producing short PHOTO essays for kindle users

Here comes an empirical question of workflow and filesize: how best to share a dozen or two images with captions so that kindle users can take these along to see (and perhaps annotate from the text).

a) Author in MS-Word then convert to AZW
b) Author in MS-Word but set paper size to 600x800 pixels (kindle screen). "Print" as PDF
c) Author in PowerPoint (insert >image >new album with text). Convert to mobi (mobi creator)
d) Author in PowerPoint. "Save as..." PDF
e) Author in PowerPoint. "Save as..." JPG (each slide and its text is one image in a folder)
f) Use Picasa3, add caption, "Print" as PDF (set to display caption; papersize 600x800 pixels)

The test file was 1200kb with the 4 images and accompanying lines of caption text.

FILESIZES

(keeping files in color, eventhough kindle displays 16 shades of grayscale)

a) *.doc =1200kb. Convert to AZW (not yet attempted)
b) *.doc to "Print" as PDF =572kb
c) *.ppt =1300kb. Convert to mobi (mobi creator -not yet attempted)
d) *.ppt to "Save as..." PDF =450kb
e) *.ppt to "Save as..." JPG =302kb
f) "Print" the photos with text to PDF =137kb (at 300 dpi)

WORKFLOW and USER EXPERIENCE

Authoring for PDF finished form has advantages: kindle can read this without conversion, formating can be controlled, the file on the kindle can later be copied to a computer and be used there as well (colors intact, despite kindle's grayscale display). Tools for PDF on kindle include "place cursor in document" so that a person can add highlight and/or notations.

Among the PDF output examples, Picasa caption line allows only 70-80 words; PowerPoint has limited text space, but a separate (text only) slide can be interspersed otherwise. The wordprocessor handles extended text the best, though. So the specific mix of words and images will determine the best authoring software to begin with.

The path of least resistence is: edit the images in Picasa, then output to PDF and load onto kindle. Done.