Last fall I had the privilege of spending a few magical days in Southern California gathering with talented creative women.  They entrusted me to document our shared memories and thus, this collective magazine was created…

The pages celebrate our differences – some of us gravitate to people, others to still life…

…and highlight our similarities – despite our unique perspectives on a similar situation, we share a keen awareness of the beauty found in playing and appreciating the simple moments…

The magazine concludes with casual portraits captured throughout the weekend of each photographer along with special thanks to our weekend organizers…

For those of you curious about the logistics of coordinating a project like this, here are 5 quick steps I took to successfully complete this collaborative project…

1.  Create an image repository.   I set up individual Dropbox folders and invited each contributor to share a specified number of images in their unique folder.  Be clear about your image specifications – I accepted any size/crop and requested no watermarks or additional text be added to the photos.

2.  Set submission deadlines.  Outline a clear project timeline and set reminders for yourself to nudge folks along as deadlines approach.

3.  Invite just a few cooks into the kitchen.  I designed the book on my own and then previewed the draft with just 2 people to keep the process from bogging down with change orders.

4.  Choose a book printer that allows for easy previewing and self-ordering.  Blurb was the perfect choice for us.  Once I shared the magazine link everyone was free to place their individual orders.  We even collected a bit extra for each book to incorporate a philanthropy component into our project.

5.  Share the love.  The beauty of printing a magazine is the ease with which you can gift extra copies to those who might enjoy such a keepsake.  I sent out a few extra magazines to friends that had played a special role in our time together.

Because it really is true that “great things are done by a series of small things brought together”.

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