Get your work published in a book

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He needs pictures. You give pictures. He mention you in book. Maybe you get more customers. That's it I think.
 
Interesting...will there be a makers index? Still not catching the spirit of the book, its sounds in its description t be a 60$ book table book, however, missing the awesome photography! I know your just putting it together but the annual blade collection is packed with professional pictures, themes, established makers, and AFFORDABLE! Now shelling out some bucks for the Scagel story is worth every penny! I know i cant shoot my knives for crap!
 
GTH11 said:
Interesting...will there be a makers index? Still not catching the spirit of the book, its sounds in its description t be a 60$ book table book, however, missing the awesome photography! I know your just putting it together but the annual blade collection is packed with professional pictures, themes, established makers, and AFFORDABLE! Now shelling out some bucks for the Scagel story is worth every penny! I know i cant shoot my knives for crap!
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Here's the spirit of the book, in a nutshell: I get a lot of questions from people about a lot of different design elements regarding knives. What different handle materials exist and how do they look. Different blade grinds. Different serrations. Different types of guards. Different fasteners. Blade coatings and finishes. Not every knife collector has an example in his/her stash of every possible design, so the book would be an informational reference chock full of eye candy and enough ideas for any maker looking for different approaches to take with new pieces.

Blade annuals have pictures, but don't provide a breakdown of design elements. That is what this book would do. The intent is not just to show pretty pictures and a list of names. I love those books, but they don't fill this particular gap.

I can prove to all of you that this is not only a worthwhile activity but one that you'll wonder what you ever did without. But I'm going to need your help...

EDIT: One quick note, I'll be posting a breakdown of all the design elements I'm referring to, and a list of people who want to contribute. That way you can see what I need and decide whether you want to help in a particular area. If I need pics of mosaic pins and you have a bunch of examples, you can let me know and I'll get you on the list. I'll get this breakdown published in the next couple of days. And thank you for your interest!
 
Are you planning on having anyone else edit, fact-check, etc? Seems to me like quite an opportunity to perpetuate inaccuracies, unless your current editor is a knife expert of high qualifications and extraordinary depth of experience. If I never see the term "blood groove" again it'll be too soon.

NB: I'm not volunteering, I'm just asking.
 
I think it sounds like a great Idea. Dan contacted me a short time ago and asked if I would be interested in taking a little bit of time for a WIP while I did What I already do, Make a Knife! As long as it is not a "This is the correct way to make a knife book" I am good with it. No need to pay me for a book I am not putting together or fronting money in any way. I would also like to see a Blog as you stated showing your progress on the project.

Count have you done any WIP's?
 
bluejaunte said:
Are you planning on having anyone else edit, fact-check, etc? Seems to me like quite an opportunity to perpetuate inaccuracies, unless your current editor is a knife expert of high qualifications and extraordinary depth of experience. If I never see the term "blood groove" again it'll be too soon.

NB: I'm not volunteering, I'm just asking.
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x2:thumbup:

I don't mind sending photos, at all. I think your intentions are good and the idea has merit. However, I fear that a "one book tells all" about knives would be a huge undertaking by an individual, no matter how well versed they think they are. Are you a maker? I'm not trying to be a jerk.... I would LOVE for this book to work out... but you intend to link makers and photos with materials, style, design, finishes, etc... There is enough difference of opinion among the craftsmen who make them everyday, let alone someone trying to collect, interpret and present it all in ONE PUBLICATION. How do you intend to have your book proofed?
 
CapitalizedLiving said:
I agree. It is a tremendous amount of work. But regardless I feel like contributors should own their own photos. I have no desire to take credit for other people's work.

EDIT: Sorry, I think there's a misunderstanding here. No one is writing, editing, organizing, laying out, proofing, printing, publishing, or distributing but me. All I need are photos.
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Especially in regards to design, how do you know what to write?

The maker has to provide a series of photos in order - and some explanation for each one what is done & why.

How would you know what their process is unless they write it up for you?

As I understand it, this is essentially a series of photo WIP threads by a collection of makers - in print?
 
How about each maker provides a bit of commentary and submits it withthe photos?
Hell, many makers call grinds and other features other names than what other makers do anyway.

And if there's some inaccuracy, so what? It isn't going to ruin the world of knifemaking.;)
 
bluejaunte said:
Are you planning on having anyone else edit, fact-check, etc? Seems to me like quite an opportunity to perpetuate inaccuracies, unless your current editor is a knife expert of high qualifications and extraordinary depth of experience. If I never see the term "blood groove" again it'll be too soon.

NB: I'm not volunteering, I'm just asking.
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Aaron


That's an excellent point.

I bought Blade's Guide to Making Knives for the Damascus section & the inaccuracies in the text and photo captions made it all worse than useless.
BAD EDITING killed that book for me.
 
RyanW said:
I think it sounds like a great Idea. Dan contacted me a short time ago and asked if I would be interested in taking a little bit of time for a WIP while I did What I already do, Make a Knife! As long as it is not a "This is the correct way to make a knife book" I am good with it. No need to pay me for a book I am not putting together or fronting money in any way. I would also like to see a Blog as you stated showing your progress on the project.

Count have you done any WIP's?
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In real life, yes.
Not here.
 
12345678910 said:
In real life, yes.
Not here.
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no disrespect meant, My point was we see a lot of makers here do a free WIP on a certain aspect of knife making without being compensated. Taking photos at different steps of the process is very little work in my mind.

Correct me if I am wrong Dan, your book will be a coffee table type book for the average person to get an idea of how a knife is created not how to make a complete functional knife. I agree with the others that have posted regarding getting too technical and disseminating false info would be an easy mistake to make in this type of project. If this ends up being a Tutorial on "how to make a knife", that has been done and over done.
 
It sounds interesting to me but clearly you need to define what you are looking for in the way of contribution from individual makers.
Self promotion is a part of being a knifemaker (at least one with a successful sales record), and this presents a smaller time maker with a golden opportunity to do that. Make what you will of it, makers, if only a few of you are involved it won't go far.
 
bluejaunte said:
Are you planning on having anyone else edit, fact-check, etc? Seems to me like quite an opportunity to perpetuate inaccuracies, unless your current editor is a knife expert of high qualifications and extraordinary depth of experience. If I never see the term "blood groove" again it'll be too soon.

NB: I'm not volunteering, I'm just asking.
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Hi. Good question. I have a professional editor I work with on all of my publishing projects, to protect me from myself. As for fact-checking, I'll list design elements I plan to include in the book in a blog, so everyone has full visibility of what is included and what is not. I'm building the spreadsheet and plan to publish it before the weekend. What this will do is enable contributors to determine what they are best suited to contribute, and to correct problems as they arise. I'm pretty thorough when it comes to fact-checking but if I do end up with something like "blood groove" on the list, everyone can see it and anyone can correct me. But in most cases I should know better or at least know enough to do my homework.

After all, we know it's really called a "plasma channel.":)
 
Rick Marchand said:
x2:thumbup:

I don't mind sending photos, at all. I think your intentions are good and the idea has merit. However, I fear that a "one book tells all" about knives would be a huge undertaking by an individual, no matter how well versed they think they are. Are you a maker? I'm not trying to be a jerk.... I would LOVE for this book to work out... but you intend to link makers and photos with materials, style, design, finishes, etc... There is enough difference of opinion among the craftsmen who make them everyday, let alone someone trying to collect, interpret and present it all in ONE PUBLICATION. How do you intend to have your book proofed?
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Hi Rick! Thanks for the input. I really don't think one book could possibly tell all and I don't want to pigeonhole makers by linking specific design elements to certain people. I want to remain objective - explain and show a design method and give credit for any illustration or photo provided by others. I know I cannot cover every possible design aspect anymore than someone could write a single book on yacht design (or any other broad-range product) and cover every aspect. The idea is to cover specific information in a general fashion and give enough information to allow the readers to (a) be informed and (b) be inspired. What I mean by "being specifically general" is I don't want the book to go into details about HOW to make a hollow grind, for instance, I just want to point out what one looks like and what makes it different from a flat grind, a convex grind, and so forth. So the idea is to not drill down into the specifics of how designs are implemented as much as just showing what design elements exist.

Oh, and I would love to include your work.
 
I'll leave my opinion of this idea out of this thread....but I am locking this thread for improper place and subject. Business needs to be done in The Exchange. This is nothing but SPAM.
 
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