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Author Topic: Mark's article  (Read 4285 times)

Kenneth Sky

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Mark's article
« on: November 15, 2006, 11:18:36 pm »

Mark
Thanks for your informative article. Could you expand on some of the information? Who, what & where is Taylor and how did you find them. How did you print that number of different pictures and how did you collate them. What decision process was neccessary in deciding the paper size?
Thanks
Ken
(BTW, I wasn't sure what section of the forum to place this.)
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Mark D Segal

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« Reply #1 on: November 16, 2006, 09:54:19 am »

Kenneth, you are welcome.

Don Taylor's firm is called The Bookbinding Studio. HE is on John Street in downtown Toronto just North of Queen. The phone number is 416 591 8801.

I printed that number of dofferent pictures by first culling them from a total shoot of about 2400 shots and ranking them in Adobe Bridge. Then over a period of several months I processed them through ACR and PSCS2 one by one, keeping them in chronological order. There is only one image per page and the page size is all 8.5 by 11 inches. The usual print size is about 6 by 9 inches on the page, allowing about an inch margin all-round but that varies from image to image depending on cropping.

I use a Canon 1Ds which produces a "native" 6 by 9 inch image at 451 PPI if you do NOT resample (only re-dimension) in Photoshop. Keeping that number of PPI for an image this size then allows me to re-dimension (NOT resample) for A3 at anything in the range of 240 to 360 or so PPI depending on the cropping again. First I do all the images I wish to retain in letter size for these bindings. Then I go through the lot and see which ones simply cry-out for larger size. Alain Briot wrote an excellent article about right-sizing photographs. My approach is a bit more intuitive. When I look at a photograph and it tells me it's trying to reach beyond its borders, I know it needs to be bigger! I have no other decision process for the paper size, except that I like to make anything except family snapshots in the letter size range (family snaps usually smaller), and I don't find it practical or necessary in my cirumctances to exceed A3 for the "fine art" stuff.

When I collate two smaller shots on a letter size sheet I do what I mentioned in the article: create a standard blank template full page size for 360 PPI. Then I open each of the images to collate on that blank template and downsample them to 360 PPI at the dimensions I need to fit the page (it will comfortably hold two 4 by 6 inch images), then simply layer them onto the blank template, move them into position using the move tool and the grid, flatten, print, unflatten and remove the images from the template. This is the poor-man's procedure for those of us not using a RIP.

Hope this helps.
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Mark D Segal (formerly MarkDS)
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markhout

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« Reply #2 on: November 16, 2006, 10:05:26 am »

MarkDS - thanks for the ideas and the good write-up. Did you ever consider online bookprinting (such as the iPhoto-book offering and Blurb.com)? Surely your print quality is better, but I can see some trade-offs against investments in cost and time. Can I ask how much one would pay for binding a series of say five letter size books, with 100 prints each?

Thanks again,

Mark
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Ben Rubinstein

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« Reply #3 on: November 16, 2006, 10:18:46 am »

Interesting, I've been doing the same thing for a while for wedding proof books. I print two 7X5" prints per 8X12" page, send them off for batch printing at a reliable and cheap lab then take them to the binder to be made into a book albeit with a slightly more upmarket cover. My only problem has been that my binder cannot bind more than 75 pages to a book due to the thickness of the photo paper (Fuji Crystal Archive) making viewing the 2nd half of the book rather difficult with any more pages. Can I ask you what binding method your printer is using and if the book is easy to view and open even at the end of the book given the amount of pages you seem to be using?

I looked into the costs of doing the printing myself but for the volume I print inkjet is not a reliable solution and certainly not cost/time effective.
« Last Edit: November 16, 2006, 10:20:52 am by pom »
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tgphoto

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Mark's article
« Reply #4 on: November 16, 2006, 11:34:53 am »

Mark,

Great idea, and I enjoyed reading the article. Are you printing single- or double-sided?  I wonder if some of the double-sided art papers offered by Hahnemuhle would work?

Tim
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Mark D Segal

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« Reply #5 on: November 16, 2006, 12:25:08 pm »

Quote
MarkDS - thanks for the ideas and the good write-up. Did you ever consider online bookprinting (such as the iPhoto-book offering and Blurb.com)? Surely your print quality is better, but I can see some trade-offs against investments in cost and time. Can I ask how much one would pay for binding a series of say five letter size books, with 100 prints each?

Thanks again,

Mark
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=85595\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Mark, when I started doing this those services didn't exist. I've looked into them since - not cost-effective, I don't have the same choices/quality control for either the prints or the binding style. I find doing my own printing and selecting the binding materials to suit the subject matter very important to my ultimate satisfaction.

Don charges me 60 CAN dollars for each book, using very good quality cloth on hard-board and archival end-papers. Re-processed leather also looks VERY nice, but is more time-consuming to work with so that will be more expensive, but I have a couple of volumes coming up by year-end that would be well-suited to that look and feel (Old London) so I think I'll go for it.
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Mark D Segal (formerly MarkDS)
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Mark D Segal

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« Reply #6 on: November 16, 2006, 12:30:24 pm »

Quote
Interesting, I've been doing the same thing for a while for wedding proof books. I print two 7X5" prints per 8X12" page, send them off for batch printing at a reliable and cheap lab then take them to the binder to be made into a book albeit with a slightly more upmarket cover. My only problem has been that my binder cannot bind more than 75 pages to a book due to the thickness of the photo paper (Fuji Crystal Archive) making viewing the 2nd half of the book rather difficult with any more pages. Can I ask you what binding method your printer is using and if the book is easy to view and open even at the end of the book given the amount of pages you seem to be using?

I looked into the costs of doing the printing myself but for the volume I print inkjet is not a reliable solution and certainly not cost/time effective.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=85597\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Ben, these are stitched and glued hard-cover bindings. He uses less than an eighth of an inche at the edge of the paper to punch a series of very small holes down the page, and stitches them altogether through those holes. Then the whole block of sheets is glued to a backing material before he puts the covers on. They open very easily from start to finish with a maximum of 110 sheets of Epson Enhanced Matte. I'm not sure that Fuji Crystal Archive is any heavier, but perhaps. Of course, as the paper gets heavier the amount you can bind in reduces if you still want easy handling from start to finish.
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Mark D Segal (formerly MarkDS)
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Mark D Segal

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« Reply #7 on: November 16, 2006, 12:33:07 pm »

Quote
Mark,

Great idea, and I enjoyed reading the article. Are you printing single- or double-sided?  I wonder if some of the double-sided art papers offered by Hahnemuhle would work?

Tim
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=85607\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Timothey, thanks. YES - double sided papers such as Hahnemuhle Fine Art or MOAB Kayenta would work. I print single-sided because that way I don't need to worry about two printed surfaces being pressed against eachother, or from an artistic perspective how the two prints look side by side in an open book. But obviously, two-sided gets you twice your money's worth!
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Mark D Segal (formerly MarkDS)
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Kenneth Sky

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« Reply #8 on: November 16, 2006, 01:13:33 pm »

Thanks again. I've got to try it. Although my family and friends are impressed with books I've had done online, I grit my teeth every time they open them. This appears to be a way for me to get some artistic satisfaction without cluttering the walls or bookshelves.
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