Photomacrography (and more) book coming

A forum to ask questions, post setups, and generally discuss anything having to do with photomacrography and photomicroscopy.

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enricosavazzi
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Photomacrography (and more) book coming

Post by enricosavazzi »

I am working on the final phases of preparing a book, entitled "Digital photography for science: close-up photography, macrophotography and photomacrography". It will be printed in three volumes, mainly for size considerations (currently close to 700 pages in total, at the latest count).

If anyone is interested, a presentation of Volume 1 is available at:
https://www.createspace.com/pub/communi ... write=true
The list of chapters and preface are available at the above URL, and there is also an online form for leaving comments (any are welcome).

I have a little additional information also at:
http://savazzi.freehostia.com/photography/default.htm
--ES

kds315*
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Post by kds315* »

Sounds exciting Enrico - congrats!
Klaus

http://www.macrolenses.de for macro and special lens info
http://www.pbase.com/kds315/uv_photos for UV Images and lens/filter info
http://photographyoftheinvisibleworld.blogspot.com/ my UV diary

DaveW
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Post by DaveW »

What sort of price point are you aiming to sell at?

The problem with all specialist works is their limited market which pushes up their production costs and the higher price then limits their market in turn. We get this with specialist cactus books. A recently produced two volume cactus work sells for £120 = $194.15 now (£80 = $129.44 if you ordered pre-production). But to encourage you within a year they had virtually sold out.

However for this price it had 900 pages for the two volumes and over 1000 full colour illustrations of species occupying 500 pages alone which would obviously be far more expensive than a work consisting of principally text or line drawings. The cheaper they are the larger the market, but you need to cover your costs and make a profit, particularly if you are self publishing. The more the price increases the more the market shrinks and with specialist publications there is a limited market anyway.

The trick is therefore just setting the price to a level that attracts maximum returns for the publisher. Hardbacks always cost more than softback, so again that can often influence sales, though with expensive works people don't expect softbacks.

Best of luck anyway.

DaveW

Harold Gough
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Post by Harold Gough »

I took a quick look at the preview. Unlike with many books on photography with "Digital" in the title, you really mean it. (I'm afraid that excludes me as a potential buyer! :) ).

I assume that you are familiar with the books by Alfred A Blaker, whose contributions to scientific photography with film, and monochrome at that, was huge. You appear to be setting out to do much what he did for scientific photography in his day.

Harold
My images are a medium for sharing some of my experiences: they are not me.

enricosavazzi
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Post by enricosavazzi »

DaveW wrote:What sort of price point are you aiming to sell at?

The problem with all specialist works is their limited market which pushes up their production costs and the higher price then limits their market in turn. We get this with specialist cactus books. A recently produced two volume cactus work sells for £120 = $194.15 now (£80 = $129.44 if you ordered pre-production). But to encourage you within a year they had virtually sold out.

However for this price it had 900 pages for the two volumes and over 1000 full colour illustrations of species occupying 500 pages alone which would obviously be far more expensive than a work consisting of principally text or line drawings. The cheaper they are the larger the market, but you need to cover your costs and make a profit, particularly if you are self publishing. The more the price increases the more the market shrinks and with specialist publications there is a limited market anyway.

The trick is therefore just setting the price to a level that attracts maximum returns for the publisher. Hardbacks always cost more than softback, so again that can often influence sales, though with expensive works people don't expect softbacks.

Best of luck anyway.

DaveW
Hi Dave,

I don't have a price yet - I have been playing with alternative thoughts. As you mention, too high a price undercuts sales. Years ago I published a book with Wiley, which at that time was one of the most expensive paleontology books I knew of (I did not have a say in the pricing). Of course, it sold only a few hundred copies, although it was frequently xerocopied by students. A more reasonable price probably would have sold at least twice the copies (I believe that Wiley is still stuck with more than half the printed copies).

One of the items on the preview site is a number of fields where visitors can enter comments. One of them is a suggested price for the three-volume set, which I put there to get reactions and suggestions.
Last edited by enricosavazzi on Sun Nov 07, 2010 8:45 am, edited 1 time in total.
--ES

enricosavazzi
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Post by enricosavazzi »

Harold Gough wrote:I took a quick look at the preview. Unlike with many books on photography with "Digital" in the title, you really mean it. (I'm afraid that excludes me as a potential buyer! :) ).

I assume that you are familiar with the books by Alfred A Blaker, whose contributions to scientific photography with film, and monochrome at that, was huge. You appear to be setting out to do much what he did for scientific photography in his day.

Harold
Indeed, I grew up (in a photographic sense) with Blaker's books. Much of the contents of these books is still valid, and often referred to in my book.

About the digital, yes, I am afraid that film cameras are only mentioned as an interesting alternative in a section less than a page long.
--ES

Harold Gough
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Post by Harold Gough »

enricosavazzi wrote:Indeed, I grew up (in a photographic sense) with Blaker's books. Much of the contents of these books is still valid, and often referred to in my book.
Me too and you confirm my belief as to the validity.

Harold
My images are a medium for sharing some of my experiences: they are not me.

g4lab
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Post by g4lab »

I have two or three Blaker books and learned alot from them. But my two favorites are Lester Lefkowitz' Manual of Close Up Photography and
George Herbert Needham's Practical Use of the Microscope. The latter admittedly is getting very long in tooth. But the McCrone Research Institute thought enough of it that they republished it "on demand". They did the same thing with another great favorite Photomicrography A Comprehensive Treatise by Roger P Loveland who was the photomicrographer at Kodak in Rochester. It is in two volumes and published by Wiley and was expensive new. It is also a bit dated but still should be read by everyone here.

Dr. Savazzi I congratulate you on your work. I have been enjoying your website since you joined this group.

DaveW
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Post by DaveW »

Harold has not yet realised film is in terminal decline Enrico apart from a very small niche market, just like steam engines, stage coaches, the sundial and cine film! :lol:

If I can buy photographic books produced for the film age from Charity Shops Harold for set-ups and techniques, just ignoring the few chapters relevant to film, I am sure film users can use books aimed at digital photography and just ignore the few digital features. What happens in front of the lens, lighting, or when you extend the lens is the same for both disciplines. Most advanced books on specialist techniques usually largely assume you know how your camera produces the image anyway, be it on film or a sensor.

After all most cameras firms have now stopped producing new film cameras and I doubt many new books will be written dealing with film. In many cases now publishers and printers are requesting material to be submitted in digital form and will do so more in future as film declines. As you know copying from film to digital degrades the original image, so you might as well shoot it in digital form to start with.

The world is also going on line and many scientific publications may solely do so in future. It is said the next set of IOBN Rules for botany may allow online publication of new species instead of requiring them to be in printed journals as in the past, therefore their images will require to be digital.

Therefore as you have already found out as a film user you are now at a distinct disadvantage in publishing pictures on even this forum. This situation is liable to increase in future because few people ever get around to digitising all their old slides for modern day use, so still shooting more rather than digital originals only compounds the problem. :?

DaveW :D

enricosavazzi
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Post by enricosavazzi »

DaveW wrote:Harold has not yet realised film is in terminal decline Enrico apart from a very small niche market, just like steam engines, stage coaches, the sundial and cine film! :lol:

...

DaveW :D
Nothing wrong with this, I am actually collecting enlarger lenses. :D

Among the reasons I choose not to publish my book in electronic format is that the rights of a purchaser of an e-book are, at present, way more limited and less clear than for the purchaser of a paper book. The owner of a paper book actually owns the copy, can sell it, give it away, lend it to a friend and more. In most countries, students can copy a reasonable amount of pages from a borrowed printed book for their own use. The purchaser of an e-book cannot do any of this, and instead only has a limited permission to read the book, for as long as the seller allows it.

So, not everything about digital media is good (yet).
--ES

Craig Gerard
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Post by Craig Gerard »

Enrico,

An extensive compilation of work that will be held in high regard and greatly appreciated by the photographic community.

:smt023

Craig
To use a classic quote from 'Antz' - "I almost know exactly what I'm doing!"

Peter M. Macdonald
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Post by Peter M. Macdonald »

Enrico,

Why produce a conventional book at all? Many very useful works are nowonly produced as PDFs. This allows you to pack them full of colour illustrations, and the incremental cost of producing a copy is minimal. You can sell them for a fraction of the price of a printed work, so opening up a much larger potential market. Chances are that you can make as much per copy as you would from a paper product, but to many more people. It costs much less to send a CD through the post than a three volume paper book. It is, of course, quite possible to go entirely electronic, and to opt for electronic delivery. PDFs are easier to fit into afinite space.

I know that a book feels nice in the hands, but for niche markets they are just too expensive to produce and for many to purchase. For such markets the book as a phyiscal entity is fast coming to the end of its days.

Before anyone thinks that I am anti book, I am not. I have a house full of them. Nothing will every surpass the feel or the lovely smell of a leather bound volume. However, the convenience of electronic publications is unanswerable. As a practicing lawyer, I know how I would rather research the answer for a client's problems.

Regards,

Peter

Harold Gough
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Post by Harold Gough »

Peter M. Macdonald wrote:, the convenience of electronic publications is unanswerable. As a practicing lawyer, I know how I would rather research the answer for a client's problems.
That's OK for a working environment but these days I do most of my reading in bed, just before going to sleep. PCs would have to get a whole lot more cuddly before I was converted! :)

Seriously, though, reading more than a page or two in a session on-screen is not the best option.

Harold
My images are a medium for sharing some of my experiences: they are not me.

enricosavazzi
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Post by enricosavazzi »

Peter M. Macdonald wrote:Enrico,

Why produce a conventional book at all? Many very useful works are nowonly produced as PDFs. This allows you to pack them full of colour illustrations, and the incremental cost of producing a copy is minimal. You can sell them for a fraction of the price of a printed work, so opening up a much larger potential market. Chances are that you can make as much per copy as you would from a paper product, but to many more people. It costs much less to send a CD through the post than a three volume paper book. It is, of course, quite possible to go entirely electronic, and to opt for electronic delivery. PDFs are easier to fit into afinite space.

I know that a book feels nice in the hands, but for niche markets they are just too expensive to produce and for many to purchase. For such markets the book as a phyiscal entity is fast coming to the end of its days.
Hi Peter,

perhaps I will publish a future edition in PDF format, eventually - but not for now. For one thing, now that I am proofreading the photography book manuscript, I find that I can catch small errors much more easily on a paper printout than in electronic format. Of course there are things better done on a PDF copy, like searching and hotlinking.

A book I published on paper with Elsevier a few years ago is now being sold in e-book format, and is selling more than the paper edition. My Wiley book is only available on paper, currently for 525$ on Amazon, and probably sells less than ten copies a year. The university where I used to work could not afford to buy it, so my students used to borrow my free copy to make xerocopies of the chapters they needed (this is legal in Sweden, by the way). Now I believe they simply have to do without it.

On the other hand, I do use a lot of literature in PDF format, but I still have to print out on paper any materials that I need to use carefully, or for an extended time. Given a choice of a reference book on paper or in electronic format, I choose paper even if more expensive. Perhaps all I need is a second or a third monitor, but right now I cannot do everything on just one monitor, especially on a laptop.
--ES

DQE
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Post by DQE »

I also prefer paper books and paper journal articles.

However, after using my new iPad for a few months, I'm beginning to believe that this type of touch-based tablet computer can become preferable for many if not most text reading purposes, as follows.

1. I can carry around a huge library in an approximately 2 pound (1 kg) gadget, including a heavy-duty shock-proof and water-resistant case. And I'm much less likely to misplace or forgetfully loan e-publications than has been the case for paper documents.

Much fewer stacks and stacks of magazines or journals/books!

It works fine for reading in bed. Sometimes I set a 30-minute timer to shut the thing off in case I go to sleep while reading.

2. I can easily annotate, highlight, and bookmark books, PDF files, Word documents, etc.

3. Much of the look and feel of less expensive paper publications can be reproduced in e-book readers, including simulated page turning.

4. I can easily vary the lighting, font style, font size, line spacing, and text justification for each document. I can also switch from dark text on a light background to light text on a dark background, useful for reading late at night. These features make the reading experience much better for me, especially helpful as my aging eyesight continues to decline. It's also helpful to know that having the gadget read the text to me is usually available, even though I don't use this feature much at the moment.

The same gadgets read BBC and NPR and PRI podcasts and display video podcasts to me, something I've become very addicted to. Works especially well for TV and movies, too. I just download a fresh batch of my favorite audio and video podcasts each day.

5. I can very quickly search each e-publication for keywords or phrases.

6. I can easily copy and paste text from each document into an electronic notepad or an e-mail or my electronic calendar.

7. The better e-readers have a built-in dictionary. I'm finding this to be surprisingly useful and enjoy improving my vocabulary as well as fully understanding unfamiliar words or jargon instead of just approximating their meaning while I read.

8. The cost and environmental impact of e-books is usually quite a bit less than new paper books. Thus, I can afford to buy more books and can avoid the environmental damage of killing trees and paying for paper manufacturing. Pulpwood and paper creation is not an especially clean or low-energy industry.

9. Volunteer organizations (Gutenberg project, Librovox, etc) provide free downlodable copies of out-of-copyright classic books, with many thousands (if not more) available as text or audio books for free download on the internet. The commercial ebook companies (e.g., Kindle) give away or sell classic books for less than 1 US dollar, and their versions are sometimes a little more carefully edited.

10. Direct downloading of e-publications means I can have a book or document on my iPad within less than a minute, using my cable TV based 15 mbps internet connection.

11. I can automatically synchronize my iPod, iPad, and PC libraries wirelessly or through aggregator software.

(Disclosure: I have a mixed, love-hate relationship with Apple products, loving it when their stuff works well and becoming frustrated when I feel too controlled or constrained by their products. Not much new in such tradeoffs but Apple seems to pose some unique stresses and rewards.)

(Another disclosure related to this and other film vs digital discussions: I retired a few years ago after working more than 30 years as a staff scientist at the Kodak Research Labs, specializing in medical X-ray image quality research and radiographic product development. Thus, I have a long-term involvement with (black-and-white) film-based imaging. Nevertheless, I love my Canon 5DII DSLR and digital macro photography.)

(Final comment - my iPad still causes duplicate posts to occur but only on this forum. I have the superficial impression that some sort of scripting problem related to the iPad's Safari-based browser is to blame... Thus I must check after each post and delete the inevitable duplicates.)

I hope an electronic version of this new, in-progress 3-volume macro photography publication becomes available soon! The more technical content it provides, the better!

By the way, Art Morris, a well-known bird photographer, now publishes most of his and his colleagues' books and mini-books as PDF files, distributed through CDs and/or downloadable PDFs. Since they receive all the profits if they self-publish, I gather that they are making more money by self-publishing than they could through traditional paper publishing. YMMV, of course.
-Phil

"Diffraction never sleeps"

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