It's all about the signatures

I recently showed some pages I was working on for a TEAL color swap. I have not worked on my teal swap since I posted the photo. Instead, I completed the pages in this post when I was in the working-out-the-kinks stage of trying to complete, photograph, and write up Monday's tutorial.

Not sure how many others have this problem I've had since Sunday, but Blogger won't let me upload photos the first time. Add to that a scanner that somehow came unplugged when I wasn't looking, and you have a blog post that took longer than uploading images from my old WIN98 computer.

These pages are part of the tutorial I posted on Monday. Each signature has a total of 48 pages and there are two signatures in the book. You do the math. That makes it a whopping 96 pages, although it didn't feel that "fat" to me.

Since I was trying to get the tutorial together, I forgot to photograph the pages until they were already sewn into the book. I will share the first half of the first signature (or set of pages) today. This will take you through page 23. The rest (pages 24 through 48) will come next week after I have them scanned.

This is a book about paper dolls and fashion. Since I forgot to photograph the pages before they were sewn into the book, it made it harder and more time consuming to scan. However, you can click on any photo to enlarge. The first page incorporates a magazine image.

Page two: Magazine image, rubber stamp, lacey border from new punch. Page three: magazine image, security envelope, punch.

Pages 4 and 5: backgrounds made using alcohol and staz-on. Scrapbook paper and stickers.

Page 6: Playing card under frame. Page 7: Various bits of old ephemera and scrapbook paper.

Page 8: Scrapbook paper, note paper, punch. Page 9: Scrapbook paper on a page from a circa 80s scientific study.

Page 10: Magazine image, book page, scrapbook paper. Page 11: Scrapbook papers and paper doily.

Page 12: Scrapbook paper, sticker from end of thread spool. Page 13: Sticker, paint chip, plastic in top came off a new spool of thread.

Page 14: Stickers, change of address form. Page 15: Vellum logarithm charts I used during my engineering days before computer programs did everything in an instant.

Page 16: Back of vellum log10 chart. Page 17: Security envelope over a book image.

Page18: Old ledger paper, book page. Page 19: Blank alcohol ink background page except for post-it marker.

Page 20: Magazine images and punch. Page 21: magazine image and piece of map.

Page 22: Map and grip paper. Page 23: Ledger paper, magazine image, security envelopes.

Each one of these "pages" I create, makes four journal pages in the book. It takes me about an hour to make one four spread page. I thought I would get faster over time, but that doesn't seem to be the case. One wonderful thing about all this is I'm using some of my mountain of stash.

Today's blog has little to do with art, some to do with photography, and lots to do with cycling. I stepped outside the altered art community and found Combing My Hair, a quirky blog title for a serious blog about cycling. The blog author, Gareth, lives in the UK and shows some nice scenes in and around his home. I know it's a different kind of blog, but I wanted something outside the box today. Hope your day is filled with fun, laughs, and outside the box thinking.