Earlier this year I designed a custom bed for my granddaughter that needed to fit in a tight alcove. I sent some photos to the editor of Good Woodworking magazine (Tegan Foley) to see if she was interested in me writing it up as a magazine article (I hadn't posted the WIP on here). At the same time I also included links to the understairs and summerhouse projects and asked if they had any restrictions on publishing such articles (given it wouldn't be exclusive to the magazine). Tegan confirmed that was not an issue (actual email text "In terms of publishing articles that have appeared on forums, I really don’t mind and can see no harm in this. Obviously the magazine article will be more detailed and comprehensive, so I think giving forum members a ‘flavour’ of the project is fine.). She then said both the understairs and corner summerhouse could be converted to articles (so the 'flavour' in a forum post can be quite strong!!). As a result, the understair storage project is appearing in next month's magazine and hopefully the summerhouse in one a few months later. My bed was published in issue 324 (Nov17) as 'Jessica's bed'.
Even though the 'story' of the build may have already been written in a forum project, converting it to the format for a magazine article takes time (for me at least 6 hours for each one).....This is the approach that has worked for me....
- Before anything else, send an email with a photo of the finished item and any summary text that could help get it accepted as an article. If accepted....
Decide the photos to be used and in what order. Rename each photo starting pic1, pic2 etc and give each a short descriptive name.
Include a dimensioned drawing (or more) - I use sketchup and export as 2D in png format. Call the file Fig1 with discription.
Upload the images to a sharing site (I now use flickr as it lets you reorganise the image order if needed). Create an Album, move the images into it and copy the shareing URL.
Write the article using Word or similar, with larger coloured font section headings and a simple black text font for the content. Where figures or pictures are mentioned in the article use a different colour font. I tend to use the section headings of:
Intro
Design,Dimension & Materials constraints or requirements
Design & Construction
Time and cost
What would I change/do differently
link to the Flickr album and anything else (e.g. sketchup file in 3d workshop)
Once completed send it in an email, including the flickr album link (check it works!) and include one image of the completed item.
You won't make a fortune !!! Its £50 per printed page(at least thats the amateur rate) and any starter photo page doesn't get counted. Back in 2003 I had an oak bureau article printed over 3 editions and got £500, so the page rate has stayed much the same, just now worth less. Before a first article is published you will need to provide the usual national insurance and bank details and sign forms (which includes you retaining copyright). You'll get paid gross so if above any tax free threshold you will need to declare it at the end of the tax year (so don't spend it all on shiny tools!).
There have been some very good projects on this forum that would make good magazine articles.
Dave
PS I sent another idea in yesterday that was accepted this morning - a simple rabbit run, will add that to the projects in a bit .