Issue 0 - Comments

[dave hailwood]

When you've had a chance to go through the issue, feel free to leave comments relating to the work inside here (constructive criticism, praise etc).

[dave hailwood]

Thought I'd paste Matt Yeo's comment here, in case anyone misses it:

'Hi Dave,

Congrats to you and the rest of the Temple APA folks on issue # 0! The strips are great and putting it out there as a free PDF is a great way of spreading the word.

Let's do some funky cross-promotion stuff!

Matt'

[dave hailwood]

Finally got the chance to say a few things about Issue 0 of The Temple.

Firstly, the feedback I've got from many contributors has been very good. I think one of the things I liked most about the digital Temple (as well as the extremely high standard of work inside) was the fact that the issue came out literally the day after the deadline. The most frustrating thing about the paper Temple used to be waiting three or so weeks to receive the issue through the post after it had been put together, so it's great to have a more immediate version.

I've also been given a few new ideas by various members for how to tackle the next issue. I'll list some of them here, so people can say which ideas they like.

Paul Eldridge likes the idea of a child-friendly issue as well as the standard issue, which I think could work well. Also it's easy enough to do (by simply removing anything of an adult nature from the child friendly issue, though keeping it in the standard version).

Tony Suleri suggested a comic strip only version of the Temple digital, which would be like the standard issue but without all the contents pages/pin-ups etc.

John Kirkham has been looking into doing a print based version of the Temple Digital, using the Lulu site. This is another good suggestion, and would probably require members to send their work at a larger size and DPI so it would be printable (which would then be reduced in size for the PDF version).

Another suggestion was a Low Res version of the Temple, which will be put into effect next time. I think it should be possible to half the MB size of the PDF file, which'll be good news for those who don't have broadband.

As for the deadline for Issue 1 of the Digital Temple, I'm thinking October 1st, as that'll mean it comes out just before the Birmingham convention.

I'll start a proper thread for Issue 1 of the Temple in a moment. If there's any other suggestions for improvements, no matter how minor, then feel free to voice them here.

[John Kirkham]

I was suppose to knock up a lo-res version… bugger

I started doing it and completely forget. So here it is, after a far bit of compression it comes in at a slender 11.6mb. All the text is legible on my monitor but let me know if you have probably reading the type on your machine.

Also I don’t thing we should do a print version of the Temple PDF, it needs to be as flexible as possible and having a restriction on the size and resolution of contributions could be restrictive. Instead I suggest we put together a Temple anthology in the style of Flight and 24Seven. We could put out an annual 100 page anthology book called ‘The Temple APA presents’ or sommit. If we use Lulu, we won’t have to pay for printing or even distribute it ourselves. Lulu will only print a book when an order comes in and the printing cost is included in the price. So we could put out a 100 page colour A4 book for £10 plus £3.50 postage.

[Paul Eldridge]

Did I say that? Sounds like a good idea then, although maybe 'like' is too strong a word. The idea of a print based version sounds good, those there people do like to get their grubby mitts on things.

[dave hailwood]

I think the idea of an annual 100 page Temple print anthology sounds good. Although 14 quid's a lot to shell out for a comic (though necessary, as colour is a must), at least it gives people the option of buying something more tangible than a PDF.

Do you think it should be all new material, or a mix of new stuff and the best bits from the PDF's? I reckon a mix would work best, as flexibility is always the key to making these things work.

Perhaps the deadline for the print anthology should be 1st May 2009, so that it's released in time for Bristol? If you fancy putting a few details up, John (such as page size, DPI, and amount of pages per contributor) it might get the ball rolling.

RIght, I'm off to download the lo-res Temple. Cheers for doing that, John (don't worry about having forgot - no one seems to have noticed!). Will let you know what I think when I've had a look.

[dave hailwood]

Okay, just had a look at the Temple Lo-res. It seems to work okay - just large enough to read without getting pixellated, so nice work there John.

One thing I noticed (this might just be on my computer) is that the links in the PDF taking you directly to members sections if you click them don't seem to work any more. It might just be that the computer I'm viewing it on doesn't have a certain option enabled, but it's probably worth someone else testing to see if this is the case or not.

[John Kirkham]

I didn't do the links because of time. I'll have a go at a revised version at the weekend

Actually £10/£13.50 for a 100 page colour trade is pretty good value. I think we should fill up those 100 pages with anything we can find, it's going to difficult to get 100 pages of new material in the first place so we will probably need to mix it up. But I’d like to see all of yours and Tony’s strips collected in one book and in vivid colour.

Using Lulu as soon as I’ve got all the material I can have a finished book on sale within 10 minutes so we can experiment as much as we like. It also doesn't matter if we only sell six copies because we aren't paying for the printing

[dave hailwood]

Ah, of course!

I forgot that by reducing the pages in size you'd also have to redo all those links from scratch! It's not too much of a problem really - feel free to leave it as is, if you think it'll take too long.

[John Kirkham]

Just thought - I can cut and paste the links from the original PDF you sent we. Should take me 10 minutes, so I'll have a revised linked version up later on today

[dave hailwood]

Nice one!

So, would you like to have a go at putting the next digital Temple PDF out yourself (your design skills might give it a new twist), or are you happy for me to do it? I don't mind either way (although I probably won't be able to make contributors covers up for them this time, due to the amount of projects I'm working on at the moment).

[John Kirkham]

I’ve only had two cups of tea this morning… but did I just talk myself into putting the Temple together?

Go on then, actually compared to the PDFs I put together for my Day Job it’s a piece of pish, I’ll still need some help on the propaganda and getting people to contribute front, but putting everything… yes, I shall take the baton/crap covered stick (delete most appropriate)

I’ll also put the print Temple anthology together, that maybe more complex if we need to do colour separations etc… How about the end of the year for a deadline?

Also here’s the revised linked up lo-res PDF, it actually took about 30 seconds to do in the end. I've deleted the other version.

[dave hailwood]

Excellent news, John. I'm sure you'll turn out a fine issue of the Temple.

At least we have Issue 0 as a guide for what members contributions should look like. I must admit, putting the digital Temple out was a lot more straight forward than the paper Temple. I found it useful to prepare the index page in advance, then keep adding to it as people's contributions trickled in towards the end.

I'll gladly assist with all other angles, such as propoganda etc (I notice you've already started on Shane Chebsey's site). I think keeping pages at 1200 pixels wide and 150 dpi seems to work well for the hi-res version, but you might be able to get away with reducing it a little (1000 pixels at 96 dpi, for example).

As for the print anthology, the end of the year sounds good, though you'll probably have to bring the deadline forward a bit due to Christmas. First week in December, maybe?