Photobook Concepts Workshop – December 9th online

Photobook Concepts

What is it?

It can be challenging to translate a photographic project into an engaging concept and design for a photobook. This workshop explores strategies and techniques for developing a dummy book. The goal is that by the end of the day you have everything you need to produce a PDF dummy book which can then either be disseminated in that form or sent to a printer to make a physical book.

This workshop will lead participants through a series of discussions, examples and exercises designed to explore the formulation of a concept for a photobook, and then ways of developing that concept into a book design which can form the basis of a digital or physical photobook dummy . It covers ways of developing a concept based on a pre-existing body of work, a discussion of fundamental graphic design principles useful for book design, and then moves on to looking at how to start laying out a design for a dummy book in the industry standard Adobe Indesign software, and a final section on production and publishing considerations.

To get maximum benefit from the day participants should come to this workshop with a project already in progress which they can apply ideas discussed during the day to.

Timetable (GMT)

8.50 – Participants gather ready to start.

9.00 to 10.30 – Developing a concept which can be used to inform book design choices.

10.30 – 11.00 – First break and activity.

11.00 – 12.30 – Graphic design fundamentals, including formats, layouts, typography, colours, and different approaches to using images

12.30 – 13.30 – Second break and activity.

13.30 – 15.00 – An introduction to Adobe InDesign, covering the fundamental steps and tools needed to set up and start designing a book project, and exporting for print.

15.00 – 15.30 – Third break and activity.

15.30 – 17.00 – Production and physical features including endings, papers, and printing. Conclusion and Q&A.

How the workshop delivered?
The workshop is broken into four elements delivered online over the course of a day, with activities to work on between each workshop element. The workshop is taught using a browser based video conferencing platform called Jitsi. You’ll be sent a link to join, there is no need to create an account or download anything. At the end you will also be sent a recording of the workshop along with a list of resources and further reading.

Who is leading it?
My name is Lewis Bush, I’m a photographer, researcher and writer. I have extensive experience of online teaching including teaching for nearly a decade on the London College of Communications MA Photojournalism and Documentary Photography (online) which I also ran for three years. I have been running these workshops since 2019 and have trained over 500 people through them. You can read my full bio here.

The fine print:
I believe workshops should be small enough for a good level of interaction, so workshops are capped at 10 participants. I also need at least six people to sign up for the workshop to run. In the unlikely event of a workshop needing to be cancelled participants will have their full fee returned to them. Participants needing to cancel up to two weeks before the workshop will have their fee returned less a 20% charge. Cancellations made less than a week before the day of the workshop are non-refundable.

You can read some testimonials about the Studio Workshops program here.

If you’ve got any question please get in contact with me here.