Images for your book
The print technology allows black and white images to be printed within
the book using our Print on demand technology. (When
we say 'black and white' we mean both line drawings where there are no shades of
grey and half-tone images such as photographs.) Full colour printing is also possible
for POD now although the finish is matt rather than glossy. It works well to include a b/w image inside,
along with a caption, but you can have
a colour image on the cover.
It helps if you can enhance your pictures. You will normally start with a
colour image. You might have to
scan the photo first. If your file is about
2Mb, it probably has about the right amount of detail. This allows you to scan
at a higher resolution - remember that if you plan to expand the image you will,
in effect, be reducing the DPI. (72 DPI is fine for screens but at least 300 DPI
is needed for printing). It is normally better to do the enhancement work while
the image is still in colour and only change it to a black & white image when
the work is done as there are more tools available for manipulating colour.
Be prepared to trim the image so that you
can focus the attention of your reader. If you remove most of the background,
you might find that you have to make fewer compromises with the other
adjustments.
Have a look at a few books and see which images work.
Then you need to:
Converting to B/W
All image processing packages offer the chance to remove colour and render
the image in shades of grey. It is best to do this first and before you start
performing other adjustments. Some packages offer to convert your picture to a
sepia tone but this still needs to be turned into tones of black and
white. To optimise the printability of your files, use 8bit greyscale with at
least 300 DPI.
Enhancing contrast
It is important to distinguish between contrast and brightness. A low
contrast image is grey. A high contrast picture has blacks and whites, and little
in between.
Adjusting brightness
If a photo is too dark or too light, details are lost. You can play with the
contrast and brightness controls to achieve the effects that will work in the
book.
Finally, you might want to use various tools that software provides to
sharpen or frame the image. With some software it is better to leave sharpening until the end so that you are not
adjusting adjustments but it is worth checking!
What you want to end up with is a an image with strong highlights. So the
contrast and brightness will have to be a bit higher than what you would regard
as normal. You can achieve some remarkable results which improve the focus of the
photograph.
Software to edit your images
GIMP offers a free download of an
excellent package which handles all the current image formats. Well worth a try.
This is a sophisticated programme and it is worth spending some time to learn
how to use it.
Source of images
There are many image libraries but Google
and Flikr both have images.
PS Don't forget to check that you have
copyright permission and/or model release
for your images.
Photo libraries
Picture technologies
Print technologies
