach above all else. The book of course covers which equipment to use and why and provides suggestions and all that typical of such a book. But its the almost out of focus images that do it for me. Which brings me to my other reason: it has some great images. In the end this book helps encourage the reader/viewer to get into the weird and really explore the subject.

Two tips she has that I particularly found interesting is 1. use aluminum foil as a background. The result is the foil will act as a mirror and reflect back the flower your are trying to photograph which gives a nice blurred and natural looking background instead of using just an all black or all white background. I would assume foil will likely be better than a mirror because the foil can be wrinkle but still reflect. The result helps to produce a blurry background. And 2: you don't necessarily need to shot fresh flowers. Flower pedals tend to curl or bend into interesting shapes when they begin to wilt. If you catch them just at the right time they will do this but retain a good amount of color as well.

I'm not really sure why the documentary style is more popular. It seems tough to find other photographers rejecting this style for something else. Perhaps that's a good thing for me.

My mother and my girlfriends parents asked for a copy of my book, "Sandwiched Lunch", as a Christmas gift this year. I made a few modifications (fixed a few typos and added some brightness to a few images, and changed the book's background from black to white). This is when the problems started.

Back in August of this year, I had no problems with Blurb's software. All of the color images use a custom color profile I assign based on my film scanner. All of the black and white images have Adobe RGB 1998 assigned as Blurb's software doesn't accept images with Gamma 1.8 assigned as a profile. When I wanted to make a few modifications I was forced to download the new version of their software. This is one of the problems I have with Blurb: to make revisions, you are forced to upgrade to the latest version which may or may not have new bugs introduced.

The new version would not display my color images. I contacted their customer support and reported the problem. Their response was to delete a hidden directory that apparently stores custom settings. Why they do not use the ~/Library/Preferences directory in OS 10 is beyond me. Anyway, I deleted it as instructed but that didn't fix my problem. So I tried doing some investigative work myself. The color images won't display at all, but the black and white images display just fine. Hmmm.....I thought well maybe its the difference in color profiles. So I converted the profile from the custom to Adobe RGB 1998 in a single color image and re-imported it. That worked. Ahhhh....it appears that BookSmart no longer supports custom color profiles. In my opinion this won't do; you gotta support custom profiles.

So another email was sent to customer support explaining what I found and I asked them to write up a bug report in hopes they'd address the problem in a future release. Their next response was to wait until the next version is released as it has "big improvements". To me, this sounded like support was just brushing me aside in hopes I'd go away. So I sent back another email asking if this new version has a fix for this particular problem. I also asked for a past version of the BookSmart software as the previous version worked fine for me (I upgraded my computer and didn't bother copying that application over). Support claimed my problem has been reported by several customers and indeed this new release will address my problem. And customers are forced to use the latest version as the software is tied to their printers. OK, I said. Not entirely happy waiting, but I will and I'll give them a chance.

Once the new version came out, I downloaded and verified the new software addressed my problem. It did not. I sent another email to support and the reply back to me was, "Well, hello there. While we’re always happy to hear from Blurbarians, we are no longer responding to emails sent to this address.". That's not a good auto-reply from any customer support. I emailed someone that helps write their blog and she had me read their FAQ and Help section and if I couldn't find what I was looking for she suggested I contact support. I responded that support doesn't seem to be accepting emails any longer and she then told me that the proper folks have been notified.

Then I did finally receive an email from support telling me that I may have corrupted images. Obviously, they never actually read my email outlining the problem in detail. They also asked if all of my photos are in JPG or PNG format and using sRGB. sRGB!?!?! Oh and they claimed that Adobe RGB 1998 is different and could be my blocking issue. Now I really know they didn't read my email as I explicitly stated using Adobe RGB 1998 is my workaround. I quickly sent a reply pleading that they stop using sRGB and encourage them to support custom color profiles. Their reply back was that my message has been reported to their printing department (on 12/2/06). As of today I haven't received any response on the issue.

Since I need to get the book finished and printed in time for Christmas, I decided just to convert all my color images to Adobe RGB. The books arrived on Thursday or Friday of last week. After all of this some of the images printed with problems, most notably one of the three that appeared on the cover.

I think the redeeming value of all of this is the price isn't bad. At this point I don't there is much more to Blurb.

Finally last night my book from SharedInk.com arrived.

I ordered I believe a 26 page linen hardcover book which cost around $45 ($39.95 for 20 pages and $1.00 for each additional page) and measured 11" x 8.25". Also, I went with the color red for the color. I don't think I would normally order such a book with the color red as the cover but since I was just evaluating print quality and general craftsmanship, I said what the hell.

The cover has a print, I believe, glued to the cover. At this point, I'm not sure how long that will last. I'm sure it will depend on how the book is handled. The cover print appears to be secured to the cover. The first and very last pages are of high textured paper that is slightly brown with multi-colored specs. The pages that the photographs are printed on, however, are glossy (but thankfully not too glossy - you can't see your face in them). Also, each photograph is shown in full with no cropping. This attribute, to me, is actually a feature. I enjoy using the full frame to compose a photograph and I rather not crop. If I do have to crop, I try to do as little as possible. So seeing the photographs in full view without cropping is really nice.

I believe the book from SharedInk is about 1/2 inch shorter and narrower than the book from Shutterfly. If I had to choose between the two formats, I would choose the dimensions of the Shutterfly book. The book from Shutterfly seems easier on your eyes. However, the SharedInk book is only a 1/2 inch smaller.

What I like about it: I agree with the review I read on this service. Its great. The print quality is great and its very nice that they actually use color management and convert your profile to match theirs. Unfortunately, I couldn't find their profile to soft proof the book. But no matter, the color and neutral tone grays turned out great. Also, the cover and binding looked great. I can tell I got what I paid for with this book.

What I disliked: It would be nice to get a copy of their profile to soft proof before I submitted an order. And once again, this book doesn't have the book title or anything else for that matter printed on the spine. If and when its put on a bookshelf, how do people know what it is without pulling it from the shelf? This is a problem I see with all 3 book printers I've used.

Conclusion: The book is fantastic. It photographs look great, the cover looks great, and the binding appears solid. The company will get my business any time I need to compile a portfolio (speaking of which...). I think I'll save Shutterfly for projects that I need quality but I need to also save a few bucks. Also Shutterfly will be good if I need a decent amount of books printed.

Read the review from Nature Photographers here. That review is probably a much better review than the one here.

I recently got in contact with 2 small run POD printers. One is located in Illinois and the other in British Columbia.

After a few back and forth in email, I had to rule out the printer in Illinois as they are unable to print 12x8 books. The other quoted me something around $23 - $24 CDN per book for 100 books. That looks like a good quote assuming the quality is good. And at this point, I'm going to assume it is. I'm sure they will provide proofs.

Now because I want to have a printer to print my books only as orders to buy the book come in, I really don't want to buy a large quantity of books at a time. In other words: I don't want to fork over cash up front.

So I think I'm going to call the printer up and talk to them. Their web site claims they provide distribution services so it may be possible to get what I want. I have a ton of questions and depending on their answers I may have even more. Because of that I think its best that I actually talk to them over the phone which I plan to do very soon.

My target price of each book is no more than $25 - $30. I think if I can get it to $20 - $25, more people are likely to at least think about buying a copy. It would be sooo nice to get the book on Amazon.com and maybe even one or two other online book retailers. We'll see.

As I stated in the previous post, I made an order with Blurb, Shutterfly, and SharedInk. The order with the latter two services is meant to evaluate their service and printing quality.

I placed the order with Shutterfly on 8/28 and received it on 8/30. That's incredibly fast!!! I was amazed to see the book at my front door of my apartment so soon. Kudos to you Shutterfly!

Now on to the actual book. The book I ordered is 27 pages, brown suede cover, and each page has only one photo printed on it. The book costs, I believe, $29.95 for 20 pages plus $1.00 per additional page ($36.95 + shipping + taxes). Also, because I just wanted to check out their color print quality the book has no text except for the title page.

I think the book looks great. I'm not a big fan of the cut out in the front cover, though I can see many who probably do enjoy it. But at the same time it doesn't really bother me. The print quality looks great. I would like to see the same book sitting side by side to a book printed on a 4 color press. Although I don't have one to compare it to, I'm very happy with the quality of digital printing. Comparing it to the quality of the Blurb book is tough for me. I don't see any difference, though I'm sure someone with a trained eye could. I will go with Shutterfly's color reproduction however. I think they do a better job over Blurb at getting the colors as close as possible.

What I like about the book:
- I really really enjoy the size format. 12x8" (bound on the 8" side) is great. This aspect ratio is great for a photography book. Compared to Blurb's 10x8, the 12x8 has it beat. The images are bigger, you have more room for more text, and the images look better in a book this size compared to a 10x8 book. I think I want the finished book to be this size. Receiving this book from Shutterfly made me realize that these one off printers are great for prototyping. Plus along the way in the process you are likely to get more ideas which only helps improve your finished book.

- The suede cover feels nice. It would make for a great special edition.

What I do not like about the book:
- My biggest annoyance is there is no text on the cover. I would like to have had the title printed on the spine of the book. If I were to place this in a bookcase, I will have no idea which book it is and I can imagine the frustration having more than one of these books stored in the same bookcase.

Verdict - Blurb VS. Shutterfly:
Shutterfly.

Why? Shutterfly's delivery is super fast. Color reproduction is better (it would be nice to know if either actually uses the color profiles attached to the uploaded images) with Shutterfly. And books printed by Shutterfly are made using their web interface and not a buggy, slow, and still in beta Java application as is the case with Blurb. Also, Shutterfly's service seems to have been around a while and thus had time to iron out the kinks. I believe Blurb opened their doors during the first of this year and it shows. Don't get me wrong, I like Blurb and the books they make. Blurb's books are cheaper. But at this point in time if I had to choose one over the other, my choice is Shutterfly. I hope to see Blurb continue improving their service and their software.

I'm still waiting on the SharedInk book. Their web site states I should expect it the first week in September. As soon as I get it, you can bet I'll report my thoughts on it.

Friday night I finally uploaded a corrected version of the book to Blurb.com and made an order. Then on Saturday while building a "Best of" book I realized I never added one particular photograph to the book. Argh! So just moments ago I added that image to the book and modified the page it would appear on within the book. And yet again, I made another order. So I'll have two copies coming within about 10 days, though only one is the finished book (the *true* finished book).

The "Best of" book was designed with no text and only 26 images. I picked what I thought were 26 of the best images from the book. Its meant to show off what I believe is the best of the best AND to demo 2 print services (SharedInk.com and Shutterfly.com). Those should arrive roughly the same time as the Blurb.com book. After using 3 different services, I'll be able to see which one I like most and which is the worse. Then I plan on using the best to print off a portfolio (maybe 2 portfolios) and various other themed books.

Also, I am working on something else and if it pans out I'll report on it. If it does not, I'll just move on to the next thing.

Yesterday I received my rough draft (1st printing) copy of my book from Blurb.com. And I was very excited opening the box.

I ordered it the evening of August 12th and received on the 21st (about 9 total days from order placement to my hands).

Here's what I thought about the book: My opinion on the book overall is I think its great. I have a few complaints on the book but for the most part I like it. For 40 some dollars, I'm happy with the purchase.

A little about the book: 8x10" book with 72 pages. Blurb adds two sheets of paper to the book; one page to the front and back. These sheets are white (all my pages in the book have a black background) and they appear to be apart of the binding of the book. I have a mixture of full color photographs and black and white photographs. The total number of photographs is 116 with 83 of those images being color and the remaining 33 images are black and white. Within their software (I used version 1.2.1.8973 [r1]), I created a "Text and Pictures" FreeStyle book. Besides the Instant Classic books, I am unable to tell a difference between a "Photo Book" and a "Text and Pictures" book. Both seem to have both pictures and text.

Things I liked about the book:
1. Of course I loved seeing my photographs in a book for the first time. So cool!

2. The color photographs look great. Except for a few that seem a little too dark, the color images printed very well. I'm happy with the quality and the color of each one. The dark images I believe are really my problem. I've noticed I seem to print a little too dark even on my inkjet at home compared to the image on the screen. This is not a problem as I printed this book with the intention of making it a rough draft. I think I can correct it in the next printing I plan to have.

3. Except for a spacing problem detailed in the next section, the text printed well too. No problems that I can see. My only complaint is BookSmart needs support for additional fonts (it currently supports only 2).

Things I didn't like about the book:
1. The hardcover doesn't have the name of the book and my name printed on it. I don't believe any mention of this is on Blurb's web site, however I except it when a book ships with a dust cover. The dust cover looks like but I feel its a pain to deal with when handling a book. I usually remove the dust covers of my books when I'm reading them and I put them back on when I put the book back on the shelf. So during the times the book is without its cover, I like to be able to see the name of the book printed on the hardcover itself. Plus, dust covers tear and bend easily. Sometimes, I'll remove the dust cover completely. If I do that with this book, I'll never know what the name of the book is without opening it first.

2. Black and White printing is so so in my opinion. I'm not a big B&W photographer but some of the images don't seem to be printed well. There are a few (most of them look great) that seem to have a slight color cast and my guess is its a slight blue cast. What is so odd about this problem is the cast appears to be only on a few images, not all of them.

3. There is a problem in the version of BookSmart I used in which sometimes spaces in between words do not appear. I noticed this while making the book. The problem only occurs once in a great while. While editing the book you will notice that two words don't have a space between them. Then you double click the textbox and you'll see the space. Click outside the box and the space disappears again. Before making the order, I wondered if the problem would show in the actual printed book. I took a chance and went through with the order. Looking over the book, I only noticed it once. I emailed support about this problem and customer support told me that there is a new version of BookSmart coming out that week (that was early last week) that would address a crashing bug I found as well as include a new text engine that may address this spacing problem. I haven't seen the new version yet. I think I'll wait one more week for Blurb to make it available and give it a try. Either way, after that week I'll make another upload of the changes to the book and make another order.

What I would like to see Blurb provide in the future:
1. Improved version of BookSmart. Fix the crashing problems, add more fonts, and fix the spacing problem discussed in the previous section.

2. Offer real publishing services to self publishers. As I see it currently, Blurb is another coffee table book printer and a good one at that. However, I remember reading an interview with Blurb's CEO where she discusses self publishing with ISBN numbers, etc. She claimed that such services would eventually be made available but as of this writing they are still not. What I would really like to be able to do is publish my own book: have someone print it for me for no up front costs at a reasonable rate and make a distribution package available so that I can make the book available in bookstores across the entire US. I'm currently exploring Lulu.com but I haven't tried them yet and I've heard mixed reviews on their color print quality. I think this can be done and I think it can be done reasonable cheap but with high digital print quality (granted not full color press quality but close). I can't wait till a time I can publish a photo book and have it on Amazon.com or asking my local bookstore to carry it without paying several thousand dollars up front to a printer.

Just so everyone is clear, this is the first photo coffee table book I've ever made so that may affect the way I judge the printed pages and the book overall. I still plan on using Shutterfly and SharedInk.com. I plan on giving reviews to the books from these services as well.

So my next step is to note the problems, fix them, and re-upload the book to Blurb and make another purchase. Hopefully this is the final version.

Earlier today I received an email from Blurb.com that my rough draft has shipped. I'm guessing I'll have it by Monday or Tuesday of next week.

Once I get it in my hands, I'll evaluate their print quality. If I like it, I'll look over it again and note any changes I want done. The next step is to make the changes in their software and make another order.

Blurb's tech support has told me that a new version of their BookSmart software is due out this week (looks like it'll be next week) that is suppose to have a new text engine and will address a crashing bug I have encountered (only seems to occur with lots of large sized images). Hopefully the new text engine will address the software sometimes not displaying blank spaces between words.

Anyway, figures are crossed concerning their print quality (I really hope its great).

Sometime yesterday evening I uploaded my rough draft to Blurb. Just beforehand I finished entering all the text and giving it a good once over. Now I wait for it be printed and mailed to me.

I also found a photographer documentary book contest on the Web. Basically they are looking for someone that has never had their work published in a book. The reward is something like $3000, book publishing, and a national tour of the book to promote it. The deadline is September 12th and the winner is announced in January 2007. At this point I'm wondering if I should put the book on hold and enter this contest. If it doesn't pan out I continue with my original idea and if I win then awesome! We'll see.

Also, I'm having second thoughts about Lulu's printing quality. I'm not sure if it will be up to par after reading another review of their service. Apparently the reviewer received some books with white boarders on the top of pages because of inconsisent cutting of the paper. I emailed someone that had 3 photo essays printed by Lulu and asked for their opinion. I figure if someone uses Lulu for 3 books something must be good. I also started looking around for other possible solutions. Errr....printing a full color book around 70 pages is tough especially if you don't want to fork over money upfront.