If you’re gonna steal…
Posted on by Paul Drummond
Working on more book covers, and like most designers at some point in their career I’m shamelessly stealing from the work of Saul Bass:
Digital design and other shiny toys
Midnight Echo issue 6 available
Posted on by Paul Drummond
Issue 6 of Midnight Echo, the official magazine of the Australian Horror Writers Association is now available. I provided the cover illustration and a short interview in which they were nice enough to describe me as a ‘rising talent’. I wonder how long I can get away with that…
Strippers, murder, vampires, and something tasty for dinner
Posted on by Paul Drummond
Just finishing another batch of ebooks, and it’s a varied selection. We have rain–soaked, neon–lit urban squalor, strippers, murder, vampires terrorising a posh school, linguistics & the art/science divide, plus some recipes.
Gone in a Flash™
Posted on by Paul Drummond
Adobe have announced they are no longer developing Flash for mobile browsers. Instead they’ll be focussing on HTML5 based tools. This is good because Flash on mobile pretty much sucks, and the antagonistic relationship between Adobe and Apple has been a childish distraction. Hopefully the resources Adobe wasted on pushing Flash for mobile can now go into developing HTML5 authoring tools such as Edge. However, it’s not all good news because 750 Adobe employees will lose their jobs over this.
Update: On a related note, Adobe have also announced they are donating the Flex SDK to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF). Flex is used for Flash-based rapid application development, and while it’s been covered by an open-source license for a few years, this move will mean it’s managed by the ASF as an independent project. Adobe will still contribute to this project but have clearly stated they see HTML5 as the future of enterprise application development.
So, does this mean Flash is dead? No. Flash for desktop PCs will be around for a while. HTML5 does some things extremely well, especially on mobile, but it can’t match Flash yet. Consider this a transition phase. (To add to the confusion, Mozilla continues to work on Flash support within their Firefox for Android browser.)
Kindle Format 8 – something else to juggle?
Posted on by Paul Drummond
Amazon recently announced Kindle Format 8 (KF8), the new ebook file format they plan to use instead of Mobi 7. It’s a shame they didn’t switch to epub as rumoured, but KF8 offers much needed improvements to layout and typography. However, my heart sank when I read that only the latest Kindle devices will support KF8. The Kindle 3 or earlier will be stuck with Mobi format ebooks, which could make things difficult. Imagine the following scenario: A client comes to me with a proposal for a graphically rich title such as a cookery book. I think “Ah, KF8 provides the layout controls we need for this and it will look fantastic on the new Kindle Fire”. Quite reasonably, the client wants to sell as many copies of her book as possible so doesn’t like the idea of limiting it to owners of the latest Kindles. Therefore, I’ll have to create two versions of the ebook, doubling the time and cost for the project. Also, the version for older Kindles won’t look very good because of the limitations of the Mobi format. And that’s before we start looking at a version for the iPhone, iPad, Nook…
Amazon claim the upcoming version of KindleGen will convert existing content, but managing two versions of an ebook won’t be as simple as creating the first one and clicking a button. For example, I recently worked on a non-fiction title with illustrations, but we knew the Kindle wouldn’t let us wrap text around the images. After some trial and error we removed the images from the main text flow and centred them in a separate block. Not as elegant as our original design, but acceptable, and it worked across the Kindle devices and apps. However, this issue would slip through an automatic conversion tool as it requires hands-on attention.
It’ll be some time before KF8 is in use, so maybe this is unnecessary worrying. Hopefully KF8 will be supported by all Kindle devices.
Kindle Fire – the real content consumption device?
Posted on by Paul Drummond
When the iPad appeared there were dismissive comments about it being a ‘content consumption’ only device, suitable for reading, web browsing and so on, but not for creative work. That was untrue, but maybe the strength of the new Kindle Fire tablet will be that it really is a device for the content consumer, backed up by a tried and tested online store. Amazon marketing for the previous Kindle focussed on the ease of reading, wide choice of ebooks and speed of delivery. Now they have a device which offers this, but also hooks into their video streaming service and has a more intuitive interface. Add web browsing, email and a carefully managed selection of apps and it could be a winner. However, bright LCD screens really aren’t good for reading lots of text, so if you’re looking for a book reader it’s probably best to stick with the e-ink devices. Or buy both types of Kindle, which is what Amazon really wants.
It’s interesting that Amazon aren’t pushing the fact that the Kindle Fire uses Android. It’s being sold on what it does, not the underlying OS. The average consumer doesn’t care about technical details, and Amazon knows this. It’s all about selling content.
Of course, this is all speculation and it will be ages before we see the Kindle Fire in the UK.
Update: The first reviews are appearing and agree that the Kindle Fire is a media consumption (and buying) device first, general purpose tablet second. The small display and sluggish performance may be a problem, but hopefully software updates will improve the latter.
Midnight Echo issue 6 announced
Posted on by Paul Drummond
Issue 6 of Midnight Echo, the official magazine of the Australian Horror Writers Association will be available in November. The theme of this issue is science fiction horror, with stories from Cody Goodfellow, Cat Sparks, Stephen Dedman, Shane Jiraiya Cummings and Joanne Anderton, amongst others. There are also interviews with Hugo and Locus Reader Award winning author Charles Stross, and renowned science fiction artist Chris Moore.
New Kindle Fire tablet and updated e-ink devices
Posted on by Paul Drummond
As expected Amazon announced new Kindle models today. The existing e-ink devices have been updated, with both models losing the physical keyboard and one of them gaining a touchscreen. As before, these models use a greyscale e-ink display and are designed specifically for reading. However, the new Kindle Fire is a 7 inch tablet device intended for reading, web browsing, game playing, music and more. Amazon clearly want some of the iPad market with this one, and the low price indicates they hope to sell millions and recoup their costs through content sales. However, I think there’s plenty of room for both Amazon and Apple. The direct competition is Barnes & Noble, and companies such as Samsung and RIM who tried to copy the iPad but couldn’t match it on cost, design, ease of use and content availability. (Of course, this is just me thinking out loud and I might change my mind when I get hold of a Kindle Fire. Just what you need, eh? Another blog with unqualified, unverified speculation on a product that isn’t available yet.)
Oddly, the new Kindle models don’t appear to support the EPUB format. This is the standard file format for ebooks and there were hopes Amazon would switch to it, but they seem to be sticking with AZW/MOBI.
The new Kindles aren’t on sale yet, and at the moment you can only pre-order in the US. (Update: the non-touchscreen Kindle is available for pre-order in the UK now.)
Release the monsters! Trick or Treat ebook available
Posted on by Paul Drummond
Trick or Treat by John Gatehouse and Dave Windett is now available, so visit the Little Lemming Books site to help Neela stop those rampaging monsters!
The ebook is currently available from Amazon and Lulu. The Amazon version can be viewed on the Kindle or the Kindle app for iPhone, iPad, Mac, and PC. The Lulu EPUB version can be viewed on a range of devices and apps such as the iPhone, iPad, Nook, Adobe Digital Editions and more.
- Little Lemming Books
- Trick or Treat (Kindle edition)
- Trick or Treat (EPUB edition)
- Dave Windett’s website
New websites: care and feeding of
Posted on by Paul Drummond
I’m often asked about support options for websites, and while each contract is different, I don’t just upload a site then forget about it. The new Chris Moore Art site went online a couple of weeks ago but I haven’t stopped working on it. This was a small project for a single client, but the post-launch work will give you an idea of what’s involved in supporting a website.
Design editing based on user reports
During development the site was tested on as many browsers, devices and operating systems as possible, but testing is not the same as day-to-day use. Real users will always turn up things the developers miss. Nothing terrible was reported, but I tweaked the page layout to help viewers with Internet Explorer version 8 or earlier on small displays. The same changes also helped netbook users running Firefox on Ubuntu:
I also disabled the homepage slideshow. I’d hidden it from older versions of Internet Explorer because of known issues with this browser, but it was still causing a delay when loading the page. We always had a fallback image for display if the slideshow was unavailable, so we’re using that for now. It’s better to temporarily lose the slideshow than cause problems for site users.
CMS updates
The content management system (CMS) used to run the site was updated a day after launch. Just to add to the fun, the CMS plug-in we’re using for the image gallery functions also had a major update. I had to test everything, re-write some of the custom code we’re using for the image gallery, then re-publish the site. This took a couple of days.
New site functions
As soon as the site went online I started work on the print ordering functions. Anything involving payment processing can be tricky so we deliberately split site development into two phases. This meant the main site was online as quickly as possible, rather than waiting for me to finish everything. After a week’s work the print ordering functions were ready.
Ongoing work
Still to come are updates to the art gallery section when this is opened to the public, more mobile device work and anything else that pops up.