Want a Picture of Discovery's Enterprise

[jaime]

Yep, that's exactly why I draw that comparison.

Because it's something that SEEMS really simple until you consider the exact details on what "drop it in" actually entails.

If insert an image into a bloc of text (say, 750 words) what happens to the paragraph spaces and line breaks? am I splitting a paragraph at a point where half the last sentence is on the next page, followed by a page break? If I'm using justified text, does this spacing make this whole thing look weird?

And then factor in unexpected quirks of whatever software you're using:
- Where the fuck did my captions go?
- Why isn't this displaying correctly?
- I need to shrink this image to make it fit better... oh shit, that means I need to crop it differently... oh shit, I didn't save the high-res version and cropping it makes it look blurry... oh shit there's the high-res version but it's in the wrong format...
- Wow, that looks clunky... let me add one additional space beneath that paragraph so it OH MY FUCKING GOD HALF MY IMAGES JUST JUMPED INTO TO HYPERSPACE

And the always wonderful:
- Huh... the high volume printer has different margin parameters than the software we're using and now we have to redo the whole thing. Fuck my life!


One would think.

"The more they overtake the plumbing, the easier it is to stop up the drain."

And the TNG manual is a REALLY good example of this, because I could almost guarantee you the layout took at least a week to finally get narrowed down, even if all the editing and retouching was completely done, and even if problems with the layout didn't require further edits.

Yes. I find modern DTP does that too. More time spent googling InDesign Arcania that actually in the document, and finding out what it doesn’t like importing. It’s made the stuff that took hours with a pasteboard take seconds, and the stuff which took seconds take hours. But a professional shouldn’t need to google the arcania, and even some of the stuff you mention doesn’t come up in my hypothetical (no ones cropping anything, or worrying about adjusting colour for print, because that shits been done back when the art was printed out for approval way back, done by the artist.)
The justification stuff and all that takes seconds, and worst case, you just don’t stick the picture there (your run of the mill art book isn’t going for fancy effects and text wraps, it has one job, two if it’s text heavy.) This isn’t for fighting with Future publishing for design cred (EDGE is always gonna win that one. Except when they get some awful art in.) it’s not reinventing the wheel. Since we are talking about the new enterprise, think about the Ships Of The Line book. It’s that annoying to shelves widescreen format, but it’s text on one page, picture the next. Nice little graphic doohickey by the title and a page number. Yeah. Decision making (I think the angle on the doohickey is too acute says editor. Artist changes it in a second and waits two hours for the email back saying they are throwing out the doohickey, and can he spend some time making it look like TNG LCARS doohickey. Which his software hates doing with its built in drawing tools so it takes three hours to draw an oval and fill it the same black as its outline........) is the lengthy and annoying part. Assuming that isn’t there (John Eaves say, has permission to self-publish his design work. So he’s got the whole creative suite sitting there, pops open InDesign and of he goes.) then the actual process, basically scrapbooking with a laptop, is all I am talking about timewise. Let’s assume the printers aren’t dicks about file formats, and nothing falls off the page...why is that months? Or even weeks?
I think it comes down to the plumbing joke, but also down to time is money. That’s why, much as I bloody hate it, Fiver is gonna mess the market up. It also comes down to Scottys engineering estimates I think.

 

[jaime]

Well, you most certainly think wrong. The fact that you seem to think the artists' images can just be dropped into the layout without any retouching being done shows that you have a basic misunderstanding of what is actually done to produce an art book, or any piece of printed work for that matter. I'm sorry to be that frank, but you really are mistaken there.

You have a piece of work already corrected for print. Your job is to show that work. You aren’t cropping it, correcting its gamut or anything. I accept this is the ideal situation, and perhaps many times it isn’t...but...assuming you have a colour corrected piece of art right there, what is the difficulty? Even if it is..how long does it take a professional to actually do that with modern image editing tools? Because I know how long it takes amateurs. And I have seen the books on my shelf, so I have seen what gets put out by professionals. To reiterate, I am not talking about sourcing your images, proofreading, editing, writing the text. Layout, pure and simple, the old pasteboarder job, does it take an ice age, and if it does, why is that?

 

[Crazy Eddie]

Yes. I find modern DTP does that too. More time spent googling InDesign Arcania that actually in the document, and finding out what it doesn’t like importing. It’s made the stuff that took hours with a pasteboard take seconds, and the stuff which took seconds take hours. But a professional shouldn’t need to google the arcania, and even some of the stuff you mention doesn’t come up in my hypothetical (no ones cropping anything, or worrying about adjusting colour for print, because that shits been done back when the art was printed out for approval way back, done by the artist.)

And layout sometimes (or often) has to be changed when you find out some of your images and graphics don't look the way on page you intended them too and need to be retouched. That's why alot of designers and technical writers deliberately map out spaces for images and diagrams ahead of time. Assuming you have very smartly completed all of the text and captions ahead of time, that still takes more than just two days.

Since we are talking about the new enterprise, think about the Ships Of The Line book.

Okay, I agree. Publishing a coffee table book that is itself just a glorified photo album would take, at most, two days to get the layout right.

Which kind of explains why these are the only kind of books that still get published, no? Because the Ships of the Line book is easily the most half-assed thing I have ever seen with a "Star Trek" label on it. If they spent more than $200 on its design and editing, they probably paid too much.

The question we originally asked was why tech manuals aren't profitable and why Art Books are far more common... the answer is, because these things are time consuming and complicated to put together in a way that is visually impressive for a professional quality product. If you're saying that it should only take two days to slap something together like a high schooler with an art project, sure, that's dooable... but that also aint the TNG tech manual you're describing either.

 

[jaime]

And layout sometimes (or often) has to be changed when you find out some of your images and graphics don't look the way on page you intended them too and need to be retouched. That's why alot of designers and technical writers deliberately map out spaces for images and diagrams ahead of time. Assuming you have very smartly completed all of the text and captions ahead of time, that still takes more than just two days.


Okay, I agree. Publishing a coffee table book that is itself just a glorified photo album would take, at most, two days to get the layout right.

Which kind of explains why these are the only kind of books that still get published, no? Because the Ships of the Line book is easily the most half-assed thing I have ever seen with a "Star Trek" label on it. If they spent more than $200 on its design and editing, they probably paid too much.

The question we originally asked was why tech manuals aren't profitable and why Art Books are far more common... the answer is, because these things are time consuming and complicated to put together in a way that is visually impressive for a professional quality product. If you're saying that it should only take two days to slap something together like a high schooler with an art project, sure, that's dooable... but that also aint the TNG tech manual you're describing either.

That’s sort of my point lol. Ships Of The Line is your basic no frills art book that simply shouldn’t take that long to produce. The TM? Yeah, a bit longer, if you factor in full production, planning, writing, actually making the graphics rather than pulling pre-existing material. But...and it’s a biggie...if there is preexisting material to pull, then that’s gonna speed things up (say the set designs already exist in the form that we are familiar with from the blueprints books, or near enough that it’s a couple of days image editing.) and depending on how the designer approach their work, there may be a ton of text you can pull from too (Sternbach seems to me to be that sort of designer...that’s why he could produce the TNG TM. It’s almost part of his process to think about these things when designing.) now...once you are looking at what is basically a black and white book (there’s some blue in the TM) with styles etc already in place (Mike Okuda and his TNG LCARS he set for the show.) then the work is again lower at the ‘producing the book’ end.
That’s basically what I am talking about. If people can pull existing stills and design elements, already done for the show, write up notes, already done for the show, put the lot into a DSC LCARS styled book (again, that means fonts and design elements do not have to be made from scratch, or even go through much in the way of agreement.) then why is a TM such an impossibility these days? Now go for ebook only publication, and you aren’t even worrying about sitting there looking at printers proofs...it simply shouldn’t be such an expensive endeavour as to rule out selling enough to make a profit.
Neelix has a cookbook on the kindle store. Granted, that has its roots in golden age of Trek (where you can also find a Federation passport) but we still get things like 150 years of the Federation (I was unimpressed) or tourist guides to Quo’Nos.... these things have got to be even more niche than TMs, and take work...and yet they exist.
Maybe the problem is it’s basically impossible to ever hit the standard of the TNG TM, so why bother? *shrug*

Maybe I was t making my point clear, but your post basically sums it up. A serviceable book is not a lengthy endeavour, from pre-existing assets (art plus words, Ship Of The Line style.) If those assets don’t exist, or are too far from usable form, maybe it’s a bit longer. But in the past, and in film making in general, there generally are a lot of serviceable assets.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

That’s sort of my point lol. Ships Of The Line is your basic no frills art book that simply shouldn’t take that long to produce. The TM? Yeah, a bit longer...

Which, as Christopher points out, is the whole reason why the only things they're still putting out are no-frills "Ships of the Line" style books. That's the whole reason we're NOT getting these awesome and detailed "Mister Scott's Guide to the Enterprise" with blueprints, set plans, diagrams, graphics and well thought out tech writeups: because those things are difficult and expensive to produce and don't sell particularly well.

Ships of the Line probably didn't sell all that well either, but considering it only cost them like $80 to slap that thing together, it's the far more profitable product, so that's all we've been getting for the last, like, 15 years. Because even if people actually buy tech manuals and such in any volume, they don't actually make much MONEY.

 

[KirkusOveractus]

So does anyone have a good profile shot of Enterprise as she appeared at the end of the episode? Just asking.

 

[jaime]

Which, as Christopher points out, is the whole reason why the only things they're still putting out are no-frills "Ships of the Line" style books. That's the whole reason we're NOT getting these awesome and detailed "Mister Scott's Guide to the Enterprise" with blueprints, set plans, diagrams, graphics and well thought out tech writeups: because those things are difficult and expensive to produce and don't sell particularly well.

Ships of the Line probably didn't sell all that well either, but considering it only cost them like $80 to slap that thing together, it's the far more profitable product, so that's all we've been getting for the last, like, 15 years. Because even if people actually buy tech manuals and such in any volume, they don't actually make much MONEY.

Cost is why the Voyager TM was shelved (Sternbach didn’t like the advance and had expensive things planned.) but cost can be brought down *if* there are preexisting assets. The Star Trek Fact Files ran for silly numbers of issues (I thought it would never end) and it’s modern descendant over with the Eaglemoss Starship Collection seems to be doing rather well (and has spun out into art book/TM type publications that are far more advanced than Ships Of The Line.) They can also be brought down by all sorts of other factors.
I think, that if Trek comes back into the public consciousness as a result of DSC, we will see TMs, and I do not think in this day and age they will be expensive to produce. It’s basically down to Simon & Shuster Though.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

Cost is why the Voyager TM was shelved (Sternbach didn’t like the advance and had expensive things planned.) but cost can be brought down *if* there are preexisting assets. The Star Trek Fact Files ran for silly numbers of issues (I thought it would never end) and it’s modern descendant over with the Eaglemoss Starship Collection seems to be doing rather well (and has spun out into art book/TM type publications that are far more advanced than Ships Of The Line.) They can also be brought down by all sorts of other factors...

And are all good examples, because the Eaglemoss magazines are NOT technical manuals or anything even remotely close to it. They're pretty much just short articles packed with concept art and CG models; what's more, the MAGAZINE isn't actually the thing that's making all the money, it's mainly just icing on the cake for their ridiculously high quality miniatures.

And for those magazines included with the ships? You can bet your ass it takes more than 2 days to polish the layouts of those. I REALLY doubt those articles would sell all that well if they weren't packaged with the models.

I think, that if Trek comes back into the public consciousness as a result of DSC, we will see TMs

We won't. As it stands, the TNG manual was being marketted almost directly to fans of the old FASA books and the Federation Officers manual that helped fill the merchandising gap of the 1970s and 80s, and even then, it was released at the HEIGHT of Star Trek merchandise sales (back when the die cast Enterprise-D, action figures, phaser toys, shuttlecraft and hot wheels ships were flying off the shelves in every toy store there was). The tie-in market has only contracted since then and is composed almost exclusively of collectors who don't actually care all that much about the tech side of things.

I do not think in this day and age they will be expensive to produce.

The things that are not overly expensive or complicated to produce are already being produced.

 

[jaime]

And are all good examples, because the Eaglemoss magazines are NOT technical manuals or anything even remotely close to it. They're pretty much just short articles packed with concept art and CG models; what's more, the MAGAZINE isn't actually the thing that's making all the money, it's mainly just icing on the cake for their ridiculously high quality miniatures.

And for those magazines included with the ships? You can bet your ass it takes more than 2 days to polish the layouts of those. I REALLY doubt those articles would sell all that well if they weren't packaged with the models.


We won't. As it stands, the TNG manual was being marketted almost directly to fans of the old FASA books and the Federation Officers manual that helped fill the merchandising gap of the 1970s and 80s, and even then, it was released at the HEIGHT of Star Trek merchandise sales (back when the die cast Enterprise-D, action figures, phaser toys, shuttlecraft and hot wheels ships were flying off the shelves in every toy store there was). The tie-in market has only contracted since then and is composed almost exclusively of collectors who don't actually care all that much about the tech side of things.


The things that are not overly expensive or complicated to produce are already being produced.

I must have missed the glut of DSC posters, pencil cases, trading cards etc.
I think the TNG TM was an outlier, but not because of when it came out (three or four years before peak Trek, with the Fact Files stretching over peak golden age to the decline.) but because how much of it was sourced from already prepared material for the show (or that could be...all those Okudagrams in the book.) and how TNG itself was made and positioned. We will see. I personally think all merchandise is pretty poor these days...it’s targetting the wrong demographic, and the state of genre TV doesn’t help that (kids don’t want figures, thirty somethings do.) but Trek and to a greater extent Star Wars (and modern Who) have always been gamechangers in that arena. I don’t think DSC will be... but...maybe the next series, or maybe after season two or three.

 

[nightwind1]

It's really not.

Hell, it took me two days just to clean up the layout of an employee handbook that didn't actually HAVE any pictures. And that for a book whose only variations were headings, fonts, and the occasional footnote.


You remind me of a client I once had who called me up at 11:15pm complaining about an invoice:
HER: I don't understand this amount. You charged us $550 for for three web pages? You said it would only cost $70.
ME: I quoted you an hourly rate of $70 an hour because you're a family friend. Normally I charge twice that. And it took me way more than an hour to finish your website.
HER: Why? It's just three pages!
ME: Well, it's three pages, plus your home page which you didn't have, plus the back-end work I had to do integrating your catalog page with your point-of-sale system, plus I had to sit there and write product description from scratch because you gave them to me on notecards instead of emailing them to me like I asked. All of that work took me a total of seven hours, plus the cost of having to buy your domain name so you could have the web address you wanted.
HER: I don't understand why that took you seven hours. I could have written those pages in Microsoft word in like twenty minutes!
ME: Uh huh...
HER: I do this kind of work for a living! I'm serious! I have a business degree! There's no way this should have taken that long! Thirty minutes tops, I could easily do it myself!
ME: I suppose that means my services are not necessary after all... well, in that case, I'll leave you to it. Good luck with your website.

Exactly.

You should send that story to https://clientsfromhell.net/