days of making photobooks

I had made a lots of photo book for myself, before I decided to give a go to self publish one. Today, I had successfully published 「Penang Record 2015」and recently a photo zine 「 Home Town」. And now I recalled, how far the journey was, to have a courage to self publish a photo book. I remembered at that moment I decided to publish one, I persuaded myself, “Give a go or give up!” And I give a go.

在我還沒有開始發行攝影集之前，我為自己製作了很多攝影集。今天為止，我成功自己發行了『Penang Record 2015』和剛剛才發行的『Home Town』攝影誌。現在回想起來，我到底走了多長的路，才鼓起勇氣去發行我的一本攝影集？記憶猶新，當我決定製作要發行的攝影集時，我是這樣告訴自己的。『豁出去或放棄！』，我豁出去了。


My journey of making photo book began after the kyoto-osaka trip in 2012 . Kyoto-osaka trip was a very important trip to me. The promotional air ticket was bought a year ago, and I bought my first camera. You see, I am so looking forward to travel japan. I was a japanese manga fans (most of the kids at my generation are the manga fans), I actually drew my own version of ‘dragon balls’ manga and made them into a comic zine (without knowing that was a comic zine) and pass around for friends to read, that happened during my primary school. After growing up a little, I turns out to be a japanese drama fans ( most of the teenages at my generation are japanese drama fans too). I was influenced by japanese culture through the mangas and dramas during my schooling time, that is the reason I am so into traveling japan. That was why kyoto-osaka trip meant a lots to me, and I need to bought a camera to record my trip. And It was still not satisfying, I need to make a photo book of it for the remembrance.

我的製作攝影集之路在2012年的京阪（京都、大阪）之旅之後才開始。京阪之旅對我來說非常重要。優待的機票在一年前就買了，在那個時候我買了我人生中的第一架相機。你看，我真的很期待去日本旅遊。在我就讀小學的時候，我曾是日本漫畫迷（幾乎所有跟我相同年代的孩子都是日本漫畫迷）。小學的時候，我還曾畫了自己版本的‘七龍珠’漫畫，並且把它製作成漫畫zine（當時當然並不知道那是zine），然後傳給朋友看。再長大一點後，我變成了日劇迷（當時的青少年也都瘋狂追日劇，那是哈日年代）。我會那麼期待到日本去旅行，那是因為在我成長過程裡，一直都從漫畫與日劇裡受日本文化的影響。所以說，京阪之旅對我來說非常重要，我無論如何都要買相機來紀錄我的旅程。而且那還不夠，我還想把當時在日本拍的照片製作成攝影集才甘願。

I came across ‘groupon’ was selling a discount deal of photobook making service. The photobook making service was provided by the photobook malaysia company. After the discount, the price was around RM60. The photo book that are going to be produced is image wrap hard cover, perfect bind, A4 size and 40 pages of photo paper. The original price was around RM200. You see RM60 was really a best deal back then. I used the provided app to design my photo book, arranging my photo in sequence, adding text, adding background patterns etc. It was fun, I remember I researched on some magazines to learn up how to arrange and composite photos and text. I loved mixing them, the photo and the text, I tried to make it looks ‘professional’. But…

The experimental composition of image and text carried on for few books, but I found myself was not satisfied with it, no matter how I arranged them. Until a day, I decided to arrange my photos in full bleed for all the pages. And with that change, I was finally satisfied with the outcome. I love full bleed, is not that it doesn’t waste pages, is because I find it allows me to blend in easily from the viewer’s point of view. While opening the pages with two hands holding each edges left and right, it forms a cubical space between me/the reader and the book. With full bleed of images, it somehow forms a connection between me and the subject. There are no frames to remind me that i am the one who did the staring, sometimes I may even be think that the someone in the book is actually looking at me, telling me his/her’s stories.

我從Groupon裡找到了優待的攝影書製作服務。攝影書製作服務來自於一個叫做Photobook Malaysia的公司。優待後，製作一本攝影書才RM60而已。攝影書是圖像包裝的厚紙皮，膠訂，A4尺寸和40頁面的相片紙。原價本來要RM200以上。對於當時來說，RM60製作一本相片集是超級值得的了。我是以這所公司指定的軟件來設計與編排我的頁面的，加圖、加字或加背景雲圖。太有趣了，我記得當時為了製作出‘有水準’的攝影集，還特地去尋找一些雜誌來參考，學習他們怎麼去編排照片與文字，並且做了很多嘗試。但是。。。

實驗性的文字與圖片搭配編排，只繼續了幾本，怎麼排我都覺得不滿意。最後，我終於鐵下心，把所有的照片直接把整個頁面填滿。經過這個改動後，我終於滿意了。我很喜歡把照片灌滿頁面，不是因為這樣才不會浪費頁面，而是我覺得這樣看攝影集才比較容易融入其中。當雙手把書打開時，兩手持書跟書頁會形成一個立方空間，而那是我／讀者跟書本的內容的親密空間。我與它之間就因此而聯繫起來了。那裡沒有框框來提醒我，我是看的那個人。有時候我會想，是書裡世界的人在看著我，告訴我他的故事。

When come to landscape, cityscape or buildings, it is even better to make them full bleed. I wanted to go into the scene so eagerly, any frames or text will distract me from blending in. Text is informative, I found a lots of magazine, they like to  overlap the text in the empty space of an image. Although they are still full bleed, but by doing that, the text may divert me to read it, and if it was not arranged it nicely, it will be a risk to spoil the mood somehow. But then, text are still important, to tell a story that can’t be told from the images. Therefore I may arrange them at a different spread or pages.

I realized one of my early photobook, I put a little title to every corner of the images. It is so funny for me to look at it now. As if the images can’t tell the title that I need to place it there to remind the readers. Hey, you are looking at a performer, because the title is ‘the performer’.  If the image can’t tell the story, no matter how nice my title goes it will not help.

如果是風景、市景或建築的照片，把頁面填滿更有說服力。我要走進照片裡去，框架絕對會把我分心。我發現很多雜誌，它們喜歡把一些斷句埋在照片的空白處。雖然照片依然填滿頁面，但文字會引導我去讀。如果沒有處理好的話，它可能會把氣氛搞砸。但文字又很重要，它可以彌補照片無法描述但東西。所以如果需要加上文字的話，我會把它們安排在另外的頁面。
我留意到我那些早期製作的攝影集裡，我喜歡在每一張照片底下留個題目。依我現在來看，覺得太好笑了。照片自身難道不懂得告訴讀者故事嗎？需要我來提醒讀者照片是在拍什麼嗎？嘿，你正在看著的照片是「表演者」哦，因為題目寫著「表演者」三個字。如果照片本身無法描述，那我名字取得多動聽也沒有用的對吧！

After all, it is not a magazine I am making, it is my personal photo book, those title really doesn’t makes sense. Sometimes, I think the title should belong to the viewer. When a photo became viral somehow, a name will be given, so that it can be easy to identified or mentioned in the article, but usually the name was came by the author who wrote that article instead.

Well, I see mistakes, silly stuff in my early days of photo book, I recalled when I received the book sometimes I was upset. I feel upset because it doesn’t turns out as what I had imagined. It looks fine at the computer screen but it doesn’t works on the physical book. But then, when I look back these silly, mistakenly arranged photo book, I feeling warm. It records my footprint, my journey of making photo books. Without those days of making books for myself, I won’t gone this far.

到頭來，我製作的不是雜誌，而是給自己留著的攝影集，所以其實題目有點畫蛇添足。有時候，題目或名字因該留給觀者來決定。比如說，如果照片被瘋傳了，名字自然而然就會產生。名字的產生是因為要在文章提起比較容易，所以名字應該讓寫文章的人來決定。

重看我前期的攝影集時，我看到了很多瑕疵，還有莫名其妙的東西。我記得當時製作完成，然後收到書後，有時會覺得沮喪，因為書本的成果並不是我所預期的那樣。在電腦螢幕上看的時候真的很讚，印出書來卻很爛，非常沮喪。但我現在再重看，看見那些幼稚，很瞎的編排時，我突然覺得很溫暖。我突然覺得，沒有昨天的挫敗，哪有今天的成就啊？