In-between Places is an exhibit-style coffee table book, featuring a collection of 70 photographs spanning the decade of 2008 to 2017 of wild landscapes in mainland Singapore. Unfortunately, most of these places have not remained intact in the present day, thus this collection remains singularly unique and can never be undertaken again, an iconic celebration of a rarely seen aspect of Singapore’s natural heritage.
My intention has always been for these books to be given away in support of local charities doing meaningful environmental and conservation work that affects Singaporeans, to assist in their fundraising efforts and outreach. No copies will ever be sold for profit anywhere. 100% of the proceeds will go directly to benefit the charities. To that end, I am currently seeking funding to produce the trade edition of books. No ISBN has been or will ever be registered for this book to prevent it from ever entering the retail chain, in keeping with the not-for-profit intent.
Please note that donations for this project are no longer accepted.
Estimated Trade Edition size is 31cm x 35cm (landscape) and 2.5kg weight.
Update 19 June 2019:
Since the word got out, I have had multiple correspondences expressing interest to acquire copies of my book. I can no longer spare the time to explain the entire complex tangle of issues to each person, so it seemed prudent to go into detail here about the extreme difficulty of realising this novel book with its equally novel intentions and aspirations.
Featured here are photographs of an Author’s Edition book that was produced in a very limited run on an HP Indigo 10000 digital press. None of these handmade books are available for distribution. The process to make them has taken over 3 years all told, excluding the years spent on photography. Production has necessarily been a drawn-out journey fraught with deep issues beyond my control, in the ardent pursuit of exquisite print quality never before achieved by the local commercial book printing industry. Printing digitally offers the wonderful ability to allow even a single print to be made at a time and each print can be different than the last, so tests can be made on the actual press on actual paper. The latter would have rarely been done with traditional lithographic offset and the former is unheard of. Countless hours were spent sourcing for and evaluating many kinds of paper to find one that exhibits just the right visual and haptic qualities, in addition to book cloth, endbands, end papers, museum-quality adhesives, mull-lining paper and boards for the case. Numerous experiments were conducted on-press to iteratively discover the optimal setup and inking for the selected paper, designed to push beyond the printer’s defaults for resolution, colour gamut and black density. By doing this digitally rather than starting with offset, I was able to save thousands of kilograms of paper, tens of thousands of dollars and managed to glean a great deal of knowledge to apply towards getting a book of this quality mass-produced.
Lithographic offset printing is necessary to produce a book in larger quantities than just a handful to keep the cost of each book reasonable. It would cost thousands of dollars to make a one-off book (the one shown here cost me many times more than that) and this immediately makes it an impossible proposition to sell, let alone give away. I require $50,000 to begin production to make 1000 books. At $50 per book, the cost is remarkably low despite the extreme level of quality specified, and surprise, surprise, the company that offered this pricing is actually one of the finest printers in Singapore with the greatest commitment towards quality I’ve ever encountered here. Going to somewhere like China to print would not reduce the printing costs at all if the same level of quality is demanded, not neglecting needing many thousands of dollars more to cover travel and accommodation so as to perform the necessary custom printing setups and measurements before printing final copy. Then there is also the additional cost of shipping 3000kg of books to Singapore – both financial as well as environmental. $50,000 will only cover the cost of producing 1000 books (the required setup costs, printing tests and making clamshell boxes for the Collector’s Edition), and does not reimburse me for my own past expenses, which have exceeded this many times over.
Understandably, no publisher or distributor is willing to undertake such an endeavour and surrender 100% of their sales to charity. The ideal situation is to have the book production entirely sponsored and for donors to make a minimum contribution towards my chosen charity on give.sg’s platform. Every donor would then receive 250% of their donation amount as a deductible from their declared income for tax as well as a free book. The entire process would be 100% transparent and maximally benefits the donor. No money will pass through my hands in such a situation. Unfortunately, I have been thus far unsuccessful at attracting sponsorship, perhaps due to the novel and singular nature of my project, and so other options were explored. Without a sponsor, I would have to be reimbursed for the print production costs before the remaining funds can be donated to charity. Crowdfunding at first seemed to be a viable alternative, but it is not a straightforward solution. Firstly, platforms like Kickstarter and Indiegogo do not allow projects that fundraise for charity. Then there is the issue of what would happen if I do not raise the required amount. If the full amount is not funded, I cannot go into production. As far as I know, only Kickstarter has an easy system to provide refunds for an all-or-nothing campaign. Give.sg requires donations to go directly to the chosen charity, so in starting a campaign there I would not get the funding needed to print the books anyway. Give.asia would have been a viable alternative but they do not share donors’ information so it would be complicated to provide refunds in the event the campaign was not fully funded. I can accept direct donations from people, but there is the following issue:
It goes without saying that it would be difficult to raise the needed amount when there is no promise of an end product. I was able to conduct a print test on lithographic offset a few weeks ago which left much to be desired. Extreme effort and considerable time are still needed to attain the print quality I desire. I am wholly unwilling to settle for anything less to represent what is my life’s work to date, dear beyond words to me. So even if the project is fully funded or sponsored, it would still be many moons before any books are ready for distribution. Then there is also the off chance that I may not be satisfied with the current workmanship after all. Many years may pass before new highly skilled craftsmen and financing coincide to make attempting this possible again.
None of the photographs in this collection is available for viewing online except in certain news publications and I have no intention of having it otherwise so. They will remain exclusive and desirable to anyone who intends to acquire a copy of the book. But I shall include several photos of the book on this page to give an idea of what it looks like.
Donations for Print Production of In-between Places Book
I am currently accepting donations towards the production of this book. Please carefully read the 19 June 2019 update and also these conditions:
1. All donations must be made in Singapore dollars.
2. A donation does not guarantee you will receive a copy of the book.
3. Unless the full amount of 50,000 SGD is raised, no books will be produced and there is no promise when they will become available.
4. If sponsorship is not secured, the donations will go towards paying for the print production costs first and the remainder will go to charity.
5. In the event production does not happen, I reserve the right to either refund donations or to pass on donations to my chosen charities at my sole discretion.
6. In the event of a refund, only a partial refund may be made. The refund amount will be less all transaction fees incurred if any.
7. Donation by PayNow (this is my preferred method): If you are banking with DBS/POSB, OCBC, UOB, Citibank, HSBC, Maybank or Standard Chartered, you should be able to link your banking account with your mobile/NRIC/UEN and use PayNow. There are no fees incurred when using PayNow. The minimum contribution is $150 to reserve one book. Donors are entitled to additional copies by donating in multiples of $150, e.g. for 2 copies, donate $300. For 3 copies, donate $450 etc.
8. Donation by Paypal: You may also choose to donate by Paypal or credit card at the link below. A Paypal account is not needed for one-time donations. Due to Paypal’s transaction fees, the minimum contribution is $160 to reserve one book. Donors are entitled to additional copies by donating in multiples of $160, e.g. for 2 copies, donate $320. For 3 copies, donate $480 etc.
9. Shipping: self-collection is free. For local shipping, please add $20 per book. For international shipping, please add $150 for postage per book regardless of country.
10. If prevailing shipping charges change, you are required to top up your donation before your book(s) will be shipped, or a refund may be issued for the difference.
11. Please provide your full name, mailing address, email and mobile. If I am unable to contact you and verify your donation, I will not be able to issue any books.
12. I reserve the right to amend these terms and conditions at any time.
Please do not make a donation if you are not agreeable to these terms. Any donations made are taken as an absolute agreement to these terms.