on e-publishing at The Clarendon in Katoomba. A long-time P!BM member, this is actually the first talk I’ve been able to attend as my work seems to take me everywhere but close to home!
, Hazelbrook and Springwood local and Adobe guru Steve Nichols, who shared their knowledge of new digital publishing platforms.
(featured in the video below) before with self-published Hazelbrook fantasy/sci-fi author
. From all accounts the evening erupted into something of a feisty affair of mainstream publishing fans vs self-publishing ‘rebels’, but you can judge for yourselves as a kind soul videotaped the talks and has posted them on Youtube for all to see.
Jenny gave a great overview of the available publishing gateways for those interested in publishing e-books with
Smashwords,
Bookbaby and
Kobo leading the charge. She covered the various pros and cons of going with each, and also referenced the various types of ebooks – PDF, EPub and Mobi – and explored compatibility, price and quality.
I'm a little late to the e-book party, I must confess. It's partly due to the fact I don't particularly like to read in this format, and partly a lack of confidence in the early e-book software that was too easy to crack and thereby render e-books free and widely available (hence no pesos for the author!). Of course the times and software have rapidly developed and I find myself running to catch up, so I can give my print books a second lease of life.
But I digress, back to the talk...
Amid the audience input that inevitably ensued was a spirited discussion about fonts and formats, and a couple of authors weighed in with their own experiences publishing via
Lulu and
Lightning Source (the latter my own contribution as a two-time print self-publisher).
For a recovering
Quark addict and self-described Adobe novice, this talk was something of a Godsend. Steve outlined quite a few tricks and shortcuts, and also spoke about
Adobe’s new ‘Creative Cloud’, a much more affordable option for creative types who no longer have to fork out a few thousands dollars for software upfront, but rather subscribe to online resources instead for a monthly fee of $60 ($40 if you do own the software outright). Probably old news for many, but for this writer it was a revelation!
It was the little things that really made this talk for me – discovering that footnotes in print books become endnotes in e-books; that loading up e-books as individual
Adobe InDesign chapters means the books loads faster than if it was loaded as one document (who knew?); and the Pièce de résistance – Adobe’s e-reader which allows companies to rebrand it as their own, so when readers download their magazine app it opens with a nice clean association with the publisher. Another handy tip revolved around image positioning in ebooks (anchor it! enough said). I felt my intelligence quotient blossom as he spoke, which was sadly too short an affair due to inevitable time restraints.
I feel like I’m indulging my inner nerd by sharing this level of detail (let alone getting excited about it!), but anyone who has ever loved a font, obsessed over the use of white space or laboured over a heading (or headline) knows where I’m coming from.
So what’s next for this former newspaper hack and semi-luddite? Why, it’s time to update my software and get myself some
Adobe InDesign training, of course!
And maybe get along to the third talk in the series...stay tuned!
