Writing
Technical writing, consumer journalism and book authoring from a freelance journalist with more than 20 years of experience and strong editing and sub-editing skills. Click the picture to find out more.
Editorial Production
Unparalleled experience in print and online publishing from an editorial production and digital imaging specialist with colour management and PDF workflow expertise. Click the picture to find out more.
Apr 12
30
Weekly column at The Register
Alistair is now writing a weekly opinion column for IT news website The Register and its product reviews sister site Register Hardware.
Under the strap Something for the weekend, sir? (no connection to the now-defunct Radio 2 programme), the column voices the frustrations experienced by those of us who share a love-hate relationship with their computers at work and home. Mostly hate, actually. Readers are invited to comment freely, and indeed they do.
Catch up on the columns you have missed by visiting Alistair’s author page at Register Hardware.
IN OTHER NEWS: It has been busy at Bento Media over the winter, which explains the lack of posts here in the main area. Regular updates via Twitter appear in the right-hand column of this page, of course.
Writing by .
The iPad edition of YOU INSPIRE has been shortlisted among the finalists for ‘Fashion Magazine of the Year’ at the Digital Magazine Awards 2011.
YOU INSPIRE is a twice-yearly luxury fashion supplement created by the editorial team at The Mail On Sunday‘s YOU magazine. The iPad edition of the September 2011 issue was redesigned and produced by Alistair Dabbs for Bento Media, and Steve Nimmo and Gavin Billenness for A&N Media, based on editorial and advertising content taken from the print edition.
The app was developed using Adobe’s Digital Publishing Suite.
In addition to editorial production, Alistair Dabbs was responsible for editing three of YOU INSPIRE September 2011 issue’s editorial videos from raw footage to their final versions, optimising all 14 editorial and advertising videos for embedding into the app, handling digital ad production, compiling the magazine app, and bundling/publishing the entire issue content to its fulfilment servers.
A pilot iPad edition of YOU INSPIRE was published in February 2011, redesigned and produced by Alistair Dabbs and Gavin Billenness. Both the February and September issues are currently downloadable free of charge within the YOU INSPIRE iPad app. The app itself is also free. Download it from here.
Winners will be revealed on 14 December 2011.
Editorial Production by .
The November 2011 issue of travelGBI, the domestic and inbound tourism trade newspaper for Great Britain and Ireland, published its biggest ever issue last week, incorporating an overview of relevant exhibitors attending World Travel Market.
A glossy monthly tabloid paper available by paid subscription, travelGBI typically comprises 24 to 32 pages each issue. The November 2011 issue ran for 40 pages, enjoying an extended print run for additional distribution at this month’s World Travel Market exhibition which takes over the entire floor space at London’s ExCeL from 7-10 November.
Editorial production of travelGBI - from raw copy subbing to page layout and delivery to press – was carried out by Alistair Dabbs for Bento Media.
Press day was a notable challenge: a midday power cut throughout the Shoreditch/Hackney area made it impossible to complete the news pages at the newspaper’s office.
With the help of a nearby shop that still enjoyed mains power, Alistair backed up the office iMac to a portable drive and tore across London to finish the pages at home, while the editor wrote the front page stories on a train (emailed from his home later that afternoon).
Alistair distributed PDF proofs by email in the evening, took corrections by phone, and ensured that all 40 pages were uploaded to the printer’s FTP site at around midnight. The compressed, full-issue PDF destined for travelGBI’s website was uploaded in the early hours.
You can read the November 2011 issue of travelGBI at the travelGBI website.
Editorial Production by .
The October 2011 issue of travelGBI, the inbound tourism trade newspaper for Great Britain and Ireland, was mailed to subscribers at the beginning of this week. Readers can also access the issue free of charge at its website.
TravelGBI is published by Travelscope Travel Publications in London E2. Editorial and advertising production is handled by Alistair Dabbs for Bento Media.
Editorially, the October 2011 involved subbing some 200 stories (172 reached print), inventing 139 headlines, writing 29 picture captions, Photoshopping 52 images, and both designing and laying out 21 tabloid pages. For advertising, the issue involved preflighting, correcting and placing 33 ads (including three full-page, full-bleed ads), and designing one full-page advertorial for London & Partners.
Bento Media also dealt with colour proofing and delivery of final PDFs to the printers and website designers.
Editorial Production by .
Sep 11
20
September 2011 issue of YOU INSPIRE
Associated Northcliffe Digital’s iPad edition of YOU INSPIRE, the twice-yearly luxury fashion supplement to The Mail On Sunday‘s YOU magazine, was updated on Saturday 17 September 2011 to support the publication of a new issue of the iPad magazine the following day.
The autumn issue of YOU INSPIRE, cover-dated Sunday 18 September 2011, was published simultaneously in print and on the iPad. The updated app allows readers to begin reading the new issue straight away while the download continues in the background. The new issue is a sizeable 380MB download but contains a large quantity of interactive material, including 14 videos.
The iPad edition of YOU INSPIRE was produced using Adobe Digital Publishing Suite by Alistair Dabbs (Bento Media), Steve Nimmo (A&N Media) and freelance designer Gavin Billenness.
Both the iPad app and the magazine issues themselves are free to download from Apple’s iTunes iOS App Store.