A question for PDF buyers.

[hellbender]

When I buy a .pdf I like it to have some artwork, and as long as the illustrations and layout compliment writing I can use and are done well, I am happy. As an illustrator and a gamer I like artwork in .pdfs, but if the book is rather big, I would much rather buy a print book and enjoy the writing and the art in hand over printing it out. I find .pdfs like those by Ronin Arts to be the handiest: solid cover, good layout and writing with a few interior illustrations, all in a fairly small file.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

I'm not some publisher fishing for free market feedback or anything, just curious about something.

A lot of the discussion around book costs centers around production values. Hard cover, full color books sell better, so people make them, but they also tend to cost more, as they cost a bit more to produce.

My question, however, is how necesary are those production values in your eyes? Sure, for a nice print product you want it to be visually appealing, but would you buy a good book, for a bargain basement price, if it was a PDF only and included no substantial art?

To whit, given the choice between to PDFs with identical content, say 200 pages of good rules and/or setting material, would you be more likey to buy the one that cost $20 and featured decent, but not spectacular art, the one that cost $5 with no art at all, or one that cost $35 with art from industry leaders?

$5.

But $20 if it's an adventure. Good maps are a nice thing.

 

[2WS-Steve]

I prefer restrained art work and borders in PDFs.

This is a place where I'm particularly impressed by Malhavoc -- they have a stylish, minimalist layout and use line art making their books both easy to print out and attractive to look at, without requiring two different versions of the file. It's a nice melding of form and function.

 

[Dark Psion]

I think a lot depends on the type of book.

A monster book does need good art to help "visualize" the creatures, see the recent Iron Heroes Bestiary for an example not so good art.

And as they say "a picture is worth a 1000 words" was never truer than in the original Unearthed Arcana. It took about three paragraphs to explain what a Kopesh sword looked like.

The perfect pdf. would be one that I could toggle aspects like art, border and color on and off as I like.
The recent Elements of Magic: Mythic Earth from E.N.Publishing does just that and maybe Ryan Nock could tell us how hard it was to create a pdf. like that.

Price wise, $20 is about my limit on a pdf., if it costs more than that I would rather buy it as a book and get my money's worth.

 

[Starglim]

I'm not some publisher fishing for free market feedback or anything, just curious about something.

A lot of the discussion around book costs centers around production values. Hard cover, full color books sell better, so people make them, but they also tend to cost more, as they cost a bit more to produce.

My question, however, is how necesary are those production values in your eyes? Sure, for a nice print product you want it to be visually appealing, but would you buy a good book, for a bargain basement price, if it was a PDF only and included no substantial art?

To whit, given the choice between to PDFs with identical content, say 200 pages of good rules and/or setting material, would you be more likey to buy the one that cost $20 and featured decent, but not spectacular art, the one that cost $5 with no art at all, or one that cost $35 with art from industry leaders?

There are at least three separate questions there.

I feel a PDF doesn't require pretty decorations such as page borders and generic fantasy illustrations - in fact, these decrease the usefulness of the product because they consume printer ink.

However, illustrations that give information about specific things (creatures and equipment, for example) and art that gives a strong visual sense of the unique elements of a campaign setting add value in themselves. A varied and well-designed layout that makes the text easier to browse and to grasp adds value over an eye-straining mishmash.

edit: After rereading the question: I don't know how serious you are in your estimate of prices, but I seriously doubt that art is the difference between a $5 and $20 PDF or that a publisher will sell any significant numbers of a PDF-only product at $35.

 

[pogre]

To whit, given the choice between to PDFs with identical content, say 200 pages of good rules and/or setting material, would you be more likey to buy the one that cost $20 and featured decent, but not spectacular art, the one that cost $5 with no art at all, or one that cost $35 with art from industry leaders?

I think you mean "To Wit" - but to answer in a more constructive way - for a pdf art means less to me than content - I vote $5.00. I rarely spend over $10 on a pdf unless it is by JoeB.

 

[arscott]

The $5 one is probably the only one I'd buy. If adding art to a book is going to cost me $15, I'll definately skip it. Of course, If it were a matter of choosing between a $8 PDF without art and a $9 or $10 PDF with art, I'd be more likely to shell out the extra dollar or two. but quadrupling the Price of a PDF to make it look pretty is almost criminal.