new icon, but just one so far

[ehyde]

"I should make a bookbinding icon. What if I took a nice pic of a stack of my favorite books I bound--" I said, forgetting for a moment that my book designs are most interesting on the front covers and very boring on the spines.

The books in the new icon are: pluck the stars - Moonlight Caught in Mutton Fat - Last of Our Kind - we waste the same day like nobody dies - Son of a Notorious Father and these are all fic recs too, btw.

I need to make other new icons too, if I'm going to be more active here. I want to make a Tai Sui icon, but there's no official art! Time to go take a picture of a tree I guess.

A couple days ago I thought, "this would be a great time for a friending meme," and spookykingdomstarlight is running a MDZS/CQL one now!

Comments

[galadhir]

Are those your books in the icon? They are very impressive and I'm really curious about what the second one down looks like. Is that blue trees on white?

Ooh, friending meme! Thank you :)

[ehyde]

Thanks! That one's an abstract design actually, sort of jagged lines in various colors. The links in the post will take you to more pictures!

[galadhir]

Oh, I didn't notice that they were links! I must go and look at them now :) ...

Ooh! Those are amazing! They're all so different and all so fitting to their books. I'm also excited to see a couple of fics there that I haven't read yet and want to. I've bookmarked Pluck the Stars, and as you know I'm currently podficcing Last of our Kind :)

Did you embroider the golden threads on Pluck the Stars? Or buy the thread and couch it on? Even the typesetting is gorgeous - are all the chapter titles hand calligraphed? What a huge variety of skills you have!

Love the choice of paper for Last of our Kind, and the black brocade for Moonlight Caught in Mutton Fat is so sumptuous against that swirling pale green :) The ones with the abstract art look so authoritative, I would believe everything they told me. And the gold one is so Jin, with the gold inside and out and the peony on the title page. They're all absolutely amazing. You have amazing skills!

[ehyde]

kdfa lsk;fj thank you!

Pluck The Stars has a fabric with gold thread woven throughout, and then I embroidered the title and couched on the threads extending up and down from the title. For aesthetic & plot reasons I wanted to work as much gold thread in there as I could (including sewing the pages--I ran a thin gold thread alongside the sturdier linen).

All the titles are fonts I found, no calligraphy (that is not one of my skills).

[galadhir]

Gorgeous! How long did it take before you felt your stuff was professional quality? (As someone who's currently trying to learn a traditional craft it would be reassuring to know you didn't get this good without some false starts.)

[ehyde]

ahhh I really would not say my stuff is professional quality to be honest, and there are a lot of the more traditional aspects of bookbinding I straight up don't know (leather? what's that?) The pictures I post online are the best pictures I could take of the best version of the book from its best angle, you know?
I started bookbinding about a year and a half ago, but I've done enough other crafting for years prior such that none of the tools or materials were really new to me, and that helped a lot with just jumping in. Actually, graphic design and typesetting is where I had the least experience, and where I think I've made the biggest improvements, but that's not very flashy.

[galadhir]

Heh, I was just saying over on my signwriting post that when it's your own stuff you can only see the flaws, while it takes other people to be able to see how good it looks. They do look very good!

I was also very impressed with the graphic design and typesetting! I've published my own books in the past and just having to choose between Draft 2 Digital's pre-made options was difficult enough.

[sunlit_stone]

What a lovely icon! I think they look very nice like that fwiw.

Oooh, friending meme 👀

[momijizukamori]

Some Lofter fanartists use CC licenses on their art! Though honestly there isn't a ton of even fanart.

[yesterdaychild]

tbh just knowing you bound those books makes them well cool!

[artemis1000]

These books are gorgeous!

[xmarksthespotwhereistand]

I alternate between two icons and i have the second one because i am a mod in a community.
Hm, maybe having a few for talking about separate topics or switching between separate fannish spheres is a good idea.