Let's Make a Book! - first proof (Patreon)

Just picked up the first proof from the printer! But first: a word on picking printers.

I solicited quotes from 4 different places. All local (so that I wouldn't be paying for shipping) and all places that people I knew had worked with before 

Marquis: I've seen the books that come out of there, always super slick looking. I've heard great things

Rapido: Super close, had heard good things

Printorium: Literally right under the studio I work at, come recommended by friends

Printing House: Close to where I live. I know the guys there, I go to them every time I have a convention. They do all my prints and business cards. 

I told them I was looking for a limited run, 50 copies, and gave them a rough idea of my budget- about 6 bucks per book. I want to sell the book for 10, so 6 was as high as I wanted to go if I wanted to make a profit. I also told them the dimensions- 7x9 

Pretty much every place quoted me around the same price-- 10.50 per book. Obviously, not great. But one place explained to me that- if I were to shrink the dimensions by an inch (7x9 to 6x8) it would drastically reduce the price. It has to do with the size of the paper they print on.I took this information to my favoured printer-- Printing House. Asked them if it was true, and they agreed. It'd be way easier to stay on my budget if the book was 6x8. 

The reason I specifically went with Printing House is because it means a lot to me to be able to speak to people in person about what I want, what I don't want- and who I'm comfortable enough to ask questions. It's great that other places email me about their paper options-- but number descriptions of paper weights mean exactly fucking zero to me. At PH I can go in and touch the paper all I want. And like I said, I know the guys there-- they know my face and they've never steered me wrong.

ANYWAYS! So I picked up the first proof today! I've already started marking in the book fixes I need to make. But also, when the book is closed there's a gap-- like it's never fully closed. And this is partly to do with the binding-- and also partly to do with the weight of the paper I chose. I asked them if there was a way to fix it-- to make the book sit flat closed. One guy suggested they could use a clamp to flatten them, Frank also suggested a lighter paper weight-- but lighter might make the pages more transparent. 

So we're working on a solution for that.

A lot of the book is too dark, which I'm not super surprised by. The pages were already pretty dark on a monitor, of course they would print even darker (That's what the D on those pages means haha). Apparently greens and purples always print darker- so I've gotta work on that. There's some lettering fixes I want to make, and some clean up fixes here and there. Things where the edge of the page is still visible, or the colours in the panel box didn't extend to the edge.

I also need to figure out how to fix the colours on the front and back cover. When i converted the files to cmyk, that bright blue lightening turned dull and unsaturated- it's hard to even tell it's blue. That's a thing with cmyk I'm learning. Neon colours don't work as well.

One big relief: I was scared a lot of details would be lost shrinking the dimensions- especially the lettering. I was scared it'd be too small to read. But it's still good! Some places need work, but not nearly as much as I'd worried.

So that's the next step! Let's make a book!!