I just completed two green blank notebooks that will be used for episode guides for two other podcasts I make (Hokudai/Cast - Japanese, English, and Chinese with music; DinoSoar Pix - audio drama). Both books are essentially the same: 150 mm x 110 mm (a handy pocket size), 120 pages (six signatures of five sheets each), and hardbound with green book cloth.
The DinoSoar Pix Episode Guide is thinner and less, er, perfect. Neither are perfect but the DPEG one is the lesser of the two. The H/CEG has endpapers whilst the DPEG does not. I think the endpapers, plus the better gluing and sewing job on the H/CEG the nicer looking of the two. Also, the H/CEG was made second so the DPEG labored as sort of a practice book.
What did we learn from this little episode guide creating event? Alignment is important. Beside alignment, thinking would be nice. Thinking is always nice. By making DPEG first, I could think about how I should improve my next attempt, the H/CEG. Maybe I should always make three or four books at a time. By the time I get to book 4, it might just turn out okay.
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Hopefully by this time next week I will have a few snaps of a fun book I’m in the process of making: A non-blank notebook - a doodle book, if you will - that is going to encompass all sorts of new techniques that I haven’t even come close to mastering or even non-mastering. An experimental book to go along with the experimental nature of Tedorigawa Bookmakers. All part of the master conspiracy in my mind. Oooh, that sounds ominous, if I do say so myself.
The new book will have a linkstitch exposed binding, a cool cover, eight signatures of four sheets each for a total of 128 pages, and about B6 in size. And a cool cover, I hope. The cover will incorporate found objects, at least two different kinds of paper, and an odd doodle or two.
Content will include stories, drawings, receipts and other stuff I haven’t decided yet. Blank notebooks are good and I get a lot of practice from them but most people don’t pick up a blank notebook and think, cool binding. They pick up a blank notebook and think, uhn, nice?
Anyway, hopefully next week. What should this book be called? I’m partial to “The Invisible Rhinos of Tokyo.”
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Just in the nick of time. Today, December 28, 2008, I managed to finish a 2009 calendar/diary. It has blue Japanese paper as a cover, with light blue paper as endpapers.
Coptic binding with black waxed thread and white pages.
This was supposed to have been finished as a Christmas present but all sorts of delays ensued, not the least of which was me spending four hours handwriting the dates only to discover while writing November that I skipped a day back in March or April. Usually I don’t mind skipping days but when they are in a permanent document that will be used over and over again as the year progresses, well, I felt I had to do something. So I started over and my, wasn’t that fun.
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Here, if you turn your computer sideways (here’s hoping you have a laptop), you can see the
handy (pun alert!) size: fits well into a jacket pocket or the pocket on some briefcases. Also, in a purse, if you carry one.
What did I learn from this escapade?
Well, first, start your yearly diaries and calendars early. Well before December 24th, I’d say - just as a rule of thumb anyway. In fact, I just finished the weekly calendar for a calendar for 2010. Thinking ahead, I am. Also, be very, very careful of dates and days. For some reason these are important in calendary/diaries. I don’t know why.
I like the hand-written monthly calendar but I didn’t like the hand-written weekly calendar, so I xeroxed a page and used that. Not the best solution but workable. Overall, I’d say this rates 3.5 stars out of five.
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