Terry About 12 years ago,
I had the same wish as you,
to make a catalogue of my collection.I looked at a few books
and started to build.html pages with my word processor.These were two things that I should not have done
and book
and first pages were trashed.The first
and most important thing to do is think exactly what you want to do: a printable catalogue
or an on screen one.This choice will determine what to do next.You must also know exactly what you want on each page: Picture of the model but also the base,
the rear,
the casting variations,
the colours,
the boxes,
etc...
and you end up with an average of 20 pictures per model
and some times up to 50.You also want some typed info: name of the model,
reference(s),
dates,
description,
dimensions,
weight,
registration numbers etc...etc...You can not start your work before you know exactly what you want.If you want a printable catalogue,
any decent word processor can do the job,
you do not have to make a page for each model as you can always
add
something in between.If you want an on screen catalogue which I think is more practical,
the next thing is to build a standard page.This is the most important
and most difficult par of the job because if you do not do it properly on the master page then you will have to
modify
each page independently.What is great with the on screen is that cross links can be made very easily between pages,
you can use larger pictures.' Adobe Photoshop Elements ' contains ' Photoshop Organiser ' but I do not think that it can do the job.It is meant to make photo albums but not with texts.I have looked at it several times but I do not have a clue on how it works.My catalogue contains now roughly 3,
000 pages
and 10,
000 photos but it is not a catalogue of my collection any more,
it is the Dinky Toys Encyclopaedia
Jan & Jacques ---Thank you very much for responding with your comments and info on doing a collection catalog. You are right in that plenty of thought needs to go into deciding just what you want it to be, and just how much detail it contains. And Jan, thanks much for sending me a copy of yours......I will have time tomorrow to open and inspect it.Terry
Wonderful idea,
and something I really need to do.Since 1994 I have kept an exercise book with one line per model,
No,
dates,
description,
colour,
date bought.That ' s it.My Dinky collection is now about 700,
and I am lucky enough to have some quite rare items,
so I MUST start some kind of proper database.Chris Warr.
