I have a lot of my journals from he past four years on trail journals. I had the idea of creating a book from each of my treks, not for the purpose of sales, but just to have a permanent sorta journal thing. Think modern photo album in hardbound book form. I would prefer to create a PDF and submit that. The iphoto ones seem easy, but pretty much photos only. I write a lot, I would like to have my journals permanently printed.

Naturally I don't want to pay a fee to start a title or whatever if I am only going to buy 2 -5 copies of my "book" for me, parents, and whatever close family members want one REALLY bad. I would prefer to pay a higher price per book to avoid that. I don't care about royalties or profits. This is just a personal vanity book/photo album.

I liked (past tense) Createspace. They don't have hardbound full color options any more. I haven't heard great reviews on lulu, but I think they have a fee per title. Correct me if I am wrong.

I have six of such books to print. Three longish ones, like 100 pages, and two short ones, one mediumish.

Is anyone familiar with any online self publishing sites that fit the bill?
Thanks!
-Gabe

I just had a 120 page monograph printed by blurb.com. Nice results. Lots of options.

Blurb looks good for my purposes. A bit pricey, but well worth it I think. Thanks!

I would like to know about any other sites like it. Maybe one where other people, mainly family could order a copy without going through me. I have a big extended family.

-Gabe

If you look into it more, some of those self-publish companies are better at printing text-only, some at photos-only, and some at text+photos. Some use really good paper for the book pages, and some don't. Some are good for small sizes, and others are good for large sizes. Some can handle color profiles for photos, and others can't. Not everybody is good at everything.

--B.G.--

You could also look into a local reprographics or print shop to see what they would be able to produce. Most have the ability to do plastic/metal comb binding or glue binding as well as offer different paper goods that you can actually touch to get an understanding of paper weight and finish. I found a local shop to print and bind my portfolio which was slightly more expensive to do per unit, but I only needed 10 units. Many online print companies have a minimum order requiring 50, 500, to 1000 units.

I'd rather spend money on SMD/MLD/GG stuff!

David? Did you have a copy of Adobe InDesignor did you do one of the online templates.

Whoever can help:
I would prefer to make a PDF, more customizable and such. On Blurb, doing a PDF requires Adobe InDesign which costs anywhere from $200-$600. But there is one version I found on Google Shopping for $22 Adobe InDesign CS4. Is that an upgrade or a weird license?

I just wanna print my &%*# travel journals without dropping $300 on Adobe software.

> I would prefer to make a PDF
Actually, you can get a plug-in for MS Word (full version, not Works?) that lets you output as PDF. And there are many free packages which will output PDF format as well. Search Gogle etc.

Yes, InDesign is nice - I use it, but it is NOT essential.

> I found on Google Shopping for $22 Adobe InDesign CS4. Is that an upgrade or a weird license?
I would say a ripped-off pirate version myself.

I suggest a local print shop for the small number you want, starting from a PDF source. They will be cheapest for <10.

Cheers

If it helps any, my bog standard MacBook will convert anything to a PDF. When I go to Print, one of the options is 'Save as PDF'

You could borrow a friends Mac for ten minutes once you have your piece saved as a word file.

Adobe usually has a free trial of their software available for 30 days. InDesign does have a learning curve to use properly but if you're a quick learner it shouldn't be too difficult. You could also check with your local university if they have a computer lab that you could use that would have the software installed as well. I've had success using CutePDF which offers a freeware version of their pdf distiller/printer.

For 5 - 6 copies your best bet is probably a print shop or a store like Staples. 8.5" X 11" with thick stock for the cover and back are fairly cheap. They charge more for the color pages. I recently had 150 8.5" X 11" training manuals printed like this at Staples. This was for 20 pages each, printed double-sided. They included a tape binding. Cost was around $600, but only the cover was color.

Another option is to print it yourself at home. A good color printer with high quality paper can do an outstanding job. I own a comb-binding machine that punches the paper and inserts the comb. I paid around $100 for it. I build a lot of presentation materials this way, and the quality is outstanding. But again it is 8/5" X 11."

I sometimes write little trip reports for my kids, often 10 - 20 pages. I do it in MS Word, convert it to PDF and email it to them. They can print it if they like.

I have a mac... sorry. And I can export as a PDF. But Blurb requires a "PDF/X-3 file" (No idea what that is) I can't do that output. Also. The page dimensions are unavailable for me. Blurb for their standard portrait requires 7.875x10. my file at 7.88x10 didn't work. hah.

I'll try the free trial of Indesign maybe. Also call a local print shop. There is one that treated my me very nicely in printing my 11x17 SHR maps.