Starting point
Old school. All different methods of practical tasks. My big takeaway from this three week project is that being comfortable with the manual side of illustration is not to be underrated. with things like cutting skills, measuring, etc, these will all be useful and open new doors in the future I'm sure.
That said, manual methods are limited to your tools, so here are mine. Rubber, pencil, dip- pen, compass, craft knife, cutting board, and though you can't see it, yes, a metal ruler.
That said, manual methods are limited to your tools, so here are mine. Rubber, pencil, dip- pen, compass, craft knife, cutting board, and though you can't see it, yes, a metal ruler.
Books
The first tasks I undertook were the book making tasks. I found these to be engaging, with varying levels of success. The first was by far the most rewarding: the stitch bound book. I thoroughly enjoy doing pattern work, and this incorporated that into the actual making of the book itself. I started off intending to create one exactly as was shown in the picture, but when I found there were many ways to bind with stitch, I indulged myself with some slightly different patterns. That said, due to time limitations I didn't get round to making the square hole throughout the pages of the book. My time management probably should've been less focused on the fancy stitch.
The second book was mostly successful, doing staple bound is something I was already familiar with, but had never done it from scratch before.
My main failing was in my choice of material. While the actual manual process was all done correctly, the thick paper made it difficult for the book to be held together.
lastly came the perfect bound book. Playing to form, as usual I am the most imperfect perfectionist you'll find. While I did have a good crack at this, I severely underestimated the careful handiwork required for this task, and so my first attempt was quite abysmal. I did intend to do a second attempt after looking into where I had gone wrong (which was mainly in the actual choice of glue and pressing of the pages together), but again due to time constraints, I was unable to produce a second one.
The second book was mostly successful, doing staple bound is something I was already familiar with, but had never done it from scratch before.
My main failing was in my choice of material. While the actual manual process was all done correctly, the thick paper made it difficult for the book to be held together.
lastly came the perfect bound book. Playing to form, as usual I am the most imperfect perfectionist you'll find. While I did have a good crack at this, I severely underestimated the careful handiwork required for this task, and so my first attempt was quite abysmal. I did intend to do a second attempt after looking into where I had gone wrong (which was mainly in the actual choice of glue and pressing of the pages together), but again due to time constraints, I was unable to produce a second one.
Presentation
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Next up came presentation tasks. These I feel quite positively about. For the first one, I had to board mount a picture with a window. I found that everything went well, a good 45 degree cut for the frame, good proportions and placement of the piece. Only, it was pointed out I would've benefitted form using gum strip for the hinge rather than masking tape. Not only that, but I also at first stuck the piece to the front facing card, which looking back now was obviously the wrong thing to do, but luckily it was easily fixed.
With that done, then came the postcard mounts. these went off without a hiccup, though it was pointed out the could've been a bit narrower by a fraction in their placement. perhaps this issue was caused by me using portrait instead of landscape cards, as these are harder to judge in this respect. |
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Cutting and working to spec
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For the next group of tasks, these were all focused on working with cutting and to a specification. for most of these I am pretty satisfied with the result, the only comments I'd have is that the embossing could've been done on a finer paper stock to give it a cleaner edge, and that also the circle cut had an ever so slight edge at one point.
I also quite enjoyed doing the decorative cutting task. I don't think there's anything necessarily wrong with the piece, but given more time I'd of enjoyed working in some more detail. The one takeaway from that task was gaining an understanding of how to handle delicate material when you're taking so much of it away. Overall though, Im very happy with how I handled it. |
