10-31-2013, 12:10 PM
10-31-2013, 01:05 PM
Markus, simples: as Mike said you can't just take photos through display cases. It works, sometimes, and I've gotten pretty good at it using filters etc, but it's NOT the same as photographing an item under ideal circumstances. If I were going to try to sell RATers on a book about helmets and ask them somewhere between €50 and €100 for a copy, I'd want to make sure the images are very high quality. Hence it'll probably be necessary to have museum photographers do it for us, or to buy extant photographs from their archives.
Rich, here's an example, likely LOW, itemization, all in €:
Normally a publisher would add 40% as 'overhead' (there is work involved here if only in getting the rights for those photos, not to mention various smaller costs), which would take that to:
€61,250, or a unit price of €61.25. If you wanted to sell this at Amazon, you're looking at a list-price of €136 or about $180.... :woot:
Also, this would be one heavy mother of a book. Think €30 to ship a single copy from Europe to the US...
Rich, here's an example, likely LOW, itemization, all in €:
- text: 80,000 words @ 10cts: €8000 (boo ,slave labor!)
- photography: 250 photos at €100 each: €25000 (yes, there will be cheaper ones, but there'll be plenty that go into the €150-200 range too)
- proofreading: €1000
- layout: 250 pages at €15/page: €3750
- printing 1000 copies, hardback, nice paper: €6000 (more copies would drop the relative price considerably, but you'd have to sell them too...)
Normally a publisher would add 40% as 'overhead' (there is work involved here if only in getting the rights for those photos, not to mention various smaller costs), which would take that to:
€61,250, or a unit price of €61.25. If you wanted to sell this at Amazon, you're looking at a list-price of €136 or about $180.... :woot:
Also, this would be one heavy mother of a book. Think €30 to ship a single copy from Europe to the US...
10-31-2013, 01:36 PM
When reading Jasper's sober estimations, I found myself dreaming about an online image database of all artifacts in all Western museum where every author can download the desired pictures for a price which is fixed by the holding museum. Wouldn't that be heaven?
It is kind of obscene that many of the very same photos which authors try to acquire for their books can be downloaded at Wikimedia Commons, Flickr or Picasa for free and are used extensively in online publications without the copyright holders ever bothering. No wonder that people find it very hard to make a living from writing books.
Perhaps it is even easier to try to convince the EU for funding a helmet and armour database comparable Navis, than going directly for the pics.
When doing this and publishing the pics, one might find himself not only violating copyrights, but also the house right of the museum if it has declared that taking photos is forbidden. At Wikipedia, there are still tons of pictures in violation of both rights (partly because it has argued unchallenged so far that pictures of two-dimensional images where the author has died more than 75 years ago cannot be subjected in principle to copyrights).
It is kind of obscene that many of the very same photos which authors try to acquire for their books can be downloaded at Wikimedia Commons, Flickr or Picasa for free and are used extensively in online publications without the copyright holders ever bothering. No wonder that people find it very hard to make a living from writing books.
Perhaps it is even easier to try to convince the EU for funding a helmet and armour database comparable Navis, than going directly for the pics.
Quote:Markus, simples: as Mike said you can't just take photos through display cases.
When doing this and publishing the pics, one might find himself not only violating copyrights, but also the house right of the museum if it has declared that taking photos is forbidden. At Wikipedia, there are still tons of pictures in violation of both rights (partly because it has argued unchallenged so far that pictures of two-dimensional images where the author has died more than 75 years ago cannot be subjected in principle to copyrights).
11-01-2013, 10:38 PM
This seems to be all of my making. I am sorry as its caused a lot of grief. I only asked, in good nature, if Mr Bishop could do a complete book on helmets. It got a good response though.
Kevin
Kevin
11-02-2013, 02:36 AM
Quote:This seems to be all of my making. I am sorry as its caused a lot of grief. I only asked, in good nature, if Mr Bishop could do a complete book on helmets. It got a good response though.My granny used to say 'if you don't ask, you don't get' so you were right to do so. It's neither your nor my fault that the circumstances make it well-nigh impossible, especially when some of the main beneficiaries of such reference books would be the very museums charging for the photos (and they have no choice in that as they too have to cover their costs). Funny old world...
Mind you, I'm not sure I'd fancy the headaches of the Crosby Garrett book multiplied by several hundred!
Mike Bishop
11-02-2013, 08:27 AM
Quote:In the long run, I suspect that the same national bodies which pay to publish scholarly articles online will give grants to pay writers of books for research time and photo rights. Right now you would have to frame the proposal in terms of research and research expenses rather than publication.kevin mills post=346102 Wrote:This seems to be all of my making. I am sorry as its caused a lot of grief. I only asked, in good nature, if Mr Bishop could do a complete book on helmets. It got a good response though.My granny used to say 'if you don't ask, you don't get' so you were right to do so. It's neither your nor my fault that the circumstances make it well-nigh impossible, especially when some of the main beneficiaries of such reference books would be the very museums charging for the photos (and they have no choice in that as they too have to cover their costs). Funny old world...
Douglas Strong is just finishing a similar project for European plate armour 1300-1430. Finding as many pieces as possible, negotiating with museums and collectors, taking photos and drawing sketches, deciding which pieces are authentic, sorting out image rights, and finding a publisher has taken decades of part-time work.
11-02-2013, 10:52 AM
Crosby Garrett book
Is there to be such a thing? Sounds like a big endeavor by itself.
Alternatively an online visual database that can be printed on demand? One that can be added to as better information and images become available ( crowd sourced)? Curated so Joe Trooper can't smoosh things.
I suspect the image quality everyone would like would be like this:
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/gigapixe...04462?mt=8
Is there to be such a thing? Sounds like a big endeavor by itself.
Alternatively an online visual database that can be printed on demand? One that can be added to as better information and images become available ( crowd sourced)? Curated so Joe Trooper can't smoosh things.
I suspect the image quality everyone would like would be like this:
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/gigapixe...04462?mt=8