What format do you prefer reference books?

buzz1941 · 16 July 2007, 05:03 PM

Books that have a lot of photos and drawings, etc.... do you prefer them in "portrait" (vertical) format or "landscape" (horizontal) format?

Sreiko · 16 July 2007, 11:10 PM

In many cases portrait orientation is better to arrange content inside. The best size ever was "World Air Power Journal". Do you have some publishing plans?

Jurgen Fliegler · 17 July 2007, 12:00 AM

Hello,
I think that portrait is the best orientation for any book, so this applies to our case also. In case of plans or paintings that need a width larger than height, they can be printed at 90 degrees rotation. Besides, the portrait orientation of the book makes it more easy to handle, to read and to store in the library.
That's my opinion.

Regards,
Jurgen

Kosh · 19 July 2007, 07:15 AM

That 90 degree rotation should never be done. NEVER! A book designer doing that should be shot. As for the orientation, I´d say that is very much dependent on the subject. Landscape format is very good for e.g. ships and tanks, for obvious reasons.

As far as storing goes, that is a double edged sword. E.g. I don´t have problems when storing e.g. A4 landscape books, but sometimes bookcases have a maximum depth on only some 10-11 inches. Luckily I have a shelf which can hold 4 x 80 cm wide rows of books up to 13-14" in depth provided the height does not exceed 10".

As for handling, that is very much dependent on the format (size). I have found no difficulties in handling or reading the A4 size Schiffer book on the XF8B despite it being quite a heavy one.

May I ask what is the topic, how large the illustrations would be and how many pages would it have?

Barrett · 19 July 2007, 02:11 PM

Concur that no self-respecting production designer would print an image so the reader needs to rotate the volume. But it happens. So does the absurdity of printing a picture backwards so it "flows in the right direction." However, I see that more in ads than anything else.

Kosh · 20 July 2007, 02:00 AM

Another thing that should not be allowed to happen is printing across the "gutter".

Regarding rotation, I had a large format (9" x 12") portrait style book weighing some 5 lbs which required constant rotation and back as the designer had had a brainstorm. Reading that book was a true pain in the ***.

buzz1941 · 20 July 2007, 02:33 AM

The subjects will be rather petite modelers guides and details -- mostly photos and profiles -- somewhat along the lines of the old "Profiles" series. Small enough to keep in a kit box.

Kosh · 20 July 2007, 04:52 AM

In other words: small format, staplebound, softback, less than 100 pages? In that case an A5 size (210 mm x 148.5 mm) or about similar in lanscape format makes perfect sense.

john_g · 20 July 2007, 12:19 PM

Kosh

A5 might be acceptable for a small publication, but if we are talking major reference works, I would prefer A4 210 x 297 portrait style, the books would be easier to store on a shelf. Air Britain has an excellent range of reference books and they stick to the A4 size and it seems to work a treat

john_g

buzz1941 · 20 July 2007, 01:13 PM

The size will be likely 6"X9" (152mmX228mm, pretty close to A5) which is a standard US printing size. Orientation is the issue. These books will be 36 pages or less (likely 24) staple-bound so they open flat and primarily feature photographs and color profiles. The primary series will be 51 volumes, but I may do a one-off of a different subject to test the process.

I'm also doing an aviation history in photographs that will span six volumes, 96 pages each. These will be perfect bound and have a spine.