Trial Photos of a Well Illustrated Vacation Guide for Cuba : A Trial Run

The style and format range in popular travel guides in the bookstores is great. This evening I shot table top shots of the Odyssey Illustrated Guide to Cuba (Hong Kong, The Guidebook Co, 1995) 314 p.

Since approximately 300 trade-sized glossy pages weigh more than a Fodor and because this guide sells in North America for double the 12 Euros of the cover price on the back, I believe it is best to illustrate at least a few of the images on the inside of the book. Guides with high quality, illustrated content are worth the average price tag of $30 (but I would settle for a secondhand pittance-priced 1995 edition and spend the $28 saved while on vacation!).

I want to experiment with setting up shots of the inside content without breaking the book's spine.

My 'table top' was merely a narrow, high back and seat on a folding IKEA bar stool, high enough so that I didn't break my own spine leaning over to make camera adjustments. Below I am sharing only two book cover shots and one inside panel from a recto-verso panoramic image.


Above - as if it fits comfortably in the side-pocket of a small backpack purse. (It won't; your guidebook practically "fills" a third of your whole bag! (The cover photo is of 'A street in Trinidad.' I know, but they ARE referring to the town in Cuba, not the island nation -- Color shift shows I need to use Photoshop or even Paint Shop Pro because my editor lacks automatically repeatable color balance settings!



Tightening up the perspective to see how this looks.




The right panel of the centrefold panoramic that shows Valle de los Ingenos.