| Chance to Become Famous in IDL Circles! [message #72773] |
Fri, 08 October 2010 08:11  |
David Fanning
Messages: 11724
Registered: August 2001
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Senior Member |
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Folks,
I have been talking to book cover designers this week
about designs for a book series I am in the process of writing.
We would like to incorporate a number of IDL visualizations
in the design. I have some, of course, but this group
is such an integral part of everything I do, I thought
you might want to participate and have a chance at
becoming famous.
So, if you are interested, I am looking for colorful
examples of IDL graphical output, preferably in
PostScript format, but fairly high resolution images
are acceptable, too. (Please, nothing displayed with
the rainbow color table!!)
I can't pay you. I may be able to buy you a drink
if I sell any books. :-)
But you have a chance to become famous and have your
design on a book that is sure to compete with old
Kurt Vonnegut re-prints on Amazon's Best Seller
list.
Drop me a line if you are interested. No promises,
but if it looks great, you have a shot. :-)
Cheers,
David
--
David Fanning, Ph.D.
Fanning Software Consulting, Inc.
Coyote's Guide to IDL Programming: http://www.dfanning.com/
Sepore ma de ni thui. ("Perhaps thou speakest truth.")
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| Re: Chance to Become Famous in IDL Circles! [message #72915 is a reply to message #72773] |
Tue, 19 October 2010 05:38  |
David Fanning
Messages: 11724
Registered: August 2001
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Senior Member |
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Folks,
This is the last call to make yourself famous. Images
are heading to the book designer by the end of the week.
Make sure your best IDL work is among them!
I've received some VERY nice images. Thank you to
all who have participated so far. I am *particularly*
in need of line, contour, and image plots. Whatever
you think is your best IDL work.
Send 'em in! :-)
Cheers,
David
> I have been talking to book cover designers this week
> about designs for a book series I am in the process of writing.
> We would like to incorporate a number of IDL visualizations
> in the design. I have some, of course, but this group
> is such an integral part of everything I do, I thought
> you might want to participate and have a chance at
> becoming famous.
>
> So, if you are interested, I am looking for colorful
> examples of IDL graphical output, preferably in
> PostScript format, but fairly high resolution images
> are acceptable, too. (Please, nothing displayed with
> the rainbow color table!!)
>
> I can't pay you. I may be able to buy you a drink
> if I sell any books. :-)
>
> But you have a chance to become famous and have your
> design on a book that is sure to compete with old
> Kurt Vonnegut re-prints on Amazon's Best Seller
> list.
>
> Drop me a line if you are interested. No promises,
> but if it looks great, you have a shot. :-)
>
> Cheers,
>
> David
--
David Fanning, Ph.D.
Fanning Software Consulting, Inc.
Coyote's Guide to IDL Programming: http://www.dfanning.com/
Sepore ma de ni thui. ("Perhaps thou speakest truth.")
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| Re: Chance to Become Famous in IDL Circles! [message #72979 is a reply to message #72773] |
Thu, 21 October 2010 05:36 |
David Fanning
Messages: 11724
Registered: August 2001
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Senior Member |
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David Fanning writes:
> But you have a chance to become famous and have your
> design on a book that is sure to compete with old
> Kurt Vonnegut re-prints on Amazon's Best Seller
> list.
>
> Drop me a line if you are interested. No promises,
> but if it looks great, you have a shot. :-)
I have been *totally* impressed with some of the graphics
that have come in with this appeal. I got one the other
day that was totally different from anything I've ever
created in IDL. It may appear not just on the cover, but
in the book itself! :-)
This weekend is the absolute deadline on this. I'm taking
everything I have over to the cover designer on Monday. If
you have something you think is neat, let me know.
I'm thinking I might need to add an "IDL Gallery" page
to my web page, where we can display some of this artwork
to the rest of the world. It really is that good, and like
any good art, it generates a TON of ideas for what you can
do with your own data.
Cheers,
David
--
David Fanning, Ph.D.
Fanning Software Consulting, Inc.
Coyote's Guide to IDL Programming: http://www.dfanning.com/
Sepore ma de ni thui. ("Perhaps thou speakest truth.")
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| Re: Chance to Become Famous in IDL Circles! [message #72980 is a reply to message #72773] |
Wed, 20 October 2010 18:19 |
David Fanning
Messages: 11724
Registered: August 2001
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Senior Member |
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Kenneth P. Bowman writes:
> I just got a new iPad, and being as vain as most authors
> I went to Amazon and bought the Kindle version of my book.
> (Now I can carry it around with me, I rationalized.)
>
> I am impressed by how well the electronic version works, although
> the color disappeared (even the color plates are grayscale).
Yes, when I spoke to a book designer last week she
told me my book would be "perfect" for the e-book
format, except that the Chapter Titles would disappear,
all the color formatting would be gone, etc, etc.
It sounded dismal.
I presume Adobe is working on a protection scheme for
PDF files, which everyone wants to use, but who knows
when that will be ready. In the meantime, I guess we
live with our fingers permanently crossed.
Cheers,
David
P.S. By the way, I've gotten some REALLY nice graphics
today. Thank you. Some of them have given me new ideas
for the book! :-)
--
David Fanning, Ph.D.
Fanning Software Consulting, Inc.
Coyote's Guide to IDL Programming: http://www.dfanning.com/
Sepore ma de ni thui. ("Perhaps thou speakest truth.")
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| Re: Chance to Become Famous in IDL Circles! [message #72981 is a reply to message #72773] |
Wed, 20 October 2010 14:49 |
Kenneth P. Bowman
Messages: 585
Registered: May 2000
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Senior Member |
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In article <MPG.272907c1aabd76c89897cd@news.giganews.com>,
David Fanning <news@dfanning.com> wrote:
> After that little screed, I decided to take a shower
> (overdue) and do a little back of the envelope calculating.
> Of course, I didn't have an envelope in the shower, but
> if my in-my-head calculations are correct, to pay my bills
> and get my youngest out of debt to the University so he can
> graduate, I'm going to have to sell something in the
> neighborhood of 25K books in the first year!
As fellow IDL author Liam Gumley once said (I think this
is from him), "It isn't going to pay for my yacht."
I just got a new iPad, and being as vain as most authors
I went to Amazon and bought the Kindle version of my book.
(Now I can carry it around with me, I rationalized.)
I am impressed by how well the electronic version works, although
the color disappeared (even the color plates are grayscale).
I am not impressed with the Kindle hardware itself, but now
that you can get Kindle readers for iphone, ipad, mac,
etc., I can see the possibility of an electronic-
only version. And the Kindle copy protection should
eliminate casual theft, at least.
Ken
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| Re: Chance to Become Famous in IDL Circles! [message #72983 is a reply to message #72773] |
Wed, 20 October 2010 14:06 |
David Fanning
Messages: 11724
Registered: August 2001
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Senior Member |
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David Fanning writes:
> I'm churning out 10 pages a day, which doesn't sound like
> much unless you have tried to do it yourself. It takes me,
> roughly, an hour a page to write a book, which doesn't
> really count all the time I have to spend on things related
> to the book. That's just the writing, and some small amount
> of editing.
Dios Mio!
After that little screed, I decided to take a shower
(overdue) and do a little back of the envelope calculating.
Of course, I didn't have an envelope in the shower, but
if my in-my-head calculations are correct, to pay my bills
and get my youngest out of debt to the University so he can
graduate, I'm going to have to sell something in the
neighborhood of 25K books in the first year!
Maybe it's not that many. I don't know. I don't
want to think about it. If I did this for the
money, I would be certifiably insane. There
must be some other reason. :-(
Cheers,
David
P.S. Let's just say passion trumps economic theory
every day of the week, INCLUDING Sunday!
--
David Fanning, Ph.D.
Fanning Software Consulting, Inc.
Coyote's Guide to IDL Programming: http://www.dfanning.com/
Sepore ma de ni thui. ("Perhaps thou speakest truth.")
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| Re: Chance to Become Famous in IDL Circles! [message #72984 is a reply to message #72773] |
Wed, 20 October 2010 13:24 |
David Fanning
Messages: 11724
Registered: August 2001
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Senior Member |
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Kenneth P. Bowman writes:
> So, are you going to produce a paper edition? I seem to
> recall you advocating going all-electronic. ;-)
To tell you the truth, I'm scared to death of electronic
books. I'm suffering here with no income and debts piling
up. The only thing I have going for me is a long-suffering,
loving wife. I would like to be compensated for the effort
I put into this. :-)
But, to answer your question, I plan both a paper and
electronic edition. There must still be a couple of people
like me in the world, happy enough to abandon the computer
for a good book in the evening. Nothing like holding a good
book in the hands to comfort a starving man!
The book I plan to print will be 6x9 inches, a standard
size technical book (think Learning Python or something like
that) on good paper, all pages in color, with a soft-cover
perfect binding. It is meant to last at least 10 years, or
until ITTVIS gets the new graphics system worked out, more
or less.
The perfect binding will allow me to get the book more
easily into bookstores, especially foreign bookstores.
And it will be cheaper and easier to ship.
I'm churning out 10 pages a day, which doesn't sound like
much unless you have tried to do it yourself. It takes me,
roughly, an hour a page to write a book, which doesn't
really count all the time I have to spend on things related
to the book. That's just the writing, and some small amount
of editing. Meeting with designers, getting image art together,
indexing, and all the rest of it is on top of this. I do that
in the evening these days, instead of reading. :-)
Anyway, I'm about to finish another chapter today, so I
figure I'm almost half-way there with this book. I'm weary,
but still enthusiastic. And I'm still taking showers
occasionally, which is *always* a good sign.
> My student Cameron Homeyer is going to send you a multi-panel
> plot where we have a video image from the wing-mounted camera of a
> research aircraft combined with data plots showing the
> aircraft location superimposed on a radar map and various
> parameters measured by the aircraft.
>
> It is one frame from an animation sequence. It is very cool,
> even if we say so ourselves. You can see multiple things
> changes simultaneously as the plane flies through the tops
> of some cumulus clouds (and the camera gets coated with ice).
Woohoo! Exactly what I'm looking for! Thanks!
Cheers,
David
--
David Fanning, Ph.D.
Fanning Software Consulting, Inc.
Coyote's Guide to IDL Programming: http://www.dfanning.com/
Sepore ma de ni thui. ("Perhaps thou speakest truth.")
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| Re: Chance to Become Famous in IDL Circles! [message #73104 is a reply to message #72979] |
Fri, 22 October 2010 01:37 |
jkeller
Messages: 35
Registered: October 2009
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Member |
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> I'm thinking I might need to add an "IDL Gallery" page
> to my web page, where we can display some of this artwork
> to the rest of the world. It really is that good, and like
> any good art, it generates a TON of ideas for what you can
> do with your own data.
>
I would appreciate this very much as I would love to see what is
doable and to get some new ideas as well ;)
Sincerely,
Jan
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