Author Photos... and a new blog

[andrewmck]

I don't often get the urge to start a new blog. More often, I'm likely to be seen shutting them down these days - my daily allowance of goof-off time has depreciated greatly over the last year or so.

But, the other day I was asked to supply an author photo to help better promote my stories and illustrations through the Australian Horror Writers Association. I've never been the most photogenic of people. I don't think many author types are - except for the Self-Help crowd who seem to revel in caked on makeup and op-shop clothes under blinding studio lights. So, in preparation for my own photo, I thought I'd hunt the web and see what other authors have been doing over the years.

Looking through the results of a google image search, it didn't take me long to realise just how bad the 'art' of Author Photography is!

Generally there is a huge lack of originality. Most poses and looks are the same fake-smile-head-titlted-chin-resting-on-hand look. But, sometimes, you come across a real corker. The sort of photo where you really wonder what they were thinking - they being: the author, the publisher and the photographer!

But hey! We buy books for the words, not the author photos...right?

Yeah, that's right. But still, just as a bad cover design can be a detriment a book's marketability, so I think can a bad author photo.

With that in mind, over the next few days, weeks, months, I'll be posting some of those author photos that I've found most curious, bizarre, surreal, embarrassing and just plain amusing over at:

Bad Author Photos (http://badauthorphotos.blogspot.com)

Keep your eye out for the first couple of posts while I sort through the pile of doozies I've already discovered. No author is safe! And, I expect, my own author photo will be no better.

If you have any contributions of your own to make - be it author photos you've seen on the web or a dust-jacket, or maybe a copy of your own author photo - you can email a link of the image to badauthorphoto@gmail.com