Book Blog
Book Blog

A very special Memory Book…

Book Printing and Binding

We recently had the honor of helping Barbara print a family history book for her granddaughter who was missing her father…

“My son died five years ago at the age of 46.  He has a now 7 year old daughter who lives with her mom in Singapore (My son and daughter-in-law went there for job opportunities and stayed for the wonderful environment and experiences that are available to Alex).  Alex was only a year and a half old when Robert died.  Recently she has been saying that her Daddy has “fallen out of her heart” because she can’t remember him.  When she turned seven in June, I sent Alex a photo of her dad at his seventh birthday party.  Her response to that made me think that this might be a good time to write down some family history and information about her dad that she can hang onto.  I tried to include photos too so that Robert will seem a bit more “real” to her. 

Alexandra sleeps with her book under her pillow every night. She calls it her “Happy Memories Book.” So, I guess we can say you made her day too!”

Barbara

A place for self published authors to sell their books!

Self PublishingOne of our published authors has taken her love of books to the next level!  She has opened a book store called the Book Nook, located in Delano Minnesota.

My name is Linda Gendron and I recently opened a charming little book store called “The Book Nook” in historic downtown Delano, Minnesota. I carry a variety of new and used books. I also cater to local authors and sell their books in my store and it has been going very well. One 13 year/old author from Albany, Mn., wrote a historical fiction that takes place in WWI, printed his book with Smith Printing and I sold 29 of his books in 4 weeks.

Everyone in Delano seems to be happy to have a book store in town and I am thoroughly enjoying this new adventure! 

http://www.delanobooknook.com/

Self Publishing Your Book Self Publishing Your Book

Self Publishing Your Book

Two books from young authors published by Smith Printing!

 

From start to finish…

Susie came to us with her family book printing project because she experienced good customer service right from the start.  We are glad she was very satisfied with her printed and bound books!

Book PublishingFrom start to finish of my project, Becky was fantastic to work with. The finished family keepsake books are beautiful and have a totally professional lookBook Publishing and feel.  The entire experience was better than I ever imagined. Thank you so much.”  

Susie Avey

Merry Christmas!

This has been a year different than any other most of us can remember.  Fear and uncertainty have been the main headlines.  We have not been able to be as close as we would like to those dear to us for comfort and encouragement.  And yet during this darkness a light is shining upon the world this Christmas season reminding us that there is still hope and joy in the world!  We celebrate a God who sent His son Jesus to be our Savior over 2000 years ago.  I love watching the “A Charlie Brown Christmas” story because Linus reminds us, “this is what Christmas is all about!”  Merry Christmas everyone!

Vector vs. Raster Graphics…

When you add pictures to your book you should have a basic understanding about the different types of digital graphics used in publishing.  Pictures that look great on your computer may not look good at all when printed on paper.  The first step is to understand the two basic categories of graphics; raster and vector. 

Raster

Raster graphics are used for most photographic images and are defined by the number of individually colored pixels that are combined to create the image.  If you enlarge a raster graphic you will see distortion because you are asking the determined amount of pixels to now cover a larger area.  The blur you are seeing is actually the edges of the pixels you couldn’t see before when the image and it’s pixels were smaller.  So if you want a picture of grandmother in your book that’s the size of a postage stamp and want it to be full page…it’s going to look terrible!  Examples of raster graphic files are: bmp, jpg, tif, gif and png.   We will go into the advantages of each type of file in a later post.

Vector

Vector graphics are found in company logos, clip art, cartoon or avatar type pictures.  This type of file is defined mathematically by a series of scalable objects, shapes and borders.  The advantage to vector graphics is that they can be resized indefinitely without distortion since they are not made up of pixels.  A good example of this concept is a computer font.  You can make it size 8 or size 800 and it will not distort.  We also use vector graphics to create the die artwork for a foil stamped image on a hard cover book.

Click to Enlarge

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Book Publishing CompanyThere is certainly so much to be thankful for this year!  2020 has been such a different year than we could have ever imagined.  We at Smith Printing have been blessed to have had so many wonderful customers this year.  Our customers come from many locations and I can see that people are doing everything they can to keep their families, friendships and this country going strong.  Jody recently worked with us on her book publishing project and gave us these encouraging words…

“Have a wonderful Thanksgiving!  One of the things that  I’m especially thankful for this year is finding your company.  You have been so helpful and made me feel at ease instantly.  

I’ve enjoyed working with a fellow sister in Christ, Jody”

Found a new publisher…

Book PublisherRon already had some experience with book publishing when he went looking for another solution.  Despite all the limitations of the current virus climate he was able to receive exactly what he wanted…

“The virus played a part with some aspects of completing our order of books. Becky worked through it and suggested a solution that didn’t change the outcome. This is my third publisher I’ve worked with. Smith Printing Company will be the first to be contacted next time. Very pleased and would order again with her.”

Ron Javner

Font in the image is Cooper Black!  Book Printing Service

Publishing help for beginners…

Book publishing helpAll of us at some point had to learn how to drive a car.  Learning how to publish your own book can be much easier than that, and certainly safer!  Many of our customers have little or no experience at all.  We have been helping people with their book projects for over 20 years and still enjoy helping you understand the process…

“I want to thank you and Terri for your assistance in publishing my book. Your experience, ideas and efficient process made it easy for this novice and I am delighted with the finished product.”

David

Gorgeous book printing…

Book Printing and Binding ServicesOn our home page we say, “Whether you need 1000 copies of your project or only one, we are excited about the opportunity to serve you!”  This was one of the instances where we printed 1,000 copies of the book.  It was a very nice hard cover book binding with gold foil stamping and a full color dust jacket.  We were very happy to receive this message from our customer after completing their book publishing project: 

“Dear People,

The books are absolutely gorgeous. Everyone says so, the colors, the finish, the paper, the endpapers, the printing, the binding, the stamping, the readability, everything! So well done.

I am now leaving for the fulfuillment center in Troy where I will sign the sponsors’ books. We should be able to send them all today, if the center is not too busy. At least they will all be signed.

Thank you all so very much for a job beautifully accomplished with patience and determination!”

Will and Caroline

 

(font used in the picture is called Sacramento, pretty nice right…)

Book Printing Service

Guiding you through the book printing process…

Book publishing guideOne of the questions we always ask our customers is, “Why did you decide to produce your book printing project with us?”  Two of the most common answers are, Book publishing guide“lowest price” and “best customer service.”  We have found that a low price can get someone in the door but it is good customer service that will close the deal and keep people coming back again and again.  Part of good customer service is knowing how to guide someone through the process of taking a book project from conception to completion.  We can take what may seem to be a complicated process and make it very simple.  We promise we won’t use complicated language that will only leave you confused or discouraged.

Dan chose Smith Printing Company for these very reasons.  He gave us this feedback:

“Becky has been very helpful in guiding me through the process of printing my first book” – Dan Clark

« Previous PageNext Page »