Last day to get Walter Koessler’s photo album

Dean Putney’s Kickstarter campaign to fund the printing of his great-grandfather Walter Koessler’s World War I photographs has been a smashing success. Earlier today they crossed the $100,000 mark, two times the original goal of $50,000 which was already very ambitious. Dean has very wisely, in my opinion, put that extra money to use in improving the quality of the book rather than expanding the scope of the project or creating a rat’s nest of additional rewards.

He also reopened the $75 pledge level for people who want a copy of the book (plus the pdf version of the book and the digital pictures.) When I blogged about it the $89 level was the least expensive option if you wanted to order a book, and it cost more because there’s a large format print along with the other stuff. If you’d like to get a book, you have just one day left to do it.

Dean has put his shoulder to the wheel this month, hired a professional designer and copy editor and worked with the printer to make the book take shape as quickly as possible without sacrificing quality. He enlisted the aid of backers to help proofread a pdf advance of the book and to help translate German postcards and letters. The comment threads on those two updates are fascinating and not to be missed.

The first of them also includes pictures of draft spreads of the book and it just gorgeous. I love the choice to have the cover be all black with Walter Koessler’s name and the years the war started and ended embossed in gold on the bottom right just like on the original album. A belly band with select pictures will be wrapped around the none more black front cover. It’s so classy I can hardly stand it.

You can get an even better sense of the size and quality of the book in the following video. Dean already has a dummy copy of the book. There’s no content in it or on it and some minor details are different — the foldout page is a different width and in a different location than it will be in the book — but it looks great already.

[youtube=http://youtu.be/rtfUeG4jcIo&w=430]

So! Twenty-three hours before pledging ends and money changes hands at 5:00 PM EST. Just thought you should know.