Another question about photos

While I was at home over December a friend brought up a new issue. Am I going to have to get permission to use the pictures of businesses? Seems fairly likely to me. I'm guessing that most of the local businesses will allow me to use their photos, its sort of like free publicity for them and fits into the "Keep Austin Weird" theme which they all subscribe to. Another friend came up with a more Austin replacement for Q (no longer Dairy Queen) which would have previously been one of the more difficult permissions to get I suspect. I need to remember to send well worded letters, perhaps with a copy of the photo I plan on using, to each of the businesses before I reach a publishing stage.

Pictures to take

As I find myself in Texas currently I've started thinking about which pictures I may be able to take to replace the ones that are not mine, or that I would just like slightly better copies of...

Bats (i don't think it's the correct time of year for this)
Elisabet Ney (or rather a picture of her portrait...would the Elisabet Ney museum have this?)
Amy's Ice Cream
Roller Derby
Treaty Oak
UT Tower, lit up orange (this will only work if they win their bowl game)
Stevie Ray Vaughn statue by the river
Bluebonnets (winter is definitely not the time of year for this)
SXSW (not festival time right now either)
Zilker Christmas Tree

And a few that I wouldn't mind getting better pictures of:
Dairy Queen
James Avery
Kirby Lane

Tasks

So I already know of several things that I'm going to need to do before I even get to the publishing phase of this process.

1. pictures Figure out which of the pictures I used are my own, and which aren't. Work on replacing those that I can't use in a book. I see several options for this:

• wait until I'm back in Austin and take replacement pictures. I see problems with this for a couple of them as they would require certain times of the year (bluebonnets, Zilker tree) or specific events (roller derby, SXSW)
• convince friends/families to take these pictures for me and allow me to use them. This is tricky too...I'd have to be happy with them, and I'm not sure my relationships need that stress. And how do I explain exactly what I want when I'm not entirely sure?
  
• Could I use photos from flickr that are under a creative commons license? I need to do a bit more research into that. If they are only under an attribution license does that mean I can use them in a commercial endeavor as long as I give credit?
• Register/buy them off of i-stock photo. Fairly cheap, definitely allowed to use these for commercial use. The question is will they have everything that I want pictures of?

2. words The book is pretty much a two line rhyme for each letter of the alphabet. Some of these I'm not entirely happy with. Some of them I just don't think sound right, or don't have the same rhyme scheme. I guess the first step is to look at syllable counts. Is that all that matters, or does the rhythm that you speak in matter as well?

3. cover This is the thing I have the hardest time with in all the books I've done. Scrapbooks, alphabet books...it doesn't matter. I'm never happy with how the cover comes out. And if I'm going to try to sell this, then the cover really matters. It's what will make people pick up the book if they look at it. Do I try to do this myself? Put up multiple options for other people to vote on? Hire someone to advise me? Hire someone to create it? Can I afford to hire someone?