The DAM Book 3.0

Krogh_140218_5460We’re thrilled to announce that work has begun on The DAM Book 3.0.

It’s been nearly five years since The DAM Book Second Edition was released, and I’m really pleased how well it’s held up in that time – the principles and thought processes remain relevant. However, five years is a couple of lifetimes in the tech world.

Cloud services, social media and mobile photography have had a tremendous impact on the way we make, publish, store and organize our photos. And video has also become an important tool for many still photographers.

I’ve continued digging in to the material deeply, particularly over the last year. If you read my blog, you’ll have seen some of my thoughts on where the world of digital photo management is heading.

In The DAM Book 3.0, I’ll be writing about how you can understand and integrate the new tools with your workflow. And the book will help still photographers understand how to get control of the video shooting and management process.

I’ll also be adding a chapter about project management. When your creative needs reach beyond the capabilities of your catalog software, you need to take a different approach to the entire process. I’ll outline how to manage and archive projects when a conventional catalog is not the proper tool.

We’re targeting a July 1, 2014 delivery for The DAM Book 3.0, but we’ll release it as soon as it’s ready.

DAM Book Guides
Another big change is one I’ve already announced. I’m pulling all the software-specific workflow out of the book. That’s the one part of the book that is outdated, and it’s also the part that is best accomplished with multimedia publications. So while the “evergreen” content will remain in The DAM Book, workflow will now be found in The DAM Book Guides.

Splitting the content in this way accomplishes several things. I can target it to a specific task or software package, or even a type of reader. For instance, Organizing Your Photos is written for all Lightroom users, while Multi-Catalog Workflow is written for a much smaller percentage of power users. And I can update these books more regularly.

Upgrade Policy
We know we’re making this announcement much earlier than most publishers would. We consider our relationship to the reader to be a partnership, so we want to keep you informed. And we know that teachers in schools and universities need to do advance planning. So we have a few offers we wanted to let you know about.

If you buy The DAM Book 2 (2009 Edition) after today (March 5th, 2014), you’ll get a $15 coupon toward the purchase of The DAM Book 3.0.

If you have bought The DAM Book 2 (or any of our other books) from us at an earlier date, you’ll get an opportunity to buy the new version at a 20% discount through the first 30 days of release. Yes, that means you get The DAM Book 2e nearly free.

If you bought The DAM Book 2 from someone other than us, Tweet, Facebook, Google+ or email us a photo of yourself with your book, and we’ll put you on the 20%-off coupon list. (Make sure to notify us directly in any case.)