fotoplay: 716 pieces = 1 book

In my last post, I wrote about the year-long evolution of the cover of Fotoplay, and the many photographic layers that were constructed, deconstructed, and reconstructed to create it. To further fill out the picture, I thought I would write about the interior pages, and the (literally) hundreds of bits and pieces I made to create them.

My Fotoplay book has been one of my most brain and time consuming projects for more than a year, and in that time, I’ve created 716 individual files for the book. You can see some of them here in these screen shots…

Each photographic file was made in one of three ways: from one of my black and white negatives, from one of my digital photographs, or from a photograph I made with my scanner.

Working in Photoshop, in many layers, I altered my photographs, adding graphics, removing color, and removing backgrounds. The photograph of the meercat below was taken last summer at the zoo in Amsterdam.

I loved the image so much that I repeated it a few times in the book. Here, for example, is the copyright page, with bleeds and crop marks.

And here is page seven of the book:

Each component of each page was created in layers in Photoshop and saved as an individual file.

I created the final pages of the book in InDesign, and then exported the pages in a PDF. Below is another page, ready for the press.

The photograph below was also taken at the Amsterdam zoo.

And here is the final page layout, page fifteen of the book.

Once again, my dog Dylan made it into one of my projects. Looking at his photograph it occurred to me that his head was a cool collection of six triangles.

Using my original photograph of Dylan (above), I created a new two-toned file, reducing his head to flat grey, and dividing it up into shapes:

Finally, on the last page of the book, I introduce myself with a small portrait. I removed the background, and copied the hat I made for my meercat onto my own head. On another layer, I created a pair of glasses.

Here is the final page of the book, with an open invitation: to create a body for me (with a camera and cool boots, please), and to send me your child’s work (or your work), which I’ll add to a gallery here in This Playground.

*Coming soon: A sneak peek at the first complete press proof of Fotoplay, along with information about ordering!