Existing Blurb books.

To get an idea of how the Blurb books will look if I got them printed, I had a look at a few existing samples. Each book I had a look at had a hardcover with professional quality paper. As I looked at each book, I noticed that the binding differed with the style of the book and the thickness. I thought this was important to note for future reference if I was to think about making my own book, going back to the Bookmaking book.

I much prefer to have my book as a hardcover, to increase stability when people are trying to write in the book, as well as support itself better when it is ‘shoved’ into books.

I also got the Blurb Swatch Kit to get me an idea of what paper I will need to be using. My personal favourite was the Proline Uncoated, 100 Mohawk Superfine, 148 GSM. The paper gives an eggshell finish, which means it is the best quality for printing photographs, as well as being able to be drawn on without too much bleeding or smudging. The quality of the photograph printed on the sample I thought was not much different to the other finishes, you can still see a lot of detail, but it does not look completely professional, which is what I intend to show in my book.

This has given me a really good idea in understanding what format I need my book to be in. it has given me a clearer understanding of what paper I should be using, because that is crucial for an activity book for people to be able to write and draw on the pages, without any ink smudging.

I also compared one of the books to a few other sizes to give me an idea of what size I would need to make my activity book. The black book at the back is A4, the middle is the Blurb 8x10in size and the Journal is A5. I felt that the 8x10in size was the most appropriate; the size allows room for drawing, note making, picture putting and will generally fit into a decent sized bag.

My pages.

Now I have got enough photos and information to try and put my book together, I began with what I knew I had. Looking back at the research I had done with the previous activity books and the activities that could be done, I had a look at what images and information I had, and then narrowed down an activity for each page.

All of the pages with illustration are roughly sketched to match the theme of the doodle sketches I have done to keep the book looking more personal than professional. I intend to make a lot of my pages have blank space, to allow room for the audience to enjoy the photos and/or writing or sketching their own thoughts down on the pages.

Because what I am doing is a photography activity book, I have included my own photographs, but I have also left room on some of the pages for people to add their own photos in, some pages even having hand-drawn boxes as ‘templates’ for them to put their pictures in.

Over time, I hope that my book will look messy and used. The purpose of this book is to be used and have the same look as a scrapbook would have.