Week 7, Book #7: SNOW

while fiddlin' around with ideas and supplies and books in need of a makeover, it snowed here in B-more. not one of those pretty Disney snows, but a real 9" outside my door snowfall. and then it warmed up outside, after days of ridiculous one-digit degree weather, and the snow began to melt, and i thought it would be a wasted opportunity to let it slip away without making a book of it. so outside i went.

snow is a stubborn substance that refuses to be anything but frozen water. it is a rigid form of clay with a particular set of physical properties. i got that after trying to make pages and in the end settled for an open book design. i call this book simply SNOW. 

Week 6, Book #6: Visions of Springtime

it's so bleepin' cold here in B-more that i've begun to hallucinate about spring, the topic of this week's book. it's modeled after the one-page books-without-words series i did several years ago, in which the visuals tell the story and communicate the message. the covers of this book are layered in egg-colored wallpaper with large leaf motifs, and the signature is made of cloth and paper.

keeping with the rubric i used last week, i think the main idea is clear, especially after seeing the single page and the images of flowers, butterflies, leaves, and a colorful tree. even without the title, it's clear that the theme is relative to nature. it would have been perfect, however, if the covers were green.

one of the things i like about the one-page book is that it feel like an invitation, but without the text on the outside. it's meant to compel the reader to open it. like the overall organization of the box book, you must open the one-pager to see what's inside.

the voice element is fun here, because it's up to the reader to create her/his own story. my job is to create content that inspires imagination. therefore, the reader controls the fluency and pace of the story, so to speak.

the fun part of making this particular book was working with different fabrics and paper and trying to find a balance with lines, shape, colors, sizes, and textures. i don't know if i achieved all that, but it was fun designing it.  

Week 5, Book #5: Secrets

I came across a rubric from grad school for writing and creating art books, and I've decided to apply this rubric to my books from now on. It covers six elements of bookmaking: Main idea, organization, voice, choice of images, fluency, and convention. There are four measurements for this rubric including: strong, developing, emerging, and not yet.

This week's Book #5 is another box book (also see Wk. 2, Book #2). I have a story in mind to tell that's part fiction and part family secret--more of the latter--and the box book feels like the perfect vehicle and structure for the story. However, at first glance my book illustrates only some aspects of the main idea/thematic focus, being family secrets. I could have used different visual elements that people typically associate with secrets, e.g., dark colors, symbols of mysteries, etc. Similarly, my choice of images do not reinforce the message since I didn't use any images.

With regard to organization, the design and format of the book definitely work to always make people open it and explore the inside. That's a built in function of the box book: you must open it to see what's inside. The title alone, Secrets, practically dares you to NOT open it.

As for voice, while the content does convey a story the contains a family secret, it doesn't convey my particular feelings and thoughts, which is one of the measurements for voice. And I'm not sure if a secret can be effectively told from a subjective perspective, with my feelings and thoughts all mixed in there. Then again, the fact that I've chosen to tell the secret, albeit framed in the language of short fiction, means that I do feel/think it's time to tell the secret. Hmmmm. I'll have to sit with this measurement a while.

I used the accordion fold signature again because it seems to work best for the box book--until I come up with something new. The arrangement of the folded pages inside the box definitely helps the fluency and pace of the narrative as the accordion cascades out of the box. However, I think the content pops out just a little too quickly. This may be remedied by using heavier stock--maybe watercolor paper.

Finally, I think I made good use of line, shape, color, size, and texture given what this is--a box book containing a story that holds a family secret. The containment factor is metaphorical and literal. What I especially like about this book that I didn't initially intend is that you have to look for the opening to the content, i.e., a clue to the secret in the story.

Following is a short video clip of the book.

Week 4, Book #4: Variation on a Fold

this post covers the 4th book I've made thus far. it's a variation on the 1st book posted at the beginning of January, with the accordion fold pages. however, this book doesn't have covers and the accordion fold has a little twist in the middle, allowing readers to literally flip the script. the effect is a stream of text without beginning or end. there's no front or back, either. just a story. and no matter where you begin, it all makes sense.

because some folk may not be able to view the video files i've been posting--for various technical reasons--i'm going to enroll my filmmaking son (ibvidpro.com/onesonstudio) to help me create a YouTube channel for easier video viewing of my books. i'll post links to the channel here in the blog along with pics of books. so, look for that change sometime in February.

meantime, here's a little video to view Book #4, titled "Variation on a Fold."