My First iBook

Last summer I put together a book using Apple's Aperture professional photo software to show off the result of spending five days shooting the 2011 Indianapolis 500 practices and qualifying. I ordered a hardcover medium sized book to be able to show friends, family, and prospective clients. It cost $75 plus shipping and tax. I'm very proud of the book, yet there are several photos I wish I would have presented a little differently.

Jump forward to last Thursday and Apple's iBooks Author software release. The process of creating a book in Author isn't that much different from doing the same in iPhoto or Aperture. The templates aren't quite as handy for creating a photography book, as Author is trying to make it easy to create text books for schools initially. It doesn't take too much work to modify them and work around some of the shortcomings, which I'm sure will be addressed in future updates. Some of those include not being able to change the page color (you have to add a shape, send it to the background, and lock it), shapes and graphics cannot be used as links, there's no way to add author information unless publishing to the iBookstore, and the formatting of the including widgets are limited.

I set out to transform the printed book I created into an iBook. Staying up late a couple of nights was all the time it took me to create a pretty much 1-to-1 copy of the printed book. After downloading and looking through a couple sample textbooks from the iBookstore, I realized I could do a lot better. Electronic books have much more potential than sitting statically on the page. A couple more late nights provided all the time that was needed to make the majority of the photos tappable, which opens them full screen. That's how a photograph book should be. I filled out a glossary for the drivers that have their name in the book (there's no way to link a glossary "term" to a photo in the book unfortunately) with an unique photo I had taken. I added a short video shot with my iPhone trackside showing the cars zipping by at 225 miles per hour - getting to the speed and movement first hand and hear them is something a traditional book cannot offer. I also used one of the included widgets to create a multiple choice quiz that challenges readers to name the owner of the helmet shown. This was incredibly easy to build and should pull readers into the book even more. There's also a page of links to the internet for Indianapolis 500 based links - buy your tickets, see the track map, and read the latest news, as well as links to their Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube pages.

My time the past half week spent using iBooks Author was one of much more fun than frustration. This is a tool most anyone should be able to learn and use fairly quickly. The possibilities are endless - think of interactive manuals, company handbooks, text books for schools, photogrpahy books, and behind-the-scenes movie books.

Download my 2011 Indianapolis 500 photo book, take a look, and let me know what you think, either in the comments here or via email. I'd love to hear your feedback, not only on the photography, the book experience as well.

The link will download a zip file. Unzip it (it should automatically if you're on a Mac) and drag the .ibooks file to iTunes. Make sure you have the newest version of iBooks on your iPad - you can get it here if you haven't already. The drag the book from the Books section of your iTunes library to your iPad (the books only work on iPads, not iPhones, for now).

If you don't have an iPad, I exported a PDF version from iBooks Author for you. I'm not crazy about it, for several reasons. I'll make a PDF version of my original printed photo book available here soon.

Another Media Revolution?

Last Thusday Apple held a small press event in New York City focused on some education initiatives. They had several announcements, including a new digital textbook format, a revamped iTunes U, and an updated iBooks app for the iPad. The part of the announcement that I'm most excited about, and want to focus on here, is iBooks Author, Apple's new tool for creating interactive ebooks.

Like most Apple software, Author makes what was once a difficult, frustrating process and makes it so easy to create a polished ebook with interactive elements, it's fun! Author is right at home with Apple's iWork offering, especially Pages and Keynote, and can in fact use existing Pages and Keynote files so you can incoporate them in to a book via drag and drop. There are a few shortcomings, but they are minor, especially for a first release version of software, and do not stop you from completing the task at hand.

A completed book can be previewed on an iPad, exported as a PDF file, or published to the iBookstore, where, similar to the App Store, Apple takes a 30% cut of your sales for hosting the files, handling the money exchange, and the downlaod bandwidth. There has been a lot of talk about the licensing agreement, as books finished in Author cannot be sold anywhere except in the iBookstore.

So what does all of this mean? I believe this is the first shot in yet another media revolution. The video and music industries have been totally upheaved over the course of the last decade. Somehow the print and publishing industries managed to keep their lock-in intact. With iBooks Author and the iBookstore, anyone can be an author and publisher. Ever want to create and sell a book of your photography? You can now, practically for free.

Media creators should be jumping for joy, as these interactive books aren't just PDF files that you slide across your mobile device screen. No, they include video, audio, HTML5 code, slideshows that can have interactivity and feedback built in, quizzes, and an open toolset so you can build your own widgets.

I agree completely with Alex Lindsay and his take on all of this. This is an exciting time - an individual, with very little money (did I mention iBooks Author is free?!) can create stellar books (or apps, or music), have them on the iTunes Store or iBookstore, and be making money. That means more individual voices are heard, which provides us with rich views of the world as even more people can share theirs.

I'll be sharing the start of mine tomorrow.