Organizing is probably not the right word since my ability to organize conflicts with my creativity, at least that’s the story I’m going with. What I really need is an index system. Not that the Pz III library is huge by any means but sometimes finding what I want quickly is a challenge. The ultimate goal is to collect as many books on this particular vehicle as I can but also be able to notate how useful any given book is for my current purpose.
For instance, if I’m building a model I need a reference that has information and photographs that are higher quality or are good closeups of the actual vehicle. For painting or building up units for an “army” I will be looking for historical information; vehicle markings, vehicle types, when available, or unique characteristics that make units stand out on the table. For dioramas I’m looking for photos that inspire, or set a specific mood, or bring out the human drama. In each case I’m looking for books that fulfill those specific needs. For dioramas I might be need two different references I as I move back in forth between “scenic” photos and model references.
I decided on four categories; General/Historical, Technical, Model Building and Pictures. For each category a book is given a numerical ranking; 1 is poor, 2 is fair, 3 is good, 4 is excellent. For an overall rating I total all four categories together which gives me a maximum score of 16. If I need to find a better technical book, then I would sort the data based on just the technical score. In theory with this ranking system I should be able to grab the right book every time based on what I’m doing.
Applying the system to the books in the library I find, that based on a total score, the Panzer Tract books are my best resource for just about everything. Unfortunately, if you don’t own these yet or are missing one or more of the five books you are going to be out of luck as they appear to be rapidly going out of print (hopefully they will be reprinted in the near future). I scored all five books in the series the same; General/Historical 2, Technical 4, Model Ref 4, Picture 3 for a total ranking of 13. For General, from a general perspective, these aren’t bad, but they are very dry reading. For technical information they are hard to beat though, filled with a lot more information than I even care about most of the time. For modeling reference, they are also great, nice close ups and excellent line drawings. I only give them a 3 for pictures though because they tend towards more closeups (which help the technical and model ratings) rather than the bigger “show” pictures which is what I’m really thinking about for this category. The Tank Power series by Wydawnicowo Militaria are not a bad replacement but nearly as good mostly due to the translations (these books have a total ranking of 10 as compared to 13 for Panzer Tracts).
If I’m looking for books that rate high in a specific category then I’ll just sort the worksheet, first by category, then by total ranking and then maybe by title (Not that the titles tend to be radically different). For instance if I want to look at the best model reference books I’ll sort by the model reference column with a secondary sort by total rank and I find one of the Kagero books on the Pz III J/L/M with a 4 for model ref and a 13 total, then the Panzer Tract books (same score actually), then Achtung Panzer #2 with a 4 and a 10, then the book from Shinkigensha with a 4 and a 9 and the Osprey book also with a 4 and a 9. Based on that I have several good choices for model building references and I can grab what I need probably further refined on which ausf version I’m working on. I have easy access to this data most of the time so if someone asks a question about which book to pick up I can make a decent recommendation based on how good I think the book for desired purpose.
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