March 22, 2019 at 01:33As I wrote and published a book about Moscow State University, or 12 critical errors
- Tutorial
Three years ago I decided to make a book about the skyscraper of Moscow State University on the Lenin Hills - a large, illustrated, with the involvement of graduates, etc. The story of this work is a real movie (in some places farce, in some places horror) with a bunch of dramatic twists. Super successful crowdfunding, a wide audience, a lot of enthusiasts, a complete failure with planning, collecting all the possible rake and, as a result, an absolute fakap on the budget and terms. In general, the classic story of "project management" - that's why I decided to tell it here.
TL; DR - if you want to write non-fix for money - just forget it. But if the soul asks for adventure, life seems too simple - go for it! You will gain a lot of unnecessary connections and discover a lot of flaws in yourself. But it will be fun :-)
Yes, and this is Longrid; Estimated reading time is 20 minutes.
When I studied at the law school, I often visited the high-rise building of Moscow State University (Main Building) with the aim of having lunch in the dining room. Then, in graduate school, they put me in a dormitory inside the building, and I spent a wonderful year and a half there. I can’t say that the building is very comfortable by today's standards, but Moscow State University students are in love with it, and I, of course, was no exception. I even tried to find something about the history of the building, its architecture, but I did not find anything fresher than the 50s: neither photographs, nor myths, nor unknown facts about the skyscraper of modern writers were interested. “This is my chance!” I decided.
At that moment, I did not constantly work and interrupted one-time orders in my part - I helped startups with Russian law. There was a lot of free time, especially in the summer, and I didn’t want to write a dissertation, so I decided to take my mind off for a couple of months and make a quick photo book about the Main Building. Idea: Crowdfunding quickly, if it burns out, compile the book itself from Internet sources, add photos, and voila!
I decided to crowd fund on Planet, because there were many similar book projects. The crowdfunding campaign has been surprisingly successful. I did not quite understand how this works, but as they say, the client went. True, I did not calculate the budget well and initially stated the amount of 130,000 rubles - "this is definitely enough." This bar was eventually taken in three days. Of course, after that, the activity of donors (“backers”) decreased, but we still collected almost half a million rubles and entered the top sites in terms of leveling the declared amount (“top losers who can’t count”).
The key to success of the crowdfunding campaign was, of course, a huge and fairly successful target audience. Almost 10,000 students live in the Main Building, on average 4-5 years; it turns out that at least 60-80,000 Moscow State University students are scattered around the world who lived in this building and managed to fall in love with it. No other skyscraper was reflected in the life of so many people. At the same time, the crowdfunding law was 100% confirmed: if you want to raise money, bring your audience to the site. Local backers (from other projects) contributed at best 2-3% of the total; fees provided primarily MSUshniki who came through my links.
Of course, it’s hard to write letters to strangers, all the more so letters asking for money, but the newsletters gave the maximum effect. Mailings on graduates of the faculties living in the building (mechmath, geologists, geographers, physicists and chemists) were especially helpful. Unfortunately, not all faculties had connections with graduates and had a lively community - for the most part, even the educational part does not keep the contacts of its graduates (why do we need endowment - they still finance it from the budget!) I had to look for curators and elders of individual courses that are I sent my calls less widely.
Good effect on blog posts. Firstly, top bloggers like Alexander Popov or Artemy Lebedev posted posts about the book for free (unfortunately, architecture connoisseur Ilya Varlamov - Ilya refused to help!) Secondly, I wrote several feature articles in LiveJournal communities about history and Soviet architecture - in 2015 they still sat quite a lot of people.
The remaining channels did not produce any results. For example, I made two hefty banners and hung them on the university’s fence before large-scale celebrations on May 9: from each came a maximum of five people + they were quickly cut off by the police. Both repost contests beloved by SMMs and publications on faculty sites turned out to be useless.
Our unlucky banner looked something like this
Another important factor: our first typesetter (well done!) Prepared an early prototype of the book for the start of the campaign. It helped: at least the backers saw with their own eyes what format the book we want to make and how it will differ from the "competitors"
As a result of the campaign, I had almost half a million rubles in my hands, and I was sure that this would be more than enough for materials and for printing a book. At that time, a lot of people sent me photographs, according to the text I already agreed with Nikolai Kruzhkov (a specialist in the history of construction and the author of the book “Skyscrapers of Stalinist Moscow”), and also previously discussed the topic with a couple of familiar architects. It only remained to take the building in the photo, but here it was lucky again: the famous architectural photographer Margarita Fedina wrote to me, which, as it turned out, had already shot the GZ a couple of years ago. She suggested sharing photos for free.
In the yard was August. I was sure that the book would be ready in three months and was already mentally counting my millions of money and kilometers of fame.
Upon closer inspection, everything turned out to be much more complicated. Firstly, almost all the photos sent were taken from one angle. It looks good on a university instagram, but not suitable for a book. Secondly, I categorically did not like the style of existing books, I wanted something less formal, respectively, the texts also had to be processed. Thirdly, it was not possible to agree with the architect (unfortunately, they are not taught at the Moscow State University). Cherry on the cake: architectural photographs of Margarita Fedina covered at most half of the building (they didn’t let her go further).
In addition, the project began to take up most of my time, and I was forced to abandon several projects. It was affordable, and I decided that I had to learn how to delegate. I hired a manager.
From the height of current experience, it seems strange that, having the experience of writing a dissertation, I took up such a project. After all, firstly, no one can write a dissertation on an unfamiliar subject in three months; secondly, no manager will help to write a dissertation. As my practice has shown, only one person can handle a dissertation and a good book, who will closely control the entire process from beginning to end. If you want to do well, do it yourself.
The student of the journalism faculty acted as a manager; At first I paid her a salary, then, as my tasks were exhausted, I switched to paying for the actual output. She tried to work in good faith, but the work was too complicated: with all the desire I could not say where to look for the material and what to do with it; From time to time, our project resembled a blind man wandering through an architectural desert. Of course, we immediately downloaded a bunch of materials from the Internet, but, firstly, they became boring to everyone, and secondly, little could be used in the book because of copyright (this is a separate discussion). They interviewed the elderly residents of the building, but didn’t know much - the life of the residents has changed a lot since the time of construction, and the memory is relative.
Manager Diana holds tracing paper (1953 drawing) in the Technical Archives of Moscow State University
Out of academic habit, I decided to draw Soviet magazines and books. The planned economy and the corresponding planned journalism had their advantages: it was decided to write about important events absolutely everywhere, broadcast what is called from every iron. As a result, almost all magazines in 1948-1953 talked about skyscrapers, sometimes in the format of entire special issues (Science and Life, for example, or Technique of Youth). By the way, when Stalin died at the beginning of 1953, all magazines wrote about it in the absolute way - the mourning issue of Murzilka is still a hit on Avito.
Not everything was easy to find. So, after tightening the nuts at the turn of the 40-50s, many magazines closed; in this confusion, entire years have disappeared from libraries. Yes, imagine there are Soviet magazines that cannot be found even in Lenin - like “The USSR is under construction” or “Moscow City Economy” of the early 1950s! I had to look for the necessary copies on Avito (1,500-3,000 rubles apiece) and ask the sellers to photograph the necessary pages. Of course, not for nothing.
Yes, imagine: there is a magazine, but it is not in the libraries
Subjects of skyscrapers in Soviet magazines are represented mainly by poorly printed and, even worse, completely identical illustrations. The official photos were staged through, depicting beautiful people in pathos interiors. I switched to foreign magazines and found a lot of funny everyday photos of the 50s; and the most informative, surprisingly, were photos of private traders-foreign tourists and foreign interns: unlike ours, they had no internal censor.
Just for comparison
In parallel with digging in old magazines, I agreed with the photographer Margarita to shoot the rest of the building. As befits a boy brought up bywolves in a university environment, I wrote a large letter to the administration with the advantages of the project, a schedule, guarantees and requests. Sent and began to wait for an answer.
Two months have passed. First, the assistant was on vacation, then the rector himself, then someone else there. Finally, they informed me that my letter was unsubscribed to one of the vice-rectors. I waited for him to leave his vacation, and went to the reception.
I do not want to go into the content of the conversation that has taken place - I can only say that it was held in raised tones. The university, they say, will write any book itself, and amateur activity is not needed here. I flew out of the office, and after the letter flew to the faculty - figure out why the teacher is engaged in nonsense.
To say that I was upset is to say nothing. I shared my pain with the graduates and here, instead of hugging and comforting, I was again scolded. The main complaint boiled down to why I even climbed to coordinate something and spent three months on it instead of doing business. I thought about it. A few other acquaintances in the administration, whom I molested, said, in general, the same thing: why did you even need permission? After all, they still will not give it until you show the result. Therefore, in any case, you need to start with the filming.
Well, shooting is so shooting.
You ask: well, really, why did you decide to coordinate everything in advance? Actually, this is not because I am a robot person, accustomed to acting according to instructions, no! It's just that the architectural shooting itself is a very slow procedure, eliminating unnecessary fuss.
First of all, for shooting interiors requires a large dynamic range. The reader should see in the photo the contents of the shaded corners, and the shape of the lights on the lights. The areas of the spaces that we rented started from 500 m2, so we could not install our light. Consequently, the technology of exposure bracketing remains - several photos with different shutter speeds are taken from one point, and then the result is combined according to presets in a special editor. This is similar to HDR, which is now absolutely everywhere, only HDR is usually done in three frames, and we have more than a dozen of them.
Since we cannot shoot ten identical photographs, including those with long shutter speeds, we need a tripod. And it’s big, because we’ll shoot on a hefty camera, standing at the level of human eyes (this is exactly what our interiors are designed for). And of course, we need to turn on all the available overhead lights (ideally, put the same bulbs in all the lamps, but this, of course, is a fantasy). As a result, we get a very long shot (5 minutes per frame), dragging large cameras and tripods with us, and everywhere we demand to turn on all the light. And without coordination, so that you understand, they don’t even open the door for us.
But the problem was slowly being resolved. Somewhere (library, club) met the local bosses and they turned out to be friendly and adequate people. Somewhere they used student ingenuity: for example, in the lobby of the club we just asked electricians to turn on the light with the right intonation - they say we have a shot. They took it and turned it on, and we all took it off. Somewhere I had to brazenly go into the room, seizing the moment, and take off until the security came. As a result, we shot the entire building from the inside, except for technical rooms, gyms and, of course, the administration. The administration is sorry, it left a lot of artifacts - from Soviet paintings to jasper columns in the office of the rector. But not at this time.
Working moments (hello dontsov !)
As practice has shown, specialized people are needed for specialized shooting. A photographer who takes only women without clothes has neither the equipment nor the skills to beautifully remove a dead elevator from the inside.
The process of shooting the very elevator and the result. The camera on the tripod stood inside the elevator, and the photographer, sitting under the tripod (so as not to get into the frame), illuminated the elevator walls with a flashlight. At a long shutter speed, it turned out very well.
Almost immediately, I agreed with the Moscow Multimedia-Art Museum, the owner of a large collection of Soviet photos. They were as adequate as possible: they sent a huge archive with thumbnails, and later, before printing, they provided high-res on request.
With other museums it didn’t work out so smoothly. I sent a manager to negotiate. Ringing:
- Yes, they have a lot of photos. But they only allow you to watch, you can’t take anything with you.
- At least you can take a picture?
- No, they are watching this. I can scan it. One scan - 3000 rubles.
Although at that time I didn’t spend half the money, 3000 rubles per scan already seemed outrageous. Moreover, while the layout was not ready, I did not know which of the photographs would fall into the book, and which ones were needed only for previews.
As a result, a year later, when we finished shooting in the building and began to typesetting, I decided once again to go to the museum myself. It turned out: both museums and archives, in the vast majority - budget organizations. They are obliged to provide their materials to other state employees, including scientists like us. But since the manager positioned himself as a private buyer, they immediately seized on her as a source of extrabudgetary funds. And the thing was - to give them a confirmation letter from the leadership of the university.
One of the dissertations devoted to Moscow State University. The 50s, the reading room of the RSL in Khimki
So I opened huge museum funds on architecture, as well as my talent as a negotiator. Subsequently, the remote archives even sent me scans to e-mail without any letters and contracts.
With the photographs, I stepped on another rake, and, despite my legal education, before working on the book I did not know about this feature of our copyright. It turns out that a huge number of Soviet works (both texts and photos) are not published, since the rights to them belong to no one knows. In a literal sense.
Look: in the 50s, the rights to photographs were valid for only five years from the moment of shooting, and the vast majority of photographers were correspondents and shot on request. Accordingly, all rights were immediately transferred to their employers (newspapers, magazines, etc.), that is, to the state. Because of this, no one was particularly worried about fixing rights - anyway, after five years they will be exhausted. As a result, for example, in illustrated magazines, photographers were often indicated at the end with a comma-separated list, and now it is impossible to restore authorship of photographs.
Then, at some point, the USSR began to ratify international copyright conventions, and the terms of protection began to grow: first up to 25 years, then up to 50, then up to 70. As a result, many works several times passed into the public domain (public domain) and vice versa: the most famous example is the series “The Master and Margarita”, which was shot on the basis of a free work, and when they were going to release it, the heirs have already returned to themselves copyright.
In general, the situation with photographs is as follows: firstly, you can reprint them from the old newspaper for free (with all the desire to pay no one, and the newspaper has long been gone, and the author cannot be found). Secondly, you can find the negativity in some archive and scan it - already for the money. Neither the first nor the second option removes the risks: the heirs of the author can always arise and demand their share. And what’s interesting: if the heirs prove authorship, the court will support them! After all, the archive / museum / magazine is unlikely to have a contract with the author, rather, just the originals of the negatives (which do not give any rights). As a result, most publishers are afraid to take such (so-called "orphaned") content.
Since I was a publishing house, I decided to take risks with orphaned photographs: in the end, it is unlikely that anyone will seriously sue. I also purchased some of the photographs from museums and archives, and some were found in the public domain. Unfortunately, I practically didn’t use work under copyright law - I didn’t make money. For example, photographs of the famous Henri Cartier-Bresson, who also shot Moscow State University, belong to the oldest Magnum photo agency, which never makes discounts to anyone.
The same photographs of Cartier-Bresson (for informational purposes only)
The search for information and typing passed the first year. Graduates slowly began to grumble in response to my letters about the next postponement. I decided to please them with a little blood and make a cover, while the main material is not yet ready.
Through my friends, I found a great illustrator Natasha , who became interested in the project and was ready to take on moderate money. At that moment I dreamed of the architectural part of my project and therefore I conceived a collage of the characteristic elements of the era: people, steam locomotives, airplanes were supposed to form in the form of a silhouette of a GZ.
Unfortunately, I did not think that the illustrator works in his own style, and Natashin's style suggested graphics, not photo collages. And the 50s were just the time of the boom of color photography: graphics almost completely disappeared from the pages of magazines, which filled the faces of smiling milkmaids and steelworkers. As a result, these years are by no means associated with graphics in our country, unlike, say, the 1930s. Natasha tried hard, but in the first version neither the Main Building nor his era were read.
The first version of the cover
Then, in search of inspiration, I came across Matthias Jung's collages, and the idea came to me: to compose the silhouette of the Main Building from elements of other “stalines” to demonstrate its relationship with the monuments of this period.
One of Matthias Jung
's works. Here's what happened in the end.
When I showed the result at the MSU forum, the majority of reviews were, let's say, disappointed:
Of course, I was upset and for a long time I could not understand what still did not suit the graduates. At some point, I realized that the reason is in the target audience of the book, or rather, in the incorrect definition of this very audience. I planned the cover primarily for hipsters, visitors to the architectural departments of bookstores. But it turned out that the main reader of my book is a graduate of Moscow State University 30-50 years old, who takes this book as a gift to his friends, possibly parents who lived in the hostel of the Main Building. And for them, everything in this cover seemed wrong: Stalin, pink, obscure references to the architecture of other buildings. They needed, on the contrary, something as traditional and pathos as possible (and preferably without Soviet contexts).
The situation is stalemate: on the one hand, there was an explicit request for a new cover; on the other hand, I did not want to abandon the existing one, which personally suited me well and in which considerable money was invested. Especially with the cover, binding and embossing titles (pages with pictures at the beginning of each chapter) were already rhymed. I even thought about printing a book with two cover options, but it was affordable. Moreover, the dust cover is, in fact, a consumable: it is needed to protect the book in the store and attract the attention of visitors, and earlier it was even customary to throw it out after the purchase (now, however, many leave it).
Then an original solution came to my mind: to make a book with a double-sided dust jacket, which readers can flip to their liking. This, on the one hand, came out much cheaper than making two different covers; on the other hand, it allowed me to show additional loyalty to the audience (“you asked for a new cover - we did! We will send it specifically for you in another cover!”) Later I instructed the stores to also put books in “both” covers on the shelf - at the buyers there was anillusion of the possibility of choice.
When the text was formed enough, and indecently accumulated a lot of photos (about 50 gigabytes), I decided to start layout. “Layout is not difficult,” I thought, having considerable (as it seemed to me) experience working on a student journal and scientific books. But it didn’t work out according to plan, and layout eventually became one of the main expense items.
Layout can be very roughly compared to cooking. Let's say you often cook cottage cheese pancakes and know that one serving will require 250 grams of cottage cheese, two eggs and 50 grams of flour. Now imagine that you with this experience are being sent to the kitchen, where there are five kilograms of onions, a package of oil, a plucked pigeon, a bag of rice and a brick. From this you were asked to prepare a dessert for 12 people. (Do not swear, I could not come up with a better analogy).
This is how I felt when I came across the realities of the layout of the book. Firstly, my material consisted of very scattered content, including multi-format color and b / w photos, video frames and scans of Soviet books; moreover, the ratio of content in different chapters was different. Secondly, I had no idea which book format to choose and what size it would be in general. Thirdly, I categorically did not like the references that I met.
In a good way, I needed a real art director who could completely put together the concept of a book in my head and then, with my help, assemble and create content for it. I began to look for options for friends.
The first typesetter was not bad. The problem is that he immediately offered to work for free "for the portfolio", and I agreed. In fact, layout is a very tedious process that can be briefly described (do not be afraid, there are no more food analogies) as an endless remaking of a redone. Somewhere they added a line, and the picture left five pages later. And somewhere, the illustrator does not want to fit into the frame of the image and the text has to be transferred to another strip. As a result, the typesetter did some of the work that was minimally suitable for the portfolio, but completely insufficient for the book, and disappeared.
The first version of the layout of the
Second layout designer (more precisely, the layout designer) I found already for the money, but it turned out that she had never done such serious things from scratch. It turned out without a twist, although very conscientiously (the only designer in my memory who always follows the deadlines. A rarity). I tried to criticize the result, but it got worse. I realized that someone with a different qualification was needed. The advance, of course, did not take back.
Second option
The third layout designer was (and remains) a true professional, a designer with a capital letter. However, during the project, he worked in the largest design studio, and if at first he was able to make time for the weekend, then as the boringness of tasks grew, he began to drag out the deadlines longer and longer. In addition, it was felt that he was much closer to the modernist style, and not the pathos of books of the 50s: for example, he insisted that black and white photographs be painted in gradients. Photos desperately resisted.
The third option
It seems that I quickly describe everything, but in reality, a year has passed behind these twists and turns of layout. Of course, I tried not to waste time in vain, I got some new materials, the rules were incoherent text. But subscribers already began to worry seriously.
From the very beginning of the project, I decided to keep in touch with graduate backers. I got an account on the mailing service, began to regularly notify them of project news. But over time, news appeared less and less, and more and more tart answers came. Backers regularly appeared in public or on planet.ru who shouted “They threw us! There will be no book! ”, And if I did not respond quickly (within 1-2 hours), the volcano opened in the comments.
For Moscow, 400,000 rubles is not such a significant amount to gain a reputation as a crook for life; however, I have been accused of stealing money more than once. There is nothing to be done: probably, when you take the time so seriously, people simply have no other way to put pressure on you. A couple of the most persistent commentators, I returned the contributions - this turned out to be the most correct decision. The supervisor who watched all of this from the side began to jokingly or seriously advise me to dry crackers and collect warm clothes.
However, most of the campaign participants even after three years behaved very dignified. I repeated, like a parrot, my “finish the layout, finish the layout”, and many sent in response not irritated letters, but words of support. Thanks to them for that!
By the way, in addition to the book, campaign participants on Planet relied on merchandise - cards, posters and T-shirts. So: T-shirts were a big mistake. A variety of sizes (requested from XXS to XXXXXL) greatly complicates the logistics; besides, clothes, unlike printing, cannot be sent with a cheap parcel (only an expensive parcel). If I could repeat the campaign again, I would point out some dimensionless canvas bags and greatly simplify my task.
Футболки, кстати, всем понравились. Изображен Ломоносов (памятник перед Главным зданием) в позе Buddy Christ из «Догмы»
In the end, layout designer number 3 advised his colleague, who was relatively free and agreed to take on my project. At the same time, his design option was perfect for a style book; moreover, after the epic with layout, I myself approximately understood the process and prepared a page plan and priority-broken materials.
The final version of the layout
And even in this format, almost a year has passed from the beginning of the last layout to the publication of the book. At first, we agreed on the layout. Then the layout designer did a draft for a long time, after which I searched for new photographs and modified the text. Perfectionism did not allow putting pictures in a book just like that, in different quality and with scanning defects - that’s why we processed each of 1000 photos, manually removing folds, artifacts and a printing raster from them.
At the same time, I entered into agreements with copyright holders, searched for materials in optimal quality - in general, I did the remaining boring technical work. After the end of the layout, he could not resist and printed a couple of books on a color printer to brag to the readers.
As a result, three years after the start of the crowdfunding campaign, I got to the press. I was offered contacts of various printing houses (from small copy centers to large enterprises), but I already understood that such a large order (one and a half thousand large format books) can be completed only by a full-fledged printing plant. I went to a bookstore and studied all the art books on the shelves: as a result, I selected three combines (in Riga, Moscow and Tver), which I liked in terms of print quality, good paper and the lack of stocks.
This is what a large printing industry looks like where books are made.
After requesting commercial offers, Latvians unexpectedly won. At the same time, the cost of printing still came out much higher than I expected in 2015 - under a million rubles. It turned out to be very expensive fabric binding, about a third of the cost of the book (it is clear why it is so rarely done). Of course, full-color printing and quality European coated paper turned out to be costly. But, surprisingly, it doesn’t cost anything at all - a fabric bookmark (lassa): publishers like to splurge in this way, squinting under "expensive" literature.
Unstitched book pages in a printing house
The press itself in a huge printing house took no more than a couple of days. And then the book went to Moscow - or rather, to the logistics center in Domodedovo - for another month or so. Then I made another fatal mistake: I chose a truck to transport books not by weight, but by volume. As a result, the little "Porter" naturally bent the body from one and a half tons and the rear doors stopped closing. Of course, we brought books, but we couldn’t accelerate even over 40 km / h on the Warsaw highway.
After receiving the books, I began to organize a presentation. I could not find a free room for 400-500 people, and in the end I divided the show into several parts: for backers, “just” subscribers, and for everyone interested. By the way, it turned out that of those who did not directly participate in the crowdfunding campaign, and showed interest after it (subscribing to groups of books on social networks, beating me with messages, etc.), only one in three actually bought the book - the rest, apparently, I liked the process itself more.
Now about the mail. At the beginning of the campaign, I foolishly promised delivery in Russia. Why foolishly: firstly, during crowdfunding, many moved, and our backers were scattered around the country. Secondly, delivery to some regions turned out to be very expensive: for example, in some Siberian cities in spring and autumn, while the ice has not yet risen / has not yet melted, you can only get by air, which is reflected in the tariffs. Thirdly, I did not imagine what kind of hemorrhoids it was: packing parcels and parcels, carrying them in the mail, waiting for an employee to post everything, etc. In total, I sent about 70 parcels and spent several days on it.
At some point, parcels and parcels lay in absolutely all corners.
I gave some of the books for sale to stores. I remember when we printed scientific literature at the department, the biggest problem was to sell it; we handed books to the store at cost (100-150 rubles), and with the commission of the distributor (stored in a warehouse and shipped to stores) and the seller, the price was 450-500 rubles.
With the book about MSU everything turned out better. The higher the price of the book, the lower the relative commission of the distributor: as a result, I handed over the book for 1400-1500 rubles, and it costs about 2000-2500 rubles in the store. However, the long sales cycle is frustrating: while the distributor picks up the book, while the sellers buy it, sell it and return the money along the chain, it takes up to six months. As a result, sales are transformed into money with a huge lag. Track sales dynamics, respond to indicators in individual stores - for the book industry this is nothing more than science fiction; while stores are not even able to quickly replenish stocks of books. As a result, on the same Ozone, the book periodically drops out of sales for a couple of weeks (stocks are out, delivery and posting takes 2-3 weeks).
Initially, I considered the book not only as a tribute to Moscow State University, but also as a successful and easy business venture. However, it turned out, at least, not at all easy. Later I realized this: if nobody did something good and necessary, then there are pitfalls. So here: the lack of a book about the building of Moscow State University was explained by the closeness of the university, the unprofitability of the whole undertaking and the withering away of the market for illustrated books.
The cost of the book ultimately amounted to more than 1000 rubles excluding shipping - despite the fact that the participants of the crowdfunding campaign paid 900 each. As a result of the book campaign, I paid out of my money (including borrowed money) so as not to throw the project halfway . The book ate a huge amount of nerves, time and energy; in fact, I spent three years working on this project, and for a long time I will not be able to recover my costs. According to my calculations, only by the third draw I can finally get any compensation - if I have the strength to get to it.
The final budget of the project
On the other hand, the book brought me to a huge number of interesting and caring people. I saw with my own eyes how the publishing house, the museum industry work, and gained a lot of experience in photography. I really like to learn something new, and architecture has become a wonderful hobby. Well and most importantly: I finally got what I was missing - a book about the Main Building of Moscow State University, such as I always wanted to read.
TL; DR - if you want to write non-fix for money - just forget it. But if the soul asks for adventure, life seems too simple - go for it! You will gain a lot of unnecessary connections and discover a lot of flaws in yourself. But it will be fun :-)
Yes, and this is Longrid; Estimated reading time is 20 minutes.
1. The idea
When I studied at the law school, I often visited the high-rise building of Moscow State University (Main Building) with the aim of having lunch in the dining room. Then, in graduate school, they put me in a dormitory inside the building, and I spent a wonderful year and a half there. I can’t say that the building is very comfortable by today's standards, but Moscow State University students are in love with it, and I, of course, was no exception. I even tried to find something about the history of the building, its architecture, but I did not find anything fresher than the 50s: neither photographs, nor myths, nor unknown facts about the skyscraper of modern writers were interested. “This is my chance!” I decided.
At that moment, I did not constantly work and interrupted one-time orders in my part - I helped startups with Russian law. There was a lot of free time, especially in the summer, and I didn’t want to write a dissertation, so I decided to take my mind off for a couple of months and make a quick photo book about the Main Building. Idea: Crowdfunding quickly, if it burns out, compile the book itself from Internet sources, add photos, and voila!
First mistake: assess the complexity of a large project in the absence of experience.
2. Crowdfunding
I decided to crowd fund on Planet, because there were many similar book projects. The crowdfunding campaign has been surprisingly successful. I did not quite understand how this works, but as they say, the client went. True, I did not calculate the budget well and initially stated the amount of 130,000 rubles - "this is definitely enough." This bar was eventually taken in three days. Of course, after that, the activity of donors (“backers”) decreased, but we still collected almost half a million rubles and entered the top sites in terms of leveling the declared amount (“top losers who can’t count”).
The second mistake: to evaluate the cost of a large project without reference to indicators.
The key to success of the crowdfunding campaign was, of course, a huge and fairly successful target audience. Almost 10,000 students live in the Main Building, on average 4-5 years; it turns out that at least 60-80,000 Moscow State University students are scattered around the world who lived in this building and managed to fall in love with it. No other skyscraper was reflected in the life of so many people. At the same time, the crowdfunding law was 100% confirmed: if you want to raise money, bring your audience to the site. Local backers (from other projects) contributed at best 2-3% of the total; fees provided primarily MSUshniki who came through my links.
Of course, it’s hard to write letters to strangers, all the more so letters asking for money, but the newsletters gave the maximum effect. Mailings on graduates of the faculties living in the building (mechmath, geologists, geographers, physicists and chemists) were especially helpful. Unfortunately, not all faculties had connections with graduates and had a lively community - for the most part, even the educational part does not keep the contacts of its graduates (why do we need endowment - they still finance it from the budget!) I had to look for curators and elders of individual courses that are I sent my calls less widely.
Good effect on blog posts. Firstly, top bloggers like Alexander Popov or Artemy Lebedev posted posts about the book for free (unfortunately, architecture connoisseur Ilya Varlamov - Ilya refused to help!) Secondly, I wrote several feature articles in LiveJournal communities about history and Soviet architecture - in 2015 they still sat quite a lot of people.
The remaining channels did not produce any results. For example, I made two hefty banners and hung them on the university’s fence before large-scale celebrations on May 9: from each came a maximum of five people + they were quickly cut off by the police. Both repost contests beloved by SMMs and publications on faculty sites turned out to be useless.
Our unlucky banner looked something like this
Another important factor: our first typesetter (well done!) Prepared an early prototype of the book for the start of the campaign. It helped: at least the backers saw with their own eyes what format the book we want to make and how it will differ from the "competitors"
3. Searches
As a result of the campaign, I had almost half a million rubles in my hands, and I was sure that this would be more than enough for materials and for printing a book. At that time, a lot of people sent me photographs, according to the text I already agreed with Nikolai Kruzhkov (a specialist in the history of construction and the author of the book “Skyscrapers of Stalinist Moscow”), and also previously discussed the topic with a couple of familiar architects. It only remained to take the building in the photo, but here it was lucky again: the famous architectural photographer Margarita Fedina wrote to me, which, as it turned out, had already shot the GZ a couple of years ago. She suggested sharing photos for free.
In the yard was August. I was sure that the book would be ready in three months and was already mentally counting my millions of money and kilometers of fame.
Upon closer inspection, everything turned out to be much more complicated. Firstly, almost all the photos sent were taken from one angle. It looks good on a university instagram, but not suitable for a book. Secondly, I categorically did not like the style of existing books, I wanted something less formal, respectively, the texts also had to be processed. Thirdly, it was not possible to agree with the architect (unfortunately, they are not taught at the Moscow State University). Cherry on the cake: architectural photographs of Margarita Fedina covered at most half of the building (they didn’t let her go further).
In addition, the project began to take up most of my time, and I was forced to abandon several projects. It was affordable, and I decided that I had to learn how to delegate. I hired a manager.
From the height of current experience, it seems strange that, having the experience of writing a dissertation, I took up such a project. After all, firstly, no one can write a dissertation on an unfamiliar subject in three months; secondly, no manager will help to write a dissertation. As my practice has shown, only one person can handle a dissertation and a good book, who will closely control the entire process from beginning to end. If you want to do well, do it yourself.
The third mistake: the manager is useless where there is undelegable work or work that cannot be parallelized.
The student of the journalism faculty acted as a manager; At first I paid her a salary, then, as my tasks were exhausted, I switched to paying for the actual output. She tried to work in good faith, but the work was too complicated: with all the desire I could not say where to look for the material and what to do with it; From time to time, our project resembled a blind man wandering through an architectural desert. Of course, we immediately downloaded a bunch of materials from the Internet, but, firstly, they became boring to everyone, and secondly, little could be used in the book because of copyright (this is a separate discussion). They interviewed the elderly residents of the building, but didn’t know much - the life of the residents has changed a lot since the time of construction, and the memory is relative.
Manager Diana holds tracing paper (1953 drawing) in the Technical Archives of Moscow State University
4. The Soviet press
Out of academic habit, I decided to draw Soviet magazines and books. The planned economy and the corresponding planned journalism had their advantages: it was decided to write about important events absolutely everywhere, broadcast what is called from every iron. As a result, almost all magazines in 1948-1953 talked about skyscrapers, sometimes in the format of entire special issues (Science and Life, for example, or Technique of Youth). By the way, when Stalin died at the beginning of 1953, all magazines wrote about it in the absolute way - the mourning issue of Murzilka is still a hit on Avito.
Not everything was easy to find. So, after tightening the nuts at the turn of the 40-50s, many magazines closed; in this confusion, entire years have disappeared from libraries. Yes, imagine there are Soviet magazines that cannot be found even in Lenin - like “The USSR is under construction” or “Moscow City Economy” of the early 1950s! I had to look for the necessary copies on Avito (1,500-3,000 rubles apiece) and ask the sellers to photograph the necessary pages. Of course, not for nothing.
Yes, imagine: there is a magazine, but it is not in the libraries
Subjects of skyscrapers in Soviet magazines are represented mainly by poorly printed and, even worse, completely identical illustrations. The official photos were staged through, depicting beautiful people in pathos interiors. I switched to foreign magazines and found a lot of funny everyday photos of the 50s; and the most informative, surprisingly, were photos of private traders-foreign tourists and foreign interns: unlike ours, they had no internal censor.
Just for comparison
Unfortunately, 95% of interesting photographs were not included in the book: either in quality or in copyright. But I do not consider this time wasted: digging in old magazines gave me (and continues to give) a lot of pleasure. So - not a mistake!
5. Approval
In parallel with digging in old magazines, I agreed with the photographer Margarita to shoot the rest of the building. As befits a boy brought up by
Two months have passed. First, the assistant was on vacation, then the rector himself, then someone else there. Finally, they informed me that my letter was unsubscribed to one of the vice-rectors. I waited for him to leave his vacation, and went to the reception.
I do not want to go into the content of the conversation that has taken place - I can only say that it was held in raised tones. The university, they say, will write any book itself, and amateur activity is not needed here. I flew out of the office, and after the letter flew to the faculty - figure out why the teacher is engaged in nonsense.
To say that I was upset is to say nothing. I shared my pain with the graduates and here, instead of hugging and comforting, I was again scolded. The main complaint boiled down to why I even climbed to coordinate something and spent three months on it instead of doing business. I thought about it. A few other acquaintances in the administration, whom I molested, said, in general, the same thing: why did you even need permission? After all, they still will not give it until you show the result. Therefore, in any case, you need to start with the filming.
Well, shooting is so shooting.
The fourth mistake: you do not need to receive the highest approval for everyone. If agreement is inevitable, you need to go for it with something material in your hands.
6. Shooting
You ask: well, really, why did you decide to coordinate everything in advance? Actually, this is not because I am a robot person, accustomed to acting according to instructions, no! It's just that the architectural shooting itself is a very slow procedure, eliminating unnecessary fuss.
First of all, for shooting interiors requires a large dynamic range. The reader should see in the photo the contents of the shaded corners, and the shape of the lights on the lights. The areas of the spaces that we rented started from 500 m2, so we could not install our light. Consequently, the technology of exposure bracketing remains - several photos with different shutter speeds are taken from one point, and then the result is combined according to presets in a special editor. This is similar to HDR, which is now absolutely everywhere, only HDR is usually done in three frames, and we have more than a dozen of them.
Since we cannot shoot ten identical photographs, including those with long shutter speeds, we need a tripod. And it’s big, because we’ll shoot on a hefty camera, standing at the level of human eyes (this is exactly what our interiors are designed for). And of course, we need to turn on all the available overhead lights (ideally, put the same bulbs in all the lamps, but this, of course, is a fantasy). As a result, we get a very long shot (5 minutes per frame), dragging large cameras and tripods with us, and everywhere we demand to turn on all the light. And without coordination, so that you understand, they don’t even open the door for us.
But the problem was slowly being resolved. Somewhere (library, club) met the local bosses and they turned out to be friendly and adequate people. Somewhere they used student ingenuity: for example, in the lobby of the club we just asked electricians to turn on the light with the right intonation - they say we have a shot. They took it and turned it on, and we all took it off. Somewhere I had to brazenly go into the room, seizing the moment, and take off until the security came. As a result, we shot the entire building from the inside, except for technical rooms, gyms and, of course, the administration. The administration is sorry, it left a lot of artifacts - from Soviet paintings to jasper columns in the office of the rector. But not at this time.
Working moments (hello dontsov !)
As practice has shown, specialized people are needed for specialized shooting. A photographer who takes only women without clothes has neither the equipment nor the skills to beautifully remove a dead elevator from the inside.
The process of shooting the very elevator and the result. The camera on the tripod stood inside the elevator, and the photographer, sitting under the tripod (so as not to get into the frame), illuminated the elevator walls with a flashlight. At a long shutter speed, it turned out very well.
7. Museums and archives
Almost immediately, I agreed with the Moscow Multimedia-Art Museum, the owner of a large collection of Soviet photos. They were as adequate as possible: they sent a huge archive with thumbnails, and later, before printing, they provided high-res on request.
With other museums it didn’t work out so smoothly. I sent a manager to negotiate. Ringing:
- Yes, they have a lot of photos. But they only allow you to watch, you can’t take anything with you.
- At least you can take a picture?
- No, they are watching this. I can scan it. One scan - 3000 rubles.
Although at that time I didn’t spend half the money, 3000 rubles per scan already seemed outrageous. Moreover, while the layout was not ready, I did not know which of the photographs would fall into the book, and which ones were needed only for previews.
As a result, a year later, when we finished shooting in the building and began to typesetting, I decided once again to go to the museum myself. It turned out: both museums and archives, in the vast majority - budget organizations. They are obliged to provide their materials to other state employees, including scientists like us. But since the manager positioned himself as a private buyer, they immediately seized on her as a source of extrabudgetary funds. And the thing was - to give them a confirmation letter from the leadership of the university.
One of the dissertations devoted to Moscow State University. The 50s, the reading room of the RSL in Khimki
So I opened huge museum funds on architecture, as well as my talent as a negotiator. Subsequently, the remote archives even sent me scans to e-mail without any letters and contracts.
Fifth mistake: discuss commercial cooperation without learning about all possible options.
8. Rights to photographs
With the photographs, I stepped on another rake, and, despite my legal education, before working on the book I did not know about this feature of our copyright. It turns out that a huge number of Soviet works (both texts and photos) are not published, since the rights to them belong to no one knows. In a literal sense.
Look: in the 50s, the rights to photographs were valid for only five years from the moment of shooting, and the vast majority of photographers were correspondents and shot on request. Accordingly, all rights were immediately transferred to their employers (newspapers, magazines, etc.), that is, to the state. Because of this, no one was particularly worried about fixing rights - anyway, after five years they will be exhausted. As a result, for example, in illustrated magazines, photographers were often indicated at the end with a comma-separated list, and now it is impossible to restore authorship of photographs.
Then, at some point, the USSR began to ratify international copyright conventions, and the terms of protection began to grow: first up to 25 years, then up to 50, then up to 70. As a result, many works several times passed into the public domain (public domain) and vice versa: the most famous example is the series “The Master and Margarita”, which was shot on the basis of a free work, and when they were going to release it, the heirs have already returned to themselves copyright.
In general, the situation with photographs is as follows: firstly, you can reprint them from the old newspaper for free (with all the desire to pay no one, and the newspaper has long been gone, and the author cannot be found). Secondly, you can find the negativity in some archive and scan it - already for the money. Neither the first nor the second option removes the risks: the heirs of the author can always arise and demand their share. And what’s interesting: if the heirs prove authorship, the court will support them! After all, the archive / museum / magazine is unlikely to have a contract with the author, rather, just the originals of the negatives (which do not give any rights). As a result, most publishers are afraid to take such (so-called "orphaned") content.
Since I was a publishing house, I decided to take risks with orphaned photographs: in the end, it is unlikely that anyone will seriously sue. I also purchased some of the photographs from museums and archives, and some were found in the public domain. Unfortunately, I practically didn’t use work under copyright law - I didn’t make money. For example, photographs of the famous Henri Cartier-Bresson, who also shot Moscow State University, belong to the oldest Magnum photo agency, which never makes discounts to anyone.
The same photographs of Cartier-Bresson (for informational purposes only)
9. Cover
The search for information and typing passed the first year. Graduates slowly began to grumble in response to my letters about the next postponement. I decided to please them with a little blood and make a cover, while the main material is not yet ready.
Sixth mistake: never make a cover until you have written the book itself
Through my friends, I found a great illustrator Natasha , who became interested in the project and was ready to take on moderate money. At that moment I dreamed of the architectural part of my project and therefore I conceived a collage of the characteristic elements of the era: people, steam locomotives, airplanes were supposed to form in the form of a silhouette of a GZ.
Unfortunately, I did not think that the illustrator works in his own style, and Natashin's style suggested graphics, not photo collages. And the 50s were just the time of the boom of color photography: graphics almost completely disappeared from the pages of magazines, which filled the faces of smiling milkmaids and steelworkers. As a result, these years are by no means associated with graphics in our country, unlike, say, the 1930s. Natasha tried hard, but in the first version neither the Main Building nor his era were read.
The first version of the cover
Then, in search of inspiration, I came across Matthias Jung's collages, and the idea came to me: to compose the silhouette of the Main Building from elements of other “stalines” to demonstrate its relationship with the monuments of this period.
One of Matthias Jung
's works. Here's what happened in the end.
When I showed the result at the MSU forum, the majority of reviews were, let's say, disappointed:
Of course, I was upset and for a long time I could not understand what still did not suit the graduates. At some point, I realized that the reason is in the target audience of the book, or rather, in the incorrect definition of this very audience. I planned the cover primarily for hipsters, visitors to the architectural departments of bookstores. But it turned out that the main reader of my book is a graduate of Moscow State University 30-50 years old, who takes this book as a gift to his friends, possibly parents who lived in the hostel of the Main Building. And for them, everything in this cover seemed wrong: Stalin, pink, obscure references to the architecture of other buildings. They needed, on the contrary, something as traditional and pathos as possible (and preferably without Soviet contexts).
The situation is stalemate: on the one hand, there was an explicit request for a new cover; on the other hand, I did not want to abandon the existing one, which personally suited me well and in which considerable money was invested. Especially with the cover, binding and embossing titles (pages with pictures at the beginning of each chapter) were already rhymed. I even thought about printing a book with two cover options, but it was affordable. Moreover, the dust cover is, in fact, a consumable: it is needed to protect the book in the store and attract the attention of visitors, and earlier it was even customary to throw it out after the purchase (now, however, many leave it).
Then an original solution came to my mind: to make a book with a double-sided dust jacket, which readers can flip to their liking. This, on the one hand, came out much cheaper than making two different covers; on the other hand, it allowed me to show additional loyalty to the audience (“you asked for a new cover - we did! We will send it specifically for you in another cover!”) Later I instructed the stores to also put books in “both” covers on the shelf - at the buyers there was an
10. Layout
When the text was formed enough, and indecently accumulated a lot of photos (about 50 gigabytes), I decided to start layout. “Layout is not difficult,” I thought, having considerable (as it seemed to me) experience working on a student journal and scientific books. But it didn’t work out according to plan, and layout eventually became one of the main expense items.
Layout can be very roughly compared to cooking. Let's say you often cook cottage cheese pancakes and know that one serving will require 250 grams of cottage cheese, two eggs and 50 grams of flour. Now imagine that you with this experience are being sent to the kitchen, where there are five kilograms of onions, a package of oil, a plucked pigeon, a bag of rice and a brick. From this you were asked to prepare a dessert for 12 people. (Do not swear, I could not come up with a better analogy).
This is how I felt when I came across the realities of the layout of the book. Firstly, my material consisted of very scattered content, including multi-format color and b / w photos, video frames and scans of Soviet books; moreover, the ratio of content in different chapters was different. Secondly, I had no idea which book format to choose and what size it would be in general. Thirdly, I categorically did not like the references that I met.
In a good way, I needed a real art director who could completely put together the concept of a book in my head and then, with my help, assemble and create content for it. I began to look for options for friends.
The first typesetter was not bad. The problem is that he immediately offered to work for free "for the portfolio", and I agreed. In fact, layout is a very tedious process that can be briefly described (do not be afraid, there are no more food analogies) as an endless remaking of a redone. Somewhere they added a line, and the picture left five pages later. And somewhere, the illustrator does not want to fit into the frame of the image and the text has to be transferred to another strip. As a result, the typesetter did some of the work that was minimally suitable for the portfolio, but completely insufficient for the book, and disappeared.
Seventh mistake: never entrust laborious work to enthusiasts
The first version of the layout of the
Second layout designer (more precisely, the layout designer) I found already for the money, but it turned out that she had never done such serious things from scratch. It turned out without a twist, although very conscientiously (the only designer in my memory who always follows the deadlines. A rarity). I tried to criticize the result, but it got worse. I realized that someone with a different qualification was needed. The advance, of course, did not take back.
Second option
The third layout designer was (and remains) a true professional, a designer with a capital letter. However, during the project, he worked in the largest design studio, and if at first he was able to make time for the weekend, then as the boringness of tasks grew, he began to drag out the deadlines longer and longer. In addition, it was felt that he was much closer to the modernist style, and not the pathos of books of the 50s: for example, he insisted that black and white photographs be painted in gradients. Photos desperately resisted.
The third option
It seems that I quickly describe everything, but in reality, a year has passed behind these twists and turns of layout. Of course, I tried not to waste time in vain, I got some new materials, the rules were incoherent text. But subscribers already began to worry seriously.
9. Graduates gesture. Merch
From the very beginning of the project, I decided to keep in touch with graduate backers. I got an account on the mailing service, began to regularly notify them of project news. But over time, news appeared less and less, and more and more tart answers came. Backers regularly appeared in public or on planet.ru who shouted “They threw us! There will be no book! ”, And if I did not respond quickly (within 1-2 hours), the volcano opened in the comments.
For Moscow, 400,000 rubles is not such a significant amount to gain a reputation as a crook for life; however, I have been accused of stealing money more than once. There is nothing to be done: probably, when you take the time so seriously, people simply have no other way to put pressure on you. A couple of the most persistent commentators, I returned the contributions - this turned out to be the most correct decision. The supervisor who watched all of this from the side began to jokingly or seriously advise me to dry crackers and collect warm clothes.
Eighth mistake: do not wait for the backers to put pressure on you: keep them in the know even when there is essentially nothing to say
However, most of the campaign participants even after three years behaved very dignified. I repeated, like a parrot, my “finish the layout, finish the layout”, and many sent in response not irritated letters, but words of support. Thanks to them for that!
By the way, in addition to the book, campaign participants on Planet relied on merchandise - cards, posters and T-shirts. So: T-shirts were a big mistake. A variety of sizes (requested from XXS to XXXXXL) greatly complicates the logistics; besides, clothes, unlike printing, cannot be sent with a cheap parcel (only an expensive parcel). If I could repeat the campaign again, I would point out some dimensionless canvas bags and greatly simplify my task.
Ninth mistake: no t-shirts needed
Футболки, кстати, всем понравились. Изображен Ломоносов (памятник перед Главным зданием) в позе Buddy Christ из «Догмы»
10. Окончание верстки. Издание и печать
In the end, layout designer number 3 advised his colleague, who was relatively free and agreed to take on my project. At the same time, his design option was perfect for a style book; moreover, after the epic with layout, I myself approximately understood the process and prepared a page plan and priority-broken materials.
The final version of the layout
And even in this format, almost a year has passed from the beginning of the last layout to the publication of the book. At first, we agreed on the layout. Then the layout designer did a draft for a long time, after which I searched for new photographs and modified the text. Perfectionism did not allow putting pictures in a book just like that, in different quality and with scanning defects - that’s why we processed each of 1000 photos, manually removing folds, artifacts and a printing raster from them.
At the same time, I entered into agreements with copyright holders, searched for materials in optimal quality - in general, I did the remaining boring technical work. After the end of the layout, he could not resist and printed a couple of books on a color printer to brag to the readers.
As a result, three years after the start of the crowdfunding campaign, I got to the press. I was offered contacts of various printing houses (from small copy centers to large enterprises), but I already understood that such a large order (one and a half thousand large format books) can be completed only by a full-fledged printing plant. I went to a bookstore and studied all the art books on the shelves: as a result, I selected three combines (in Riga, Moscow and Tver), which I liked in terms of print quality, good paper and the lack of stocks.
This is what a large printing industry looks like where books are made.
After requesting commercial offers, Latvians unexpectedly won. At the same time, the cost of printing still came out much higher than I expected in 2015 - under a million rubles. It turned out to be very expensive fabric binding, about a third of the cost of the book (it is clear why it is so rarely done). Of course, full-color printing and quality European coated paper turned out to be costly. But, surprisingly, it doesn’t cost anything at all - a fabric bookmark (lassa): publishers like to splurge in this way, squinting under "expensive" literature.
Unstitched book pages in a printing house
The press itself in a huge printing house took no more than a couple of days. And then the book went to Moscow - or rather, to the logistics center in Domodedovo - for another month or so. Then I made another fatal mistake: I chose a truck to transport books not by weight, but by volume. As a result, the little "Porter" naturally bent the body from one and a half tons and the rear doors stopped closing. Of course, we brought books, but we couldn’t accelerate even over 40 km / h on the Warsaw highway.
The tenth mistake: never load more than a ton into the Porter :-)
11. Presentation and mailing. Sales
After receiving the books, I began to organize a presentation. I could not find a free room for 400-500 people, and in the end I divided the show into several parts: for backers, “just” subscribers, and for everyone interested. By the way, it turned out that of those who did not directly participate in the crowdfunding campaign, and showed interest after it (subscribing to groups of books on social networks, beating me with messages, etc.), only one in three actually bought the book - the rest, apparently, I liked the process itself more.
Now about the mail. At the beginning of the campaign, I foolishly promised delivery in Russia. Why foolishly: firstly, during crowdfunding, many moved, and our backers were scattered around the country. Secondly, delivery to some regions turned out to be very expensive: for example, in some Siberian cities in spring and autumn, while the ice has not yet risen / has not yet melted, you can only get by air, which is reflected in the tariffs. Thirdly, I did not imagine what kind of hemorrhoids it was: packing parcels and parcels, carrying them in the mail, waiting for an employee to post everything, etc. In total, I sent about 70 parcels and spent several days on it.
Eleventh mistake: do not send lots by Russian post. Offer pickup or private delivery services
At some point, parcels and parcels lay in absolutely all corners.
I gave some of the books for sale to stores. I remember when we printed scientific literature at the department, the biggest problem was to sell it; we handed books to the store at cost (100-150 rubles), and with the commission of the distributor (stored in a warehouse and shipped to stores) and the seller, the price was 450-500 rubles.
With the book about MSU everything turned out better. The higher the price of the book, the lower the relative commission of the distributor: as a result, I handed over the book for 1400-1500 rubles, and it costs about 2000-2500 rubles in the store. However, the long sales cycle is frustrating: while the distributor picks up the book, while the sellers buy it, sell it and return the money along the chain, it takes up to six months. As a result, sales are transformed into money with a huge lag. Track sales dynamics, respond to indicators in individual stores - for the book industry this is nothing more than science fiction; while stores are not even able to quickly replenish stocks of books. As a result, on the same Ozone, the book periodically drops out of sales for a couple of weeks (stocks are out, delivery and posting takes 2-3 weeks).
12. Results
Initially, I considered the book not only as a tribute to Moscow State University, but also as a successful and easy business venture. However, it turned out, at least, not at all easy. Later I realized this: if nobody did something good and necessary, then there are pitfalls. So here: the lack of a book about the building of Moscow State University was explained by the closeness of the university, the unprofitability of the whole undertaking and the withering away of the market for illustrated books.
The cost of the book ultimately amounted to more than 1000 rubles excluding shipping - despite the fact that the participants of the crowdfunding campaign paid 900 each. As a result of the book campaign, I paid out of my money (including borrowed money) so as not to throw the project halfway . The book ate a huge amount of nerves, time and energy; in fact, I spent three years working on this project, and for a long time I will not be able to recover my costs. According to my calculations, only by the third draw I can finally get any compensation - if I have the strength to get to it.
Twelfth mistake: never expect to make money on books
The final budget of the project
On the other hand, the book brought me to a huge number of interesting and caring people. I saw with my own eyes how the publishing house, the museum industry work, and gained a lot of experience in photography. I really like to learn something new, and architecture has become a wonderful hobby. Well and most importantly: I finally got what I was missing - a book about the Main Building of Moscow State University, such as I always wanted to read.
PS Habraeffect quickly destroyed the stocks of books on Ozone. You can use any other online store; the lowest prices, as far as I know, at Urban Books.