The Big People Book Covers are out being printed. Printing the prototypes is the current effort, which includes all of the editions. I have a few printers lined up, for production, but for the prototypes, I am working with a very talented technician one on one at a small printer which is well suited for the development process. Once I have the finished books, then we will look to the larger houses. The issue with the larger printing houses is that I need to secure sufficient orders to engage in large quantities. So that is a different stage of operations.
But, getting back to the Gnome-Sized Books; because these books will also be presented in a boxed set, the spines of the books (in particular) need to match, pretty much perfectly. As simple as that sounds, it has not been simple to achieve. I have resorted to building each file on the basis of the previous file, all of which are based on the alignment specs of a Master file. You might believe that that goes without saying, but shockingly, slight shifts have seemed to been a problem. I have managed to get past that, so I won't be redundant.
The Gnome-Sized Book Covers are almost done and about ready to be printed, which means I will be returning to the inner pages. I have another upgrade to the inner pages and I need to size them correctly. Everything was created in one size layout, which was used for the sake of ease of the layout. Now the sizes need to be adjusted for the new book sizes. In that regard, I found that at one point, a number of revisions ago, the text did not read well when it was published in the Gnome-Sized Book. So I went through the entire layout and changed certain text choices for a better font that was easier to read when published in a smaller size. There were many other alterations that needed to take place as the books became refined. So now we are almost ready to publish the Gnome-Sized Books.
One thing that was suggested was to find a sponsor willing to foot the bill for the Gnome-Sized Books. The reason for this is that we plan on having readings at a number of libraries and at those readings, we will give the kids who attend a Gnome-Sized Book for attending. I think that is a good idea. I wanted to pass off the readings to other people, but I keep being told that I need to read to the kids. Well, ok. But I also want to have some puppetry going on. So that needs further development to make that happen.
If I get enough pre-sales of the Big People Books, well, that can pay for the Gnome-Sized Books that we want to give away. But even so, sponsoring the giveaway books might be a good publicity opportunity for someone. So I am open to duliscussing that with anyone. Just send me an email; image.of.the.mind.studios@gmail.com. Sometimes an email will get lost in spam, so don't take offence if I'm not right on top of it. I try to be, but it doesn't always happen.
I will be looking for a sales manager and possibly a production manager. There is a degree of operations that will be taking place in-house, but even with the larger production quantities, inspection and order fulfillment with be taking place at IMS, so we will need personnel for that. It's a contingent on quantities and pre-sales. There will be no retail from IMS, only wholesale and Limited Editions issued to investors.
More on this later. AG
