During the last CNP meet everyone felt we need to bring out a CNP coffee table book! This will be non-commercial effort and the book will be available for buying at cost price. Several CNPians have volunteered to complete this huge task which probably will take more than 6 months of effort (since this not our full time job). There were multiple discussions/views/suggestions among group of folks during the meet. We plan to take this effort with all your support.
We would like to share the proposed plan as it stands today! Please stay tuned and share your views/suggestions. When we complete this task we will have the book to see, enjoy and feel proud off! We need all your support to complete this huge effort. We will keep you updated with the progress we make in this thread.
- CNP Staff
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The current sketch of the plan
What it takes to bring out a book?
- Selection of images
- Written/mail consent from copyright owners (CNPians)
- Preparing written content for the book (what and how - design)
- Review of the written content
- Preparing high resolution images/processing images for an uncompromising quality print
- Book design - cover designs, internal layout designs, fitting images, written content to chosen layout
- Soft Proofing, book as PDF (a side product)
- Choosing appropriate print media
- Reviewing first copy
- Review feedback incorporation
- Working with a publisher (probably we will take self publishing route)
- final printed copies in hand!
Structure of the teams & responsibilities (arrived based on interest/volunteering)
- Book Design Team (Saurabh Desai, Lila - both of them seem to have design team/design background, RD, Ganesh)
- Responsible for designing the book using Adobe InDesign (or whatever the chosen book design software)
This includes front/back cover design and internal layout of the book with images and written content (Saurabh and his team)
- Providing suggestions/review feedback on overall design (Lila/RD/Ganesh)
- Image Selection Team (VMR, Ramesh Adkoli, Shankar Kiragi, Praveen P Mohandas, Nevil, Nirlep, Adithya Biloor, Jayesh Joshi)
This team will select N images based on the selection criteria below (we need to decide on total number of images)
This will be a tough job, we have over 9000 images to go through!
- Image Post Processing Team (Raj/Ganesh/Saurabh(if he has time)/Ashwini Kumar Bhat/Shivakumar L/Ravi Prakash SS)
This team processes each image using fully calibrated print workflow. We should make every attempt to preserve the artistic intent of the creator of the image.
The owner of the image prepares the high resolution image matching her/his creative intent. Final tweaking for the print workflow will be done by this team.
- Written content team (VMR & Nirlep)
- Based on the selected images this team prepares written content
- Content review team (Lila, Sriharsha, Shivakumal L)
- This team is responsible for review of the written content - syntax and semantics.
- QA team (RD/Vikas/Ganesh)
- Responsible for ensuring final uncompromising quality of the book! The book will not be mass printed without the approval by this team
- Working with a chosen publisher (Saurabh + whomever he chooses to support him)
Book size & paper type
TBD
Image Selection Criteria
Timeless
Fair mix of natural history and art
Fair mix of color & B/W
Having enough resolution to be able to print at 300dpi for the chosen size
(this means we need 300 pixels to make 1 inch print. For example an image of dimension 900 pixels x 600 pixels can only yield 3 inches x 2 inches print)
Image Selection Process (to be followed by the image selection team)
- Each member of the image selection team selects N "timeless" images except her/him own
- The image belongs to a person who is currently a member of CNP and agrees for its non-commercial use in the book
- The team debates,collates and make a final selection of N images (We will print M images, M<N)
- Request for high resolution files will be sent along with written consent for the intended use
- Ensures the needed quality for printing in those high resolution files
- The team will hand over M high resolution images to the post processing team.
Proposed start date
1 June 2016
Proposed end date
1 Jan 2017
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Summary of suggestions/thoughts/views so far.
For the text - as we had discussed in Dandeli, how about considering the valuable and thoughtful comments that are there in the gallery / discussion forum.
Many times it has so happened that the comments have gone beyond that particular image which has triggered the thread. The challenge is to find out such instances and dig those comments which talk about 'creativity', 'composition', 'breaking the rule', etc in general and that can be worth of preserving.
As we all agree that it is not just the images but the discussions like these that has happened around these images which has made this forum what it is today.
Showcasing just the images as part of the book would mean to leave one entire part of the community. Having these thoughtful comments / articles in between the images would give more holistic pleasure to the reader and reduce our effort in coming up with separate text to describe each of the finally selected images.
Most CT books are made with a theme. But I can visualise CNP CT book will be close to WPY yearly book.
Can we also include a page introducing the rationale behind starting CNP and the thoughts behind creating this platform from your POV? I guess it will act as a great starting point for people to start enjoying the images. Also are we considering grouping images into specific themes, like BW, Blurs and OOFs, Abstracts etc?
1. Do we have one write-up in the beginning followed by pictures without words or we want to have write-up with each picture
2. Coming to Shankar's poser; do we divide the book into various sub-themes with write-up for each. How do we include photographers' own vision behind his/her pictures
3. Will the pictures be color only
4. Foreword by the core editorial team touching upon the need to have a forum like CNP and the way ahead
5. Ashwin's point about including interesting comments would make the book more engrossing
and distressed borders for pictures?
Unlike an exhibition a book has certain unique features
- It is permanently available to one for repeated viewing: So we must make the viewer go back and find new meaning over a period of time
- It is a little more controlled experience in terms of sequencing and pairing of images. You can see a contrast from two facing images
- A visual experience which makes you come back to it see it again think about it and give you that "Aha" moment
Therefore
In that sense I was thinking an uninterrupted flow of images as a well as thought out sequence based on a philosophy rather than subject centric
We should sequence flow of images to a theme and we should pair images to add to the ability to uncover new meanings and open new conversations within and without
A philosophy foreword and in the end a description for each picture by page number ?
till which (uploaded) date we should consider images for selection? Till March 2015 or end of 2015 or ..?
How about choosing the cover image for the book? Has that been factored into the Image selection process? And defining the criteria for choosing the cover image