Blog Book Design Inspiration

It has been a a while since I've had an opening on my waiting list so this website has sat dormant for over a year. Word of mouth and return clients keep me hopping so posting here hasn't been high on my priority list.
I'm sorry to say that openings for new projects are still few and far between (see previous post for books I AM available for), but that doesn't mean I can't pop in and share some of my favorite layouts & some design/blogging tips when I'm waiting for a final book draft to upload to Blurb.com.

Tonight I'm sharing some layouts from one in a series of books that I have been making for a client in Colorado.  My hope is that seeing what a difference the ratio of text to photographs has in the feel of a blog book will encourage you to format your blog posts with a potential blog book in the back of your mind.

Vacation posts tend to have an abundance of photographs that can often take up multiple pages in a book. Whenever possible I try to group the text together at the beginning or with one particular photo so the rest of the photographs can be showcased like you see in the layouts below.  (The dark gray rectangle that you see at the top and bottom of the screenshot is the spine of the book.)

I am always on the lookout for 'clean space' in a photograph that I can use to superimpose text. I feel like this gives me the best of both worlds - eye catching layouts with the descriptions that are meant to go with the photos.

Wasting space means wasting clients money which is a big no-no in my book, but page after page of my signature 'patchwork layouts' is not ideal either. Instead I strive to strike a balance which to be honest, is often achieved simply by the flow of a blog...some posts have lots of photos and some don't!

Sometimes white space can be just as powerful as the photos themselves.



...and sometimes I use a combination of white space, blocks of text, and patchwork layouts to lead the eye through the story as the author intended.

Remember, a blog is set up to scroll through one picture or at best, one collage at a time with text sprinkled or pooled in varying places in the flow of pictures.  A blog book, on the other hand is designed to help a reader take in a much larger portion of the story all at once.  They eye travels around and around each two page spread until everything has been processed. If I've done my job right, a reader will keep circling the layouts, picking up new nuances on each pass.



When it's all said and done what matters is that you have invested in preserving memories!   I hope I  have inspired you to take more photos, write more blog posts, design your own blog book, or hire me if your project fits my current availability.




I made a book a month last year so there are many more samples & tips to come! If there is something you'd like me to cover in my next post please leave your questions and/or topic suggestions in the comments.

Formatting tip - the size of the picture file matters

In most cases I will be downloading your images from your blog so it is important that you keep the picture files large enough to produce quality images that fill the photo containers in your book. This first screen shot is of a two page spread where the photo files are too small. The one on the left is around 70k. That's better than the 15-22k like the two photos on the opposite page, but as you can see, the space isn't used as well as it could be. Due to small photo files this is as large as the pictures will get - regardless of which layout I use.



This is an example of using the full container and letting the best images take center stage once in a while. If you want the images in your book to be larger than 2x3,
KEEP PHOTO FILES AS CLOSE TO THEIR ORIGINAL SIZE AS POSSIBLE. EACH FILE SHOULD BE AT THE VERY LEAST 300K

Formatting tip - How to conserve pages

Blogs that have hundreds of posts are obviously going to cost more than those that have less, but with this tip about writing captions for your pictures, you can save pages (and money) in a post that's mostly pictures.

KEEP YOUR CAPTIONS SHORT

By keeping your captions less than 6 words I can fit up to 9 photos on a page. If you write 2 paragraphs that will only make sense if the photo is right next to the description, then I will be forced to put 2-3 pictures on each page so there is enough room for text. Multiple posts like this can make your book more expensive than it needs
to be.

The other option is to
SKIP CAPTIONS ENTIRELY - WRITE YOUR POST FIRST AND THEN
INSERT PICTURES AFTER
What I mean by this is, if you want to describe each picture, make the captions flow into each other so they can be combined into a paragraph.
This saves space by making it possible for me to layouts like this that maximize the space for text. I have 70 different layouts at my disposal and I do my very best to use the ones that make the most of the space without compromising the design.


If you are a veteran blogger and know that many of your posts do not comply with this advice - that's ok. I can still make you a beautiful book!




This tip is mainly for those who are just getting started and know that down the road they want to publish their book - either on their own or hire me to do it.