I know I haven't posted in ages. Lots of things have happened, and a lot of those things are not entirely happy. Some of them were really crappy. More on that later, maybe.
Right now, just a quick note to say I'm no longer in the woods of Nova Scotia. Instead, I'm halfway up a small mountain on British Columbia's Vancouver Island. I've come home. I'm resting, healing, figuring out what to do next.
What I do know is that there will be a lot of art. A lot of exploring nature. A lot of writing.
More soon.
Showing posts with label nice things. Show all posts
Showing posts with label nice things. Show all posts
23 March 2016
17 April 2014
Throwback Thursday: Marionette
Here's a thing you may not know about me: I love puppets. I grew up on Sesame Street and The Muppet Show, and my fascination for how a skilled puppeteer can bring an inanimate object to life has never waned. One of my favourite toys as a child was a raccoon hand puppet that my dad brought back from a trip (I had a huge collection of stuffed animals, too). It was realistic enough that even my young self could make it look like I was holding a live animal in my arms.
Also, my paternal grandfather had puppets. I believe he made some of them himself. We grandchildren weren't allowed to play with the marionettes, but I remember when we visited I'd always try to sneak into the basement and just look at them. One in particular fascinated me: a papier mâché skeleton. Now that my grandfather is gone, I sometimes wish I had that puppet, so I could look at it, the way I did as a child.
Then, a few years ago (okay, more like ten or fifteen years ago), I decided I should try to make a marionette. So I did what I always do when I want to try something new: I went to the library and got out a stack of books, and I read them.
I was already making dolls. Not many, just the odd one as an idea came into my head. So I figured why not try a stuffed doll marionette first, to see if I could. So I did. Meet Iris.
Iris was inspired by the Greek goddess, messenger to the gods of Olympus, and spirit of rainbows. As I child, I also loved rainbows (unicorns, too). I used black cloth with white paint because I love the look of Greek white-on-black pottery, and I used ancient Greek art as a starting point to design the look of her face.
Her hair, hand-dyed yarn that I picked up on a whim, is much more rainbow than it looks in the photos -- the greens and blues and purples are at the back -- and it has little crystal beads tied into it, like the water drops that make a rainbow.
I don't think the Iris of Greek myth was depicted with wings on her feet (Edit: according to my notes, she did indeed sometimes have winged boots), but Mercury -- also a messenger to the other gods -- was, so I extrapolated. Except I gave her butterfly wings. If I were to do this same puppet again, I might go with dragonfly wings instead.
So why a sudden post about marionettes? I always meant to make more, after Iris, but I never did. Soon after I made her, I went to art school (she was in my application portfolio) and didn't have time for such whims. But a couple of weekends ago, my neighbour at the Halifax Crafters spring fair was Pam of Puppet Dudes. She makes Muppet-like hand puppets, but my puppet-love was roused again. And I've been watching Jim Henson's Creature Shop Challenge on TV (don't tell anyone, but I might have a slight celebrity crush on Brian Henson).
Now I want to make another marionette. I had an Idea. I bought some fabric: black cotton again. And then I haven't had time to work on it. Right now I'm in a slight pause between the two halves of a big bookbinding job while I wait for the artist to finish the rest of the pages. I should be catching up on my April book reviews. And I will. But since I haven't had time to play with my marionette Idea, I thought I'd write a quick something about it.
Edit: I remembered I have my NSCAD application sketchbook still. Here are a couple of the pages where I was working out Iris's design (one added above, one here):
When I get some free time, I'll make another cloth doll marionette. If it goes well, maybe I'll try a papier mâché skeleton.
Also, my paternal grandfather had puppets. I believe he made some of them himself. We grandchildren weren't allowed to play with the marionettes, but I remember when we visited I'd always try to sneak into the basement and just look at them. One in particular fascinated me: a papier mâché skeleton. Now that my grandfather is gone, I sometimes wish I had that puppet, so I could look at it, the way I did as a child.
Then, a few years ago (okay, more like ten or fifteen years ago), I decided I should try to make a marionette. So I did what I always do when I want to try something new: I went to the library and got out a stack of books, and I read them.
I was already making dolls. Not many, just the odd one as an idea came into my head. So I figured why not try a stuffed doll marionette first, to see if I could. So I did. Meet Iris.
Iris was inspired by the Greek goddess, messenger to the gods of Olympus, and spirit of rainbows. As I child, I also loved rainbows (unicorns, too). I used black cloth with white paint because I love the look of Greek white-on-black pottery, and I used ancient Greek art as a starting point to design the look of her face.
Her hair, hand-dyed yarn that I picked up on a whim, is much more rainbow than it looks in the photos -- the greens and blues and purples are at the back -- and it has little crystal beads tied into it, like the water drops that make a rainbow.
I don't think the Iris of Greek myth was depicted with wings on her feet (Edit: according to my notes, she did indeed sometimes have winged boots), but Mercury -- also a messenger to the other gods -- was, so I extrapolated. Except I gave her butterfly wings. If I were to do this same puppet again, I might go with dragonfly wings instead.
So why a sudden post about marionettes? I always meant to make more, after Iris, but I never did. Soon after I made her, I went to art school (she was in my application portfolio) and didn't have time for such whims. But a couple of weekends ago, my neighbour at the Halifax Crafters spring fair was Pam of Puppet Dudes. She makes Muppet-like hand puppets, but my puppet-love was roused again. And I've been watching Jim Henson's Creature Shop Challenge on TV (don't tell anyone, but I might have a slight celebrity crush on Brian Henson).
Now I want to make another marionette. I had an Idea. I bought some fabric: black cotton again. And then I haven't had time to work on it. Right now I'm in a slight pause between the two halves of a big bookbinding job while I wait for the artist to finish the rest of the pages. I should be catching up on my April book reviews. And I will. But since I haven't had time to play with my marionette Idea, I thought I'd write a quick something about it.
Edit: I remembered I have my NSCAD application sketchbook still. Here are a couple of the pages where I was working out Iris's design (one added above, one here):
When I get some free time, I'll make another cloth doll marionette. If it goes well, maybe I'll try a papier mâché skeleton.
05 February 2014
Birds
We get plenty of visitors to our house, year round, because I put out seeds every morning, and I try to keep a suet feeder filled in the winter (once the squirrels discover it, it empties fast). Here are a few of the most recent birds, from the past week.
A female Downy Woodpecker. These little birds are not shy about telling me when the feeder is empty or someone else is eating from it. They're quite talkative.
A couple of shots of Dark-Eyed Juncos. There are juncos where I lived in BC, too, but they had brown bodies and black heads, instead of the solid slate grey that NS birds have. Either way, they're terribly cute. These guys won't eat from a feeder, but are happy to take seeds from the ground, and really like it when the jays get into the suet, because they drop a lot on the ground.
For a few minutes, a male Hairy Woodpecker condescended to share the suet with a Blue Jay. It didn't last long, though, before the woodpecker chased the jay away. They're pretty close in size, but our jays tend to be a bit skittish, and even the Mourning Doves can chase them off.
A female Downy Woodpecker. These little birds are not shy about telling me when the feeder is empty or someone else is eating from it. They're quite talkative.
A couple of shots of Dark-Eyed Juncos. There are juncos where I lived in BC, too, but they had brown bodies and black heads, instead of the solid slate grey that NS birds have. Either way, they're terribly cute. These guys won't eat from a feeder, but are happy to take seeds from the ground, and really like it when the jays get into the suet, because they drop a lot on the ground.
For a few minutes, a male Hairy Woodpecker condescended to share the suet with a Blue Jay. It didn't last long, though, before the woodpecker chased the jay away. They're pretty close in size, but our jays tend to be a bit skittish, and even the Mourning Doves can chase them off.
13 July 2012
Reindeer Girl Cover
If you're a Facebook friend or you follow me on Twitter, you'll have seen pretty much everything in this post, but I thought I'd bring all the work-in-progress shots for this book cover together in one place.
First, a bit of background. I've been working off and on to write a novel about a character called Maring Darkberry, who belongs to a culture called the Reindeer Herders (or just Herders)--a genetically mixed people who live on the barrens of my imaginary island/continent of Frisland (also the setting for many of my short stories, and for the Aeryn Daring stories I write as Calliope Strange).
The story started out as a short story called "White Foxes, Full Moon," but I soon realized there was a lot more to Maring's tale. But for some reason I never got farther than perhaps two-thirds finished.
So recently, I saw a call for submissions from a place called JukePop Serials which had an interesting business model. And I thought maybe by serializing the thing, so there were people waiting for the next chapter, I might actually finish it. And the editors at JukePop liked it. So now the title is Reindeer Girl, and it'll be serialized starting in September. And it needs a cover.
Maring
First I needed a reference for Maring. It didn't have to look like her, exactly, as long as the pose was right. So digging through a box of old pictures, I found this one of my beautiful mother with my sister and me (I'm the chubby one on the left) in her lap.
I did a sketch I was pleased with, changing her features to make her look less like my mom and more like the character in my story. Though in the story Maring has fair skin and blue eyes to go with her black hair, I wanted it to be clear from looking at her that not all her ancestry is European. Her people have intermarried all over the place, and they currently live quite close to a people they refer to as the Snow People (who are, of course, Inuit). So I wanted Maring to look like some of her recent ancestors were Inuit or perhaps Siberian or even Mongolian.
I could already tell that I probably hadn't really left enough room for the rest of the picture, but I was thinking about scanning the inked drawing and colouring digitally, so I went ahead and inked the drawing on the sketchbook paper, rather than transferring it to watercolour paper.
Text
I spent a long time looking at type, and found what I thought was the perfect typeface for the title. It was Celtic, but rough-looking; calligraphic but loose. Unfortunately, none of the links on the designer's website worked. So I kept looking and eventually decided that what I really wanted to do was hand-letter, a la Walter Crane, or more recently, Charles Vess.
Background
I had in mind a particular photograph, taken on the barrens of the southern Avalon Peninsula of Newfoundland, which just happened to have caribou in the shot (for the curious, caribou and reindeer are the same animal, Rangifer tarandus, the first usually used in North America and the second in Europe). Alas, there must be another box of my photographs still in storage at my mother's house in BC, because I couldn't find it. So instead I used this one, taken somewhere between Cape Ray and Gros Morne, Newfoundland.
I started with a blue wash, and quickly began to wish I'd taken the time to transfer the drawing to watercolour paper before inking.
Then I added green and yellow. You can see the paper getting more and more wrinkled with each colour I add.
Then some brown and grey, and a little red and purple.
Finally, I brightened up some of the colours and added a few details with pencil crayon.
Then I had to flatten the thing so I could get a good scan. I did this by thoroughly spritzing it with water from the back, until the paper relaxed and it lay flat. Then I put it between sheets of printmaking rag (I used some old proofs) and newsprint, and put it under a goodly amount of weight to dry. And the next day it was perfectly flat.
I had to scan it in two pieces, because it's too big for my scanner--thanks to Photoshop's "photomerge" function, putting the two pieces together was a snap.
And if anyone's interested, I've made it available as a print through Zazzle (if you order, make sure to let the preview load for the size you select--some sizes will cut off the top and bottom of the image). I may do my own prints at some point, on my very nice super-deluxe photo inkjet printer on digital photo rag paper. If enough people ask, that is.
First, a bit of background. I've been working off and on to write a novel about a character called Maring Darkberry, who belongs to a culture called the Reindeer Herders (or just Herders)--a genetically mixed people who live on the barrens of my imaginary island/continent of Frisland (also the setting for many of my short stories, and for the Aeryn Daring stories I write as Calliope Strange).
The story started out as a short story called "White Foxes, Full Moon," but I soon realized there was a lot more to Maring's tale. But for some reason I never got farther than perhaps two-thirds finished.
So recently, I saw a call for submissions from a place called JukePop Serials which had an interesting business model. And I thought maybe by serializing the thing, so there were people waiting for the next chapter, I might actually finish it. And the editors at JukePop liked it. So now the title is Reindeer Girl, and it'll be serialized starting in September. And it needs a cover.
Maring
First I needed a reference for Maring. It didn't have to look like her, exactly, as long as the pose was right. So digging through a box of old pictures, I found this one of my beautiful mother with my sister and me (I'm the chubby one on the left) in her lap.
I did a sketch I was pleased with, changing her features to make her look less like my mom and more like the character in my story. Though in the story Maring has fair skin and blue eyes to go with her black hair, I wanted it to be clear from looking at her that not all her ancestry is European. Her people have intermarried all over the place, and they currently live quite close to a people they refer to as the Snow People (who are, of course, Inuit). So I wanted Maring to look like some of her recent ancestors were Inuit or perhaps Siberian or even Mongolian.
I could already tell that I probably hadn't really left enough room for the rest of the picture, but I was thinking about scanning the inked drawing and colouring digitally, so I went ahead and inked the drawing on the sketchbook paper, rather than transferring it to watercolour paper.
Text
I spent a long time looking at type, and found what I thought was the perfect typeface for the title. It was Celtic, but rough-looking; calligraphic but loose. Unfortunately, none of the links on the designer's website worked. So I kept looking and eventually decided that what I really wanted to do was hand-letter, a la Walter Crane, or more recently, Charles Vess.
Of course, I then decided I also wanted to hand-colour, so I had to figure out a way to squeeze everything onto the page.
Background
I had in mind a particular photograph, taken on the barrens of the southern Avalon Peninsula of Newfoundland, which just happened to have caribou in the shot (for the curious, caribou and reindeer are the same animal, Rangifer tarandus, the first usually used in North America and the second in Europe). Alas, there must be another box of my photographs still in storage at my mother's house in BC, because I couldn't find it. So instead I used this one, taken somewhere between Cape Ray and Gros Morne, Newfoundland.
I started with a blue wash, and quickly began to wish I'd taken the time to transfer the drawing to watercolour paper before inking.
Then I added green and yellow. You can see the paper getting more and more wrinkled with each colour I add.
Then some brown and grey, and a little red and purple.
Finally, I brightened up some of the colours and added a few details with pencil crayon.
Then I had to flatten the thing so I could get a good scan. I did this by thoroughly spritzing it with water from the back, until the paper relaxed and it lay flat. Then I put it between sheets of printmaking rag (I used some old proofs) and newsprint, and put it under a goodly amount of weight to dry. And the next day it was perfectly flat.
I had to scan it in two pieces, because it's too big for my scanner--thanks to Photoshop's "photomerge" function, putting the two pieces together was a snap.
And if anyone's interested, I've made it available as a print through Zazzle (if you order, make sure to let the preview load for the size you select--some sizes will cut off the top and bottom of the image). I may do my own prints at some point, on my very nice super-deluxe photo inkjet printer on digital photo rag paper. If enough people ask, that is.
01 October 2011
My Week in Books (25 Sep to 01 Oct 2011)
Since I don't really get that many books in the mail these days, but I have started going to the library again, I thought I'd turn "Monday Mailbox" into "My Week in Books" and put it at the end of the week instead of the beginning. I'll post the books that came into my house, via purchase, library, or friends, and I'll write a few lines about whatever I've recently read.
Note: My Amazon Associates doohickey doesn't seem to be functional right now, so I'll add links and pictures later on, assuming it ever starts working again.
Arriving Via Mail
I did get one book in the mail this week, from a fellow BookMoocher in Ontario. Of course, I have now used up all but 0.8 of my points, and my budget's still a little tight for mailing books out (if you're not in Canada, you would be shocked and appalled at the cost for mailing books within the country), so I'll have to wait a while before I can mooch any more.
From the Library
I hadn't been to the library in some time, as I had a fine. My fine turned out to be a whopping fifty cents. Heh. So I paid it, and now I'm going to the library again. This trip, I ventured more deeply into the newly re-arranged kids' section. I was disappointed by the selection of graphic novels, but the YA book section turned out to be pretty good. So all the fiction this time is from the YA section. But I did bring home a few non-fiction, too. Also, I was disappointed to see the shelf of for-sale discards was gone. Maybe they'll do a once-a-year sale instead?
Currently Reading
I actually have quite a list of in-progress books, many of which are non-fiction of the dense and scholarly type that I tend to set aside for long periods at time, or else read in frequent, short chunks. Every now and then, though, I find one so well written I speed through it like it was a novel. I love those ones.
Recently Finished Reading
Note: My Amazon Associates doohickey doesn't seem to be functional right now, so I'll add links and pictures later on, assuming it ever starts working again.
Arriving Via Mail
I did get one book in the mail this week, from a fellow BookMoocher in Ontario. Of course, I have now used up all but 0.8 of my points, and my budget's still a little tight for mailing books out (if you're not in Canada, you would be shocked and appalled at the cost for mailing books within the country), so I'll have to wait a while before I can mooch any more.
- Little (Grrl) Lost by Charles deLint (fiction)
There was a time when I would run out and buy every new CdL book as soon as it came out in hardcover (of for the days of nothing but books to spend my money on), but over the years I've been a little less excited at each new release. I do still enjoy his books a great deal, just not as rabidly as I once did. Anyway, this one I hadn't picked up yet, and I got a very nice hardcover for my mooch point.
From the Library
I hadn't been to the library in some time, as I had a fine. My fine turned out to be a whopping fifty cents. Heh. So I paid it, and now I'm going to the library again. This trip, I ventured more deeply into the newly re-arranged kids' section. I was disappointed by the selection of graphic novels, but the YA book section turned out to be pretty good. So all the fiction this time is from the YA section. But I did bring home a few non-fiction, too. Also, I was disappointed to see the shelf of for-sale discards was gone. Maybe they'll do a once-a-year sale instead?
- The Fossil Cliffs of Joggins by Laing Ferguson (non-fiction)
- Common Wild Flowers & Plants of Nova Scotia by Diane Larue (non-fiction)
- The Man Who Found the Missing Link: Eugene Dubois and His Lifelong Quest to Prove Darwin Right by Pat Shipman (non-fiction)
- The Time Travelers by Linda Buckley-Archer (fiction)
- Plain Kate by Erin Bow (fiction)
- Zombies vs Unicorns edited by Holly Black (fiction)
- The Search for the Red Dragon by James A. Owen (fiction)
- The Alchemyst by Michael Scott (fiction)
Currently Reading
I actually have quite a list of in-progress books, many of which are non-fiction of the dense and scholarly type that I tend to set aside for long periods at time, or else read in frequent, short chunks. Every now and then, though, I find one so well written I speed through it like it was a novel. I love those ones.
- Common Wild Flowers & Plants of Nova Scotia by Diane Larue (non-fiction)
- Meanwhile, In Another Part of the Forest edited by Alberto Manguel (fiction)
- Song of Innocence and of Experience by William Blake (facsimile edition; poetry)
- The Origin of Species by Charles Darwin (non-fiction)
- Into the Mummy's Tomb edited by John Richard Stephens (fiction and non-fiction)
- Servants of Nature by Lewis Pyenson and Susan Sheets-Pyenson (non-fiction)
- Artists on Comic Art by Mark Salisbury (non-fiction)
- Illustrators of the Eighteen-Sixties by Forrest Reid (non-fiction)
- Written in Bones edited by Paul Bahn (non-fiction)
- Mechanics of Wonder: The Creation of the Idea of Science Fiction by Gary Westfahl (non-fiction)
- Dinosaurs of the Air: The Evolution and Loss of Flight in Dinosaurs and Birds by Gregory S. Paul (non-fiction)
- Only Connect: Readings on Children's Literature (3rd Edition) edited by Sheila A. Egoff (non-fiction)
- Black Water 2: More Tales of the Fantastic edited by Alberto Manguel (fiction)
Recently Finished Reading
- The Alchemyst by Michael Scott (fiction)
If you saw my Twitter/Facebook rant yesterday, you might be expecting me to say some not very nice things about this book. But aside from having the characters' archaeologist parents discover some decidedly palaeontological fossils (if you don't know why this is annoying, I shall just point out that archaeologists study past humans. It's palaeontologists who study other--often much more ancient--fossil life), and a few other details that jarred me out of the story (really, I don't think anyone still used Altavista even in 2007 when the book was first published), it was actually quite good. Good enough, anyway, that I'll see if the library has the next one in the series. Also, though this is the first fiction I've read my Mr Scott, I have read some of his work on Celtic myth. - The Fossil Cliffs of Joggins by Laing Ferguson (non-fiction)
We were supposed to go to Joggins and Parrsboro for my birthday, but between car trouble and a very lean summer, it never quite happened. As soon as the weather gets better in the spring, though, I am determined to go fossil-hunting. In the meantime, this little booklet about the cliffs was a good bite-sized introduction to the geology of the area. I'll see if there's a new version out when I finally get the the Fundy Geological Museum. - The Secret Supper by Javier Sierra (fiction)
This was a pretty good book, though definitely not a quick read. It reminded me a lot of The Name of the Rose, though not quite as dense. Monks, art, secret heretical religions, codes. Leonardo da Vinci.
25 September 2011
Giving Back
Just a quick post today, because I have a manuscript that needs editing, and it's going to be a lot of work (not my manuscript, but one for one of my many part-time jobs).
I've been thinking about better ways to use this blog. Mostly I've been using it to keep people updated about what I'm doing, in writing, in craft, in art, and in my house. Most of my family and friends are far away, and this is a way to keep in touch. But I also want to give something back to the folks who've supported me, with comments and encouragement, with purchases, with gifts, with love. My monthly giveaways are about that, too, of course, but I also want to write useful things for folks who stop by.
And I've noticed that the one post of mine that gets consistent traffic is the gothic medieval bookbinding post. So one thing I'm thinking of doing is adding how-to posts. How to make a pamphlet, how to print a linocut without a press, that sort of thing. Stuff people can try for themselves.
The other thing I just thought about today was little folklore articles. I have an MA in the subject, so I might as well do something with it. Also, this is something I can do for the readers of my fiction who might not be interested in printing or bookbinding, but who might want to know more about the creatures and tales I draw on to make my own stories.
So, to that end, I'm going to attempt a weekly short how-to (for more complicated topics, the instructions might spread out over several weeks) and a weekly short folklore article. Of course, this could all end in failure, as anyone who has read many of my posts will know I tend to try to take on too much for any one person to accomplish, but I'll try it and see how it goes.
Also, for those of you who are readers, as soon as I get myself a little better organized, I'll be posting little articles, comments and reviews on pulp adventure fiction, serial novels, and other fun things (like rayguns!) as Calliope Strange over at Raygun Gothic (and I may also change the title of that blog as it doesn't fit as well any more), and as Nic Silver I'll be writing about urban fantasy, dark and creepy stuff, and maybe a bit about human sexuality at Lies Through Silver.
I've been thinking about better ways to use this blog. Mostly I've been using it to keep people updated about what I'm doing, in writing, in craft, in art, and in my house. Most of my family and friends are far away, and this is a way to keep in touch. But I also want to give something back to the folks who've supported me, with comments and encouragement, with purchases, with gifts, with love. My monthly giveaways are about that, too, of course, but I also want to write useful things for folks who stop by.
And I've noticed that the one post of mine that gets consistent traffic is the gothic medieval bookbinding post. So one thing I'm thinking of doing is adding how-to posts. How to make a pamphlet, how to print a linocut without a press, that sort of thing. Stuff people can try for themselves.
The other thing I just thought about today was little folklore articles. I have an MA in the subject, so I might as well do something with it. Also, this is something I can do for the readers of my fiction who might not be interested in printing or bookbinding, but who might want to know more about the creatures and tales I draw on to make my own stories.
So, to that end, I'm going to attempt a weekly short how-to (for more complicated topics, the instructions might spread out over several weeks) and a weekly short folklore article. Of course, this could all end in failure, as anyone who has read many of my posts will know I tend to try to take on too much for any one person to accomplish, but I'll try it and see how it goes.
Also, for those of you who are readers, as soon as I get myself a little better organized, I'll be posting little articles, comments and reviews on pulp adventure fiction, serial novels, and other fun things (like rayguns!) as Calliope Strange over at Raygun Gothic (and I may also change the title of that blog as it doesn't fit as well any more), and as Nic Silver I'll be writing about urban fantasy, dark and creepy stuff, and maybe a bit about human sexuality at Lies Through Silver.
11 September 2011
A Leisurely Sunday Bike Ride And A Snack of Feral Apples
I was going to write a nice long blog post about the bike ride B and I took along the Cobequid Trail bike/hiking path between Old Barns and Truro today, with some of the many photos I took, but I just made and ate a tasty supper and now I'm too sleepy to concentrate. But there was much pedaling, and red Nova Scotia mud, and birds and cows and sea grasses and blue sky. Also feral apples, shaken from a tree and eaten in the sun (and a whole bag of them now in the fridge). And it'll be Fall Cleanup time soon, when people haul out all sorts of big heavy things for the garbage trucks, and we scored a battered old globe on the way home. It still has the USSR on it and the stand kind of flops over, but hey, it's a free globe! So instead of that long post and many photos, here is one photo, of a handsome fellow I met on the path:
(Click to make him big and see his weary, tattered wings.)
(Click to make him big and see his weary, tattered wings.)
26 July 2011
Nautilus Specimen Mini Porthole Steampunk Notebook
How's that for a long title? I was trying to think of what I would call this if I were to list it in my Etsy shop (which I might do).
I worked on this on Sunday (it's Idea Two from this post), and finished it up last night. It's a tiny round blank book, hand-bound in deep blue goatskin and decorative paper, with a silver-on-blue embossed nautilus shell on the cover (I hand-cut a rubberstamp that I used to print the design--I meant to include a photo of it in this post, but forgot, so it'll have to wait till a future post). The endpapers (which I alo neglected to photograph) are a mottled blue with gold marbling.
The binding is medieval sewn-on-cords (hence the raised bands on the spine), so it's super-strong. It includes a recycled tea tin, lined with midnight blue velvet and embellished with faux rivets to make it look like a porthole.
The bottom is lined with brassy metallic paper and decorated with another nautilus embossed in silver on dark blue paper.
The book nestles snugly inside the tin.
And closed, it's like viewing a specimen through a porthole.
I think, if I do this again, I will make the book a solid colour and mount the "specimen" closer to the middle. The division into two colours detracts from the nautilus in a way I didn't intend. And that's why I might not list it in my Etsy shop just yet. I might make a new book for it first. Or I might just keep it for myself--at least until I have the supplies for another tin (I have an empty tin, in brass colour, but the only "rivets" I have are also brass, and I want a contrast).
It *is* terribly cute.
Also, I think I need some more large size white plastic erasers to make more shell cross-section stamps.
I worked on this on Sunday (it's Idea Two from this post), and finished it up last night. It's a tiny round blank book, hand-bound in deep blue goatskin and decorative paper, with a silver-on-blue embossed nautilus shell on the cover (I hand-cut a rubberstamp that I used to print the design--I meant to include a photo of it in this post, but forgot, so it'll have to wait till a future post). The endpapers (which I alo neglected to photograph) are a mottled blue with gold marbling.
The binding is medieval sewn-on-cords (hence the raised bands on the spine), so it's super-strong. It includes a recycled tea tin, lined with midnight blue velvet and embellished with faux rivets to make it look like a porthole.
The bottom is lined with brassy metallic paper and decorated with another nautilus embossed in silver on dark blue paper.
The book nestles snugly inside the tin.
And closed, it's like viewing a specimen through a porthole.
I think, if I do this again, I will make the book a solid colour and mount the "specimen" closer to the middle. The division into two colours detracts from the nautilus in a way I didn't intend. And that's why I might not list it in my Etsy shop just yet. I might make a new book for it first. Or I might just keep it for myself--at least until I have the supplies for another tin (I have an empty tin, in brass colour, but the only "rivets" I have are also brass, and I want a contrast).
It *is* terribly cute.
Also, I think I need some more large size white plastic erasers to make more shell cross-section stamps.
25 July 2011
Monday Mailbox
I had intended to blog about the book I made yesterday, but it's not quite finished. Instead, I'm stealing a meme from . . . um . . . somewhere. I saw this on a book blog (sorry to whomever I stole it from that I can't remember who you are), and basically you post the books you got in the past week, not necessarily in the mail (but somehow those are the best ones). Since I actually *did* get books in the mail today, I thought why not share them and make you all envious.
So, first, a few I picked up at the local mall bookstore last week. I went in to kill time while B got a haircut and ended up with an armful of remainders, all for less than $20. What I got:
Yes, mostly fiction, and mostly YA. I have read two and three in the row, and have been busy reading the two that come before the first one in the row (if that makes any sense).
Today, I stopped in to use the washroom at Chapters after dropping B off at the truck repair place so he could go to work, and of course I had to look around. I was good and only bought two books, one remaindered and one remaindered and then discounted to a whopping $2:
Then on the way home I stopped at the post office to mail a print to the Netherlands (the last of my Steam Ichthyosaurs) and pick up a parcel from Powell's containing the books I ordered almost two months ago with my birthday money (which got hung up in the post-strike/lockout backlog). In it was:
You may have noticed that two of the above have "cabinet of wonder" in the title. I have a peculiar attraction to cabinets of curiosity and own a few other books with similar titles. No doubt I will acquire more, by and by. Also, most of the ones that aren't YA are natural history, which should come as a surprise to exactly no one.
Tomorrow I hope to have that post about the very cool book I have almost finished.
So, first, a few I picked up at the local mall bookstore last week. I went in to kill time while B got a haircut and ended up with an armful of remainders, all for less than $20. What I got:
Yes, mostly fiction, and mostly YA. I have read two and three in the row, and have been busy reading the two that come before the first one in the row (if that makes any sense).
Today, I stopped in to use the washroom at Chapters after dropping B off at the truck repair place so he could go to work, and of course I had to look around. I was good and only bought two books, one remaindered and one remaindered and then discounted to a whopping $2:
Then on the way home I stopped at the post office to mail a print to the Netherlands (the last of my Steam Ichthyosaurs) and pick up a parcel from Powell's containing the books I ordered almost two months ago with my birthday money (which got hung up in the post-strike/lockout backlog). In it was:
You may have noticed that two of the above have "cabinet of wonder" in the title. I have a peculiar attraction to cabinets of curiosity and own a few other books with similar titles. No doubt I will acquire more, by and by. Also, most of the ones that aren't YA are natural history, which should come as a surprise to exactly no one.
Tomorrow I hope to have that post about the very cool book I have almost finished.
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