My SoFoBoMo book is done! Here’s the link to my book on the SoFoBoMo website:
www.sofobomo.org/2009/books/TJAvery/what-is-it-for-henry/

If that doesn’t work, or if that website goes away sometime in the future, you can also download the PDF from my website here (6.3 MB).

Also, I’ve turned it into a Blurb book. The link to order the book is here.

The book design is very simple, but it’s intended for my 4-year old son I ended up using 39 different photos, and there are 18 subject pairs for him to guess. Some are pretty simple, but some will take some thought. Of course his second reading of the book will be no challenge at all. His mind is sharp and he remembers everything. He even tells me when I’ve accidentally skipped a page while reading him one of his other books.

For me, this wasn’t really about producing a book. The process of shooting and editing was good practice. This has been a nice photo project and has given me experience in doing the photography work and making a final presentation from it.

Hopefully Henry will enjoy it. I would guess that this book will become well worn within just a few months and we’ll probably have to order a new copy for Michael when he gets around to enjoying such a book.

Not much has been happening with my photography lately. I’m in an off period. That would account for the lack of posts here

I can’t explain it, but my photographic creativity and my desire to shoot has just abandoned me. It’s been gone about two months now. It’s not a stereotypical creative block, but rather a lack of creative drive and enthusiasm.

This happened about the same time last year. I spent about two months in a photographic lull, then all of a sudden it came back (and full-force too). I itched to get out with my camera again.

I think there are a lot of reasons behind this current lull, and I’m not going to get into the details now. I feel a great change in my photography is at hand.

This lull is inadvertently giving me a break. A break is sometimes needed to prevent burn-out and perhaps recharge the creative energies that have been spent (or over-spent).

Some years ago, I completely burned myself out of my LEGO hobby and hardly built anything for a long time. That was bad and I missed building with my bricks. What I needed was a break, but I didn’t realize it at the time.

SoFoBoMo update
However, I am pushing forward with my SoFoBoMo project. Most of this work is just follow-through. I laid down the creative plans a while back and I’m now just fulfilling my visions.

I officially started May 24th. I’m planning on wrapping up the book and publishing a PDF sometime around the 20th or 21st of June. Stay tuned…

I think I’m pretty much done with planning the concept of my SoFoBoMo book. This is going to be fun, and I’m looking forward to a project that I can work on right here at home.

The main concept is that the book will be sort of a guessing game for Henry (the book is for Henry, BTW). The idea is to have a close up and slightly abstracted photo of something he knows well followed by (on the next page) a wide, big shot of the whole thing. E.g. a close-up of one of the wheels on his yellow Tonka dump truck followed by a wide-angle shot of the whole dump truck with our backyard in the background.

The reason behind this concept is two fold:
1. I wanted a project that I could feasibly do within the rules of the SoFoBoMo project (so working at home is easy enough for me).
2. I wanted to make a book with some use. Creating a kids book is a good idea, IMO, because Henry can use it and also my younger son, Michael, when he gets older.

The next phase will be for me to select items around the house and backyard and then plan out the shots. Each item will require two photos.

So, that’s an update! Let the planning continue…

I’m taking the plunge and will embark on the SoFoBoMo (Solo Photo Book Month) in May. The concept is that you shoot, edit, and create a photo book within a 31 day time period.

www.sofobomo.org/2009/books/TJAvery

I have an idea, and my book will have a very specific purpose when it’s finished. I’ll post updates here as the project progresses.