Anyone know how to get a hold of Leo Santucci? I am in the process of writing a book about Quick Change rear ends and have questions about the publishing and formating. If anyone could help me out it would be most appreciated.

If he needs to remain anonymous, you could ask him to PM me. I promise not to be a PITA!

Thanx,

Bruce

You can contact him through the published Inliners International Members List.

I am doing the same thing with several books myself right now. Self publishing is the way to go and much easier than you think, plus you stay in control of your own work. There are really no guidelines as to how formal or informal you have to be, mainly just adhere to the margins they recommend for placing your text and pics on the pages. Many printing companies offer the do-it-yourself service. You provide the content in a PDF format and they print it for you, its that easy. The pics cannot be in a Jpeg format, they are not high enough resoultion for the printing industry, only 72 DPI, and you need 300 DPI minimum for printing books and magazines, so you have to convert them to another format. You just have to decide what size book you need, 5-1/2 x 8-1/2, 6 x 9 or 8-1/2 x 11, color or black and white pics. You will need to get some specialized software to do the page layouts and cover, you can do the initial layout in Word, but you will need the higher end software like Adobe Photoshop and InDesign to do all final editting and layouts before its ready for hand off to the printer. If your going to be having distribution through a retailer, then you need to apply for an IBSN barcode to identify your book so the scanner can read it, its about $150 to get it. If you need any tips or help let me know. I have one fixing to go to the printer now. I can recommend some printers and give you some ideas on what it costs per book to have it done.

Thanx to both of you,

CNC, that is exactly the type info I am looking for. What format do you use for pics to get the higher resolution?

I am doing the the text in Word but figured it would have to be converted.

The only thing I'm sure of is I want 8-1/2 x 11. I assumed that color might be cost prohibitive. I will take you up on the offer to help. PM to follow as I get closer.

Bruce

Your more than welcome Gearhead. You will need to save the pics as a TIFF extension, either with Photoshop or Publisher with a 300 DPI minimum(it asks the resolution you want before you save it). If you are going to do black and white pics, to will also need to change them to grayscale with Publisher or Photoshop as well.
Keep in mind that all you are doing in Word with your text and pics is only a rough draft, and once you get all the total page count figured out and text and pics added you will need to do all final editting in InDesign or equivalent editting software. I use InDesign CS2 which can even let you design and layout the cover using bleeds which is critical your that stage of editting.
Just let me know what you need help with and I give you a hand.