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Let's take a brief
look at how to think

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about submitting your
photographs as potential cover

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art in their presentations.

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The first thing
that's essential is

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for you to study
the journal layout

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to which you are
submitting your image,

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how they might be placed in
a particular cover format.

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Most covers these
days are full bleeds.

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That is, the image
takes up the whole cover

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and is therefore vertical.

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Some of them still have,
let's say, rectangle places

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within the larger
vertical format.

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But most of them are
bleeds at this point.

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So you have to think
about that when you

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do submit an idea for a cover.

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Think about where the
journal's logo is placed,

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where additional text
might be dropped.

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You have to take all these
things into consideration

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to help the art director decide
whether or not the image is

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good enough for a cover.

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But I do suggest not submitting
a cover idea with the journal

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logo.

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Just let the folks at the
journal use their imaginations.

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Let's start with something
I did fairly recently.

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Here I was given a number
of samples of material.

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They're all fabricated pieces
that respond differently

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to pressure.

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Trying to think of
how in the world

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I was going to come up with
an interesting cover design.

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So I decided to play
around with the shapes.

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Here I'm using my
flatbed scanner,

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and I'm adding a few
pieces here and there

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and finally wound up with
this composition, which

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I thought had the potential
of being considered

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for this particular
journal cover.

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And I did digitally add a
gradient to the background,

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as you can see.

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In the end, yes, it did make
a cover, which is always nice.

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But do keep in mind,
it's not just the image

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that will get you on the cover.

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It's the science in the article
that informs the journal's

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selection, maybe some
other things as well,

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which none of us are privy to.

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So it's not just the
aesthetics, mostly about

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the importance of the research,
which should be the case.

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Here's another example,
which you've seen before,

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showing the flexible circuitry
imprinted on transparent

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material.

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And again, we were delighted to
get the cover of the journal,

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probably because of the
importance of the science.

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And by the way, that journal
now has another format,

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where the cover art takes a
completely different shape

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than what you're seeing here.

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So again, it's very important
to match your image's format

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with the journal's format.

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For this image, another one
that you've seen before,

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it still is one of my favorites
after all these years,

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a bit unusual because I
don't usually like old stuff.

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But they used it for the cover
of a textbook in chemistry.

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After all, this is very,
very much about chemistry.

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And notice how they cropped
the image to fit the format.

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And of course, I gave
the publisher permission

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to do that.

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And here, this image was made
by the researchers hundreds

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of miles from my studio.

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But we communicated closely
through email with my making

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suggestions on how to
photograph and light the work.

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In this next image, the
researchers shined a laser

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onto the container with
no additional room light,

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and we see new
material showing up.

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We couldn't see it before
because those balls have

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the same index of refraction
as the solution in which they

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were floating.

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That's the point
of this research.

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The researchers wanted
to show this image

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with a hand in place, suggesting
that the laser is turned off

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ready to be turned on.

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And I said, no,
please, no hands.

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I believe that hands
generally distract and detract

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from the rest of the image.

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It's just another distraction.

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Please don't use hands.

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So I suggested starting with
the container under a lamp

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as before and then
take another picture

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with just the laser
shining through the lower

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part of the image to
see the hidden material.

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So this is the first image,
and this is the second image.

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I selected the lower part of
the second image, copied it

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and pasted it onto
the first image.

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So that we have a sort of photo
illustration, which you're

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going to see more of next week,
in that we will show what it is

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without the laser and what it
is with the laser side by side

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comparing the two with the
information in the caption.

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The idea was to make the cover,
and we did, which was nice.

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I think it worked well.

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You know, some images
look even better

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when they are made into covers
with the addition of text.

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They might not be
spectacular on their own,

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but often, in my opinion, are
enhanced with well-placed text,

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as what happens here.

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This is not a very
exciting image that I made.

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It's a detail of
equipment that's

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used in this particular lab.

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I was delighted that they
liked the abstract quality

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of the image and used
it well, in fact,

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with good placement of text.

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In this image, I was working
on some print material

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for what was then called the
DuPont MIT Alliance, which

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funded research about
bioinspired material.

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I made a picture of a
sea urchin, which is

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a fascinating story in itself.

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I made it straight on.

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I also tried it with
the flatbed scanner.

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In the end, the very
talented graphic designer,

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he created a pretty stunning
brochure, placed the scanner

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image on the cover,
and it worked well

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in terms of the whole
design of the brochure.

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And in this image,
which was also

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part of the same
project, a bioreactor

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where liver cells grow in
three-dimensional space,

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I did like the
picture as I made it.

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But once again, the
graphic designer

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took it to another level,
using the image as is

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and also associating it
on the page with a drawing

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of the same reactor.

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A very interesting way of
reinforcing the structure.

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For our book No Small Matter,
I made a photograph of beer.

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The idea was to consider the
molecular or nanostructure

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of bubbles.

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Now, notice that I
included the wall

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of the rectangular container
in the image on the right.

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The final cover wrapped the
image around the full book

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and used the container area
as the front book flap,

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which I think is kind of cool.

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Here's an image
you've seen before,

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and here it's used in the title
page of the Chinese version

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of our book No Small Matter.

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And here's the American title
page, again just showing you

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how photographs can
be used with text.

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Once again, dropping
text, I think,

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can make an OK image,
(which this is, of bubbles),

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into a more interesting cover.

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The left side is the back
cover of this booklet.

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I think that worked pretty well.

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And this photograph is a
straight, highly documentary

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image showing the presence
of material in an assay.

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And I simply used the image
in a more expanded idea

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for a cover illustratively
giving more information

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about the material.

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I don't use Illustrator very
often, but in this case,

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it seemed to work.

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And finally, here's
another image

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you've seen before,
used both as a cover

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and back cover for
an MIT publication.

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I was quite pleased that the
image I made 15 years ago still

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had a life, frankly because of
the importance of nanocrystal,

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or quantum dot science.

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Yeah, the picture was good,
but the science is even better.

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If you are lucky to work
with researchers whose work

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is timeless, then
your photographs

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might become timeless as
well, if you are lucky.