William Haber wrote:
>
> Hi Lizs, Clara, Cindy and other folks,
> (this message may arrive twice as I wasn't sure as to which address I
> should use)
>
>         It sounds like there are several people out there interested in
> hearing more about the book I worked on. So, I'll share my response to some
> of Liz Sieferd's questions.
> (I know Liz also wants some "tropical stories," too - which I'll try to
> send to the list-serv from time to time)
>
> WHAT I DO:  About eight years ago I started working on the Flora of
> Monteverde project.  My partner, Dr. William Haber, is employed part-time
> with Missouri Botanical Garden.  I have been paid as field and herbarium
> assistant/ illustator off an on by a National Geographic grant.  In
> addition to the work on the book, I have been tour guide, instructor of
> plant i.d. classes, writer/consultant for a laminate about the cloud
> forest, etc. I've also been involved in native species plantings, photocopy
> herbarium and arboretum projects (part paid/part volunteer). While I love
> illustration, as you can see, I don't do it full-time; and I think if I did
> do it full-time, I would not love it!  I consider myself a
> botanist/illustrator/environmental educator.
>
> SO... production of An Introduction to Cloud Forest Trees:  Monteverde,
> Costa Rica took a long time.  Bill and I were both doing lots of other
> things along the way.
>
> I have little formal training as an illustrator, but took one wonderful
> biological illustration course (and an independent study) with Marion
> Sheehan at U. of Florida.
>
> BOOK DESKTOP PUBLISHING AND PRODUCTION:  I started out on a Mac IIsi and
> progressed to a PowerMac 7100 with a 17" color monitor.  I chose to work
> with FrameMaker as it is designed for book production, and I wanted to do a
> number of master pages (back in the old days one could only have two master
> pages in PageMaker). I originally thought that I would print out hard copy
> (600 dpi) on my Apple LaserWriter 360 and hand that to the printing
> company, so compatibility with programs wasn't a concern.  (Later, I
> learned about PostScript files).
>
> We wanted the illustrations to look life-like, so I did them from live
> material (instead of pressed specimens).  Ocassionally I worked in the
> forest, but most of the time I brought small branches of plants into the
> lab/studio.  After doing a pencil drawing on paper, I used crowquill (with
> some rapidograph) on Denril Multi-media vellum.
>
> Illustrations were scanned in as B&W images using a Umax UG630 (ancient!)
> at 600 dpi.  (I didn't know at the time that scanning in greyscale first
> would have yielded better results).  They were scanned in at 50-67 percent
> of original size.
>
> I imported text from Word and illustations as Tiff files and put everything
> together in FrameMaker. (Sounds easy... right).
>
> All sections/chapters of the book were saved as separate files, and kept
> together in a special FrameMaker book arrangement.
>
> After talking to a number of printers here in Costa Rica, I chose one and
> decided to print the book using PostScript files.  In this way, I could
> hand them a Syquest cartridge containing the whole book.  From that, they
> sent the files directly to the Linotronic and printed out negatives.  There
> was a font glitch in one section, and fortunately I did not have to make
> the 4 1/2 hr. trip back to the city... I e-mailed the corrected files (as
> attachments).
>
> Printing here in Costa Rica is always a bit risky... there are often
> problems with quality control.  A few of the books came out with twisted
> covers, and there are a few other imperfections, but all in all, the book
> came out all right.
>
> After being on the list-serv for awhile, I've learned more about how to use
> technology in illustration and desktop publishing... the way I did the book
> here on this Costa Rican mountaintop may sound somewhat primitive to some
> of you, but it's been amazing to me.
>
> For those who have asked about obtaining the book, please e-mail my sister,
> Marianne Cogan, at: [log in to unmask]
>
> Hasta luego,
>
> Willow Zuchowski



Hi Willow - Is this the message you wanted to know if it arrived? It
did! Sounds very interesting, and soon I'd like to yak with you some
more about it all - I'm up to my butt in alligators right now and am a
very slow typist, so I'll defer until things settle down. Also got
your thank you - thanks in return! I'm looking forward to seeing the
book!

Take care -
Cindy