We have now seen colour in our Bulletin for the first time. For reasons of cost, all colour reproductions appear on the same doubled page. However, this separates the pictures from their text, and as soon as I received the first copy from the printers I realised that there was insufficient information to allow the reader to easily restore this link. I hope that I have now dealt with this shortcoming.

The easiest place to put these pictures is the centre spread. Fortunately it is also the easiest place for the reader to find. As the text is subject to constant revision up to the last minute — late adverts, notices etc — trying to arrange the pictures on any other pair of pages can be very time consuming and frustrating. Of course, one can break up the text of the article. This invariably happens in commercial magazines but affects the readability which is unacceptable.

From the photographs that I receive, it is fairly obvious that some people are better at composing a picture than others. For example, a batch I received recently suffered variously from wet finger marks on the lens, horizons tilted at up to 15°, and the photographer’s knees in the foreground. By the nature of things there have to be a lot of rejects, but it is a pity if this is for reasons of technique rather than the usual one of content.

In the past, magazines or their printers would only accept transparencies or colour slides for reproduction. This is no longer the case, and our printers are happy to deal with glossy colour prints. This is also better from the publishers point of view as I can judge the final result more easily and also crop if necessary. So from now on please only send colour prints and size 6” x 4” is perfectly adequate, as this is the maximum size of picture used.