Just to keep me accountable... I'm going to give updates along the way... to that, I've started to dig in. I've worked out the key design elements-- size, type styles, how entry pages will work, etc. This is the largest update I've done in terms of both content AND design. A LOT of stuff has come out since the last edition. Here's the biggest thoughts/changes/ideas for this version:
1. INTERACTIVITY. A page or so back, you'll see I was talking about turning this into a website and to use tags to make for a better user experience. I wanted to give the ability to choose a path-- do you want to follow one physical prop through the years? Or one narrative prop? Or all the sabers used by one character? Here's the thing though-- I HATE web design. With my background in print design and motion graphics I find website design to be infuriating. Things never line up the way I want, I can't truly know what every person is going to see, and frankly, my brain does not think in code and I struggle to work with it. I'm a visual person. That said, I am going to do my best to add hyperlinks to this edition. Links that let you bounce from the table of contents to pages, links between pages for through lines, and links from the book to RPF threads when applicable. If anyone wants to do a website, I am happy to give you all the collected info from the guide.
2. LESS IS MORE. Technically there will the MORE pages because so many new entries are needed, but I have cut a lot of content that in retrospect, I put in to fill spaces and make the book larger. I no longer need filler. We don't need my polemic on rivets vs screws, we don't need all the amazing blueprints by
roygilsing because he is awesome and hosts the guide right in the same section of wannawanga as the blueprints. I never intended the book to be an exacting build guide, just a reference to current known information. Doing a little LESS is also going to help me where I have been stuck in terms of some information still being debated/researched or knowledge that is accepted, but can't be shown because of NDAs. When something is in contention, I will be more general, and again, have links that fly to RPF threads.
3. REDESIGN. Once again I am changing the size. This time I am showing for something close to 16 x 9 as most all monitors are roughly these dimensions now. I want to fill screens with less scrolling. Also, given that this has never been meant for print, I am going to pack a little more type onto pages knowing every can zoom and PDFs will stay sharp, Of course that means scrolling, but I am picking my battles here. Enough people hated the "dark mode" of the last version with white text on black background, so I'm going back to black text.
4. ARRANGEMENT. This is the big one. I am changing the order in which the entries are listed. Given that the book started with just covering the OT sabers, it made sense to do it by character. The novelty of this is whole crazy hobby is that in the OT, there are only FOUR lightsabers. And yet, those four narrative lightsabers are played onscreen by several dozen individual props. As the book grew, the break down of things was beholden to that, but also slipped out of it on several occasion because not everything fit into that style. Starting with this version, lightsaber entries will now be presented by PRODUCTION, in the order they were chronologically released. Within an individual production, entries will still be by character. (see snapshot of the table of contents below) This will also make it a lot easier for future me to add new entries as they come out, without having to go back and shoehorn them into a pre-existing section.
And just to get everyone worked up-- here's a few sample pages...
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Having the options of the screen-accurate and idealized parts seems like the best solution for what I'm looking for. I guess I just need to be patient and hope they get their shop in order.
