I am happy to announce that Artist Eye Studio is now adding book publication to the list of artist services. (Publication in a limited capacity of course, as my primary service will always be photography.) Book publication is a natural extension of my artist marketing and artist portfolio services, and provides yet another way for artists to present their work. This new service is a result of my collaboration with artist and writer Peggy Joyce and the recent publication of her book, Pj’s World: One Kid’s Memoir of Sorts.
Peggy came to my studio last year intending to have me photograph her paintings and perhaps help organize her many stories the paintings were illustrating. The paintings she brought to me were sweet and honest as were her stories. I showed Peggy some samples of work that I had done combining images with text and explained the options that we could explore. The first step would be to create a well-formatted, full color document that could be printed at any print shop. A print shop would also be able to bind the copies together. If Peggy wanted to stop there, she would at the very least have all of her work well organized and printed: something she could hold in her hand. This was a good place to start. If Peggy decided to take the project the next level, we could then pursue options for her work to be published as a book.
There was a time, not so long ago I might add, that getting a book published meant either doing what was necessary to find a publisher or dropping lots of money on a publishing house that would print your work, as long as you had the cash to back the publication. Back in 2002, I went the traditional route to find a publisher for the book Alaska’s Daughter: An Eskimo Memoir of the Early 20th Century, by Elizabeth Pinson. After a 2-year process, the book was published in 2004. Though this made the author and myself thrilled and filled with success, 2 years is a really long time to wait.
Those publication options are still available of course, but now there is another path to publication: print on demand, otherwise known as self-publishing. After doing some research I found CreateSpace (now KDP or Kindle Direct Publishing), a subsidiary of Amazon, which made things fairly easy with regards to distribution and royalties to the writer. Amazon also made the search for her book on their site a breeze. Once someone orders a book, it is then created through KDP and shipped to the buyer through Amazon, who will then put Peggy’s royalties into her bank; pretty cool!
As a client, Peggy definitely falls into the “full service” category once again. In addition to the publication and design of Pj’s World, I wrote the blurb on the back cover and took her portrait for it as well. Peggy also asked me to create her postcards and business cards. The second book in the series is in the making. So I guess it is safe to say…to be continued.
