PHOTOGRAPHY 73 



had no remotest conception of the publishing interests 

 of this age, in which one firm, and that not notably the 

 largest, issues two books each business day of the year. 

 For each book, probably a thousand "booklets" appear, 

 and the catalogue production is probably many times 

 greater. 



Not all booklets or all catalogues are potential sub- 

 jects for the camera man with the designing eye, but I 

 believe I am safe in saying that an increasing majority 

 of them may be photographically decorated, given only 

 the acute attention of the man who knows how. To 

 illustrate, I cite the case of a successful nurseryman, 

 the front of whose catalogue had remained " plain " for 

 years, the cataloguer alleging that his customers pre- 

 ferred it so. One day, without discussion, I laid before 

 him a photographic snowberry design that had been 

 carefully worked out. His only words were : " I'll 

 take it; go ahead ! " 



. Here was the point — the purely 



Read^'^" American point : When he saw the de- 

 sign, he wanted it at once ; but if I had 

 suggested the making of a design, he would not have 

 been moved. We buy what we see, if we like it, and 

 the acute merchant attracts by his accomplishments 

 rather than by his promises. Therefore the photographer 

 in this field must resolve to use his own brains in 

 planning and making designs to offer, rather than to 

 await commissions that will seldom come. 



In designing covers for booklets or catalogues — and 

 the line between the two is vague indeed — objects of 

 any kind may be used photographically. While I might 

 expect to attract the hatchet manufacturer by a sugges- 

 tion of a cherry tree, it would have to be most obviously 

 connected with the truth-telling desires of the father of 

 our country to be more to the hatchet-man's fancy than 

 a remarkably fine photograph of a young axe made by 

 him. Machinery and tools, textiles, pottery of all sorts, 

 shoes galore, corsets and lingerie — all these and count- 

 less other things have been and will be used decora- 

 tively and photographically in increasing measure as the 

 workers rise to opportunity. The field is limitless, but 

 not so easy that it is overcrowded, and the really good 



