Planning your workflow

However you plan to work in the production of your book, spend some time now planning your workflow, using the notes above as a guide.

Think about how much flexibility you can allow yourself – don’t put yourself under too much pressure. At the same time, be aware of time constraints that may be outside your control. If you’re using a local printer, for example, make contact as soon as possible. Your printer may have a limited timeframe for doing your job and you’ll need to factor this into your workflow.

Scoping – 1-2 weeks

Contacting printers for costings and timescales is a major unknown for this assignment. Whether to use online or physical printers? Size and cost implications? Before or after Christmas?!

Research and content creation – 2 weeks

This will consist of online research as well as physical research, COVID restrictions allowing. There will be the need to select a subject matter, mind-map and create mood boards. This would then need to be streamlined into some semblance of order. Sourcing and creating imagery for my book and generating copy will need to be done and finalised.

Design – 2 weeks

This will involve deciding how the content will be displayed. This will be done by designing page layouts, covers and flat-plans and critiquing them to further hone the design. Other considerations will have to be decided on such as how the book is intended to be read(will it be a coffee-table read to thumb through or will it be held in hand for a long while?), what papers to use and what finishes it will have.

Pre-production – 2-3 days

Proofing and sure everything is correct. I’ll then prepare files for print, making sure that all images are 300dpi and CMYK and sufficient bleed is added. Make sure all files are backed-up and saved in the preferred format and quality that the printer prefers or recommends.

Printing – 1 week?

Liaising with the printer from the off is key to getting this stage right, whether that is online or in person. Can the printer do the binding on site or is that something else to consider? How will Christmas affect the timings? Can the printer provide the required finishes?

All this will need to be carefully considered as this is a complex process with some aspects that are out of my control which could cause problems with the timeline, Christmas being one and COVID the other. These could both impact on my ability to get my book printed. Physical printing may have to come later, perhaps just a digital copy submitted initially with printing to follow. However, the aspects of the process that are going to take up the most time are the research and design stages which will be needed to produce a good quality end result.

Image credit: BIS Publisher’s Wim Crouwel Alphabets written by Kees Broos with the forward by David Quay who also designed the book along with Rick Sellars.