So we sent the map to the printers today! Can’t really believe it. Talk about a troubled birth. 1 year late and so much more work then we could imagine. I can’t believe we thought we could get it done in a couple of months. We must have been mad to have started this especially as we had Owen as a newborn to deal with too. Stupid and crazy but you live and learn.
I like the end product there are always more things I would have changed and sorted out but sometimes you just got to send it to the printers before you go nuts. So we will save those changes for the second edition.
Time to rest and catch up on sleep
We have a handfull of corections that need to be done but all the files are in the right format and the images are checked. We are almost there finally. We have one major thing to decide on and that is the binding, Our printers are sending us a couple more samples as we where not happy with the first ones. Hope to get that sorted out by tomorrow and then send everything off. Finally.
So many changes and so little time. trying to get the map off to the printers by the 22nd. I think we can do it. We are going to sell it at $15 canadian and $17 us. That way we may even make some money selling to Baker and Taylor.
As for the binding we are going to Wire-O bound instead of perfect bound. The reason is that the book is too small to do perfect bound properly and might be so tight that half the map would be hidden when someone tried to read it. Also with the wire bound the book will sit flat. The spine will be covered so it will look ok on a bookshelf. It may mean the map book falls apart quicker. This is a concern but not sure what we can do about it. Also no waterproof paper as that is so expensive we would have to print @10000 for it even to begin to be worth it.
Back to the proofing
Proofing is never my favourite job. I’m not exactly the world’s most patient person, nor am I a natural perfectionist. But I grit my teeth & picture the perfect (or perfectly accurate) map. And it’s wonderful to be on the home stretch!
It has taken about 3 days to do the bloody map key! Talk about fiddle fiddle fiddle. Switching between indesign and illustrator and stupid lining things up. Now cracked it and just got to make it look pretty. My eyes are going nuts! Why are the guides so stupid in illustrator? Anyway we are still making progress. Beth is pushing for wire bound with a spine. She does not think it will look good perfect bound her main point being it might bind too tight making the maps hard to read. Oh the horror if that happened!!! I hate post production horror stories make my blood run cold! Need to look at some samples and talk with people who know.
Also the american green back keeps falling making it harder to nail down the US price. Maybe $15 dollars canadian and $400 american? If their economy keeps going south no one will be travelling from there anyway. Shudder.
And we are still backing up.
Map drawing has been delayed for an afternoon while we head over to westvan to give a slideshow on the camino. It has been a few months since we have done one so I hope that we are not too rusty. Don’t think there while be too many people there. Our babysitters just called and said they where hungover and maybe late. I pity them looking after our two whirlwinds in that state. What is worse they are doing it for free!
Need to go do the last few things before we head out.
Beth says she has had enough of Pili Pala Press. I think the computer crash has crushed her. Let’s get the map out first before we go nuts.
Started to put the corrections in to the proof map and now have some quotes to play with too. The final stages! yeah! Should not get too carried away what with our recent past. thinking of printing 3000 and maybe charge $15.95. Never done the 0.95 game before always had a flat $25. I know almost every other retailer in the world does the .95 thing and I know why they do it BUT i still don’t like it but would enable us to charge more. Is there a huge difference between 15.95 and 16? Yes there is I am beginning to think. Need more time to dwell on this.
The map is not cheap to print. Full colour means it is almost as expensive as a whole book. Ouch. Hence the need to have a higher price to cover our cost. Waterproof paper is crazy expensive so much so that we are not going to do this on our first map. Still wondering about perfect bound and Wire-O bound. We hope to have some samples soon so we can make a better judgement on this too.
Almost up to date with the reentry of data that we lost in the great computer crash. Still makes me angry just thinking about it. Oh well at least our new back up is cool.