birding-aus

Pizzey Regional Guides (ebook version now)

To: Clive Nealon <>
Subject: Pizzey Regional Guides (ebook version now)
From: Russ <>
Date: Tue, 15 Oct 2013 23:53:04 +1100
I'm also hanging out for the app! I hope we see it soon. I bought a couple
of the regional guides today, but I haven't had time to explore them much,
except to get a bit of a shock when I noticed the pagination issue. At the
default font size, many of the pages split in the middle of an article,
leaving the sketch for a species on the top of a page, with the
Header/Species name for the NEXT species beneath it. e.g. Page 397 has a
very nicely drawn Malleefowl, and the text underneath says:
AUSTRALIAN BRUSH-TURKEY and goes on with the latter's description. It made
me do a bit of a double-take!

I haven't found the species maps yet - I hope they are included. And the
contents pages DO link to sections in the text. Hold a title (e.g. Waders)
and release it after it highlights. The page will flip to the start of the
Waders section.

One nice feature is the capability of adding notes and bookmarks. Simply
highlight a word or phrase, and choose NOTE from the popup menu. From what
I can tell, the word will stay highlighted and have a small sticky note
icon next to it, which you tap to view / edit the note. It's a more
user-friendly feature than the annotations available in the Morecombe app.

I haven't seen the print version of these books, but I guess the intention
was to minimize the size for use in the field. That meant cutting out about
75% of the text for each species - and unfortunately, that was one of the
things I felt always gave Pizzey's guides  the edge over the others - the
quality and wealth of information in the text.  I'm a little disappointed
that the eBook version didn't restore the full text from the whole field
guide. Let's hope the full text is available in the app - along with maps,
and of course calls.

Russell Woodford
Ocean Grove


On 15 October 2013 14:53, Clive Nealon <> wrote:

>
> Talking of Pizzey and Knight I would be much more interested in the
> availability of
> the Pizzey and Knight Birds of Australia iPhone Edition. Has anybody got
> any information on this?
> My inquiries to Gibbons Multimedia have so far been ignored.
>
>
> Regards, Clive.
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Peter Shute <>
> To: Carl Clifford <>
> Cc: Birding-Aus Aus <>
> Sent: Tue, Oct 15, 2013 2:56 am
> Subject: Re: [Birding-Aus] Pizzey Regional Guides (ebook version now)
>
>
> These books have been released today for iBooks for iPads, iPhones, and I
> assume
> iPods. I've purchased the Mallee to Limestone Coast volume ($14). As
> pointed out
> to me when Carl first started this thread, they're books, not apps. No
> sounds,
> no smart search, etc.
>
> I assume that this electronic version is laid out in similar fashion to the
> paper version. Unlike the full Pizzey and Knight, the text is intermingled
> with
> the pictures, and there's far less of it.
>
> The index has a warning that because the electronic version has different
> pagination, you're better off doing a search rather than trying to use the
> index. That makes sense because you can adjust the font size in iBooks,
> which
> changes all the page numbering.
>
> It would have been nice to be able to tap on a name in the index and go to
> the
> page, but you can't. You can however tap and hold to highlight the word,
> then
> choose Search to save typing it. That doesn't necessarily work when the
> index
> separates the parts of the names. E.g. There's a heading for Tern, with
> Little
> on a separate line, so searching for just "little" isn't going to get you
> far.
>
> The changed pagination means some birds are split across two pages. I
> changed
> the font to the smallest, and the layout to scrolling, and that makes it
> easier
> to get the bird concerned onto one screen.
>
> iBooks let's you scroll though the pages, but you only see the chapter
> name and
> page number until you stop scrolling, so finding stuff isn't going to be
> as easy
> as flipping book pages, but you can add book marks and highlighting.
>
> I bought it intending to use it on my ipad, and it has appeared
> automatically on
> my phone as well. It looks surprisingly usable there, I thought it would
> be just
> too small.
>
> I haven't looked at the text much yet, but the pictures look the same as
> my full
> copy. I'm interested to hear others' comments if they've bought it.
>
> Peter Shute
>
> Sent from my iPad
>
> > On 23 Aug 2013, at 10:31 am, "Carl Clifford" <>
> wrote:
> >
> > I notice that four regional guides based on the Pizzey field guide have
> been
> released. Has anyone had a chance to have a look at any?
> >
> > Carl Clifford
> > ===============================
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