Book Review - Papercraft: Design and Art with Paper

Papercraft: Design and Art With Paper
Robert Klanten, Sven Ehmann, and Birga Meyer

When I first saw the cover, I immediately placed it on order before it was released. I incorrectly assumed that it would be a how-to book on paper art & crafts. After I got the book, I quickly skimmed through the book, and much to my great delight, it was not a how-to book, but a well-curated “exhibition” on the art and craft of paper as executed by the designers and artists. I later discovered that the cover photo is a paper illustration of all the ingredients for its creator’s chili recipe.

As I went past the title page, I expected to find a table of contents, but it was not included – instead, a preface appeared. As I was reading it, I was relieved to find that it was not an “academic treatise”, but an entertaining, insightful, and beautifully written introduction (authored by Robert Klanten) to the use of paper as a physical and tangible medium for use in fine arts, fashion, illustration, animation, objects and graphic design.

Due to the lack of the table of contents, I had to skim through the whole book to count the number of chapters. I have found that it was grouped into five “chapters” which looked more like categories. Each “chapter” starts with the text written by Sonja Commentz, and her writings were just as creative as many of the paper works shown in the book.

The book itself is truly mind-boggling especially when all of the works are either done in two-dimensional or three-dimensional with nothing but paper. One could say that it’s sheer paper madness – murals, display, poster, collage, typography, objects, characters, toys, shoes, costume, trains, villages, repurposed/altered books, life-sized dioramas, installation sites and many more.

From examining the colorful and good sized photographs, I saw that many different paper craft techniques were employed in various projects: folding, kirigami, cutouts, silhouettes, sculpting, scoring, and embossing, to name a few. The coffee table size of the book allows many of the photographs to be large enough for me to be able to look at some of the works in detail so that the paper techniques can be figured out.

At the end of the book is an index where the first letters of the company names and even the artists’/designers’ names are sorted. The strange thing is that there is a table of contents included - not for the book itself but for the CD which is attached to the inside back cover. The included CD contains both the videos (DVD) and the templates (ROM) for 18 “urban paper” artists’ models. The video portion contains interviews, animation and demonstration. One of my favorite paper animation videos, This is Where We Live, done by Apt & Asylum Films is included and I was absolutely delighted to have it in my possession.

In summary, this book is the most inspiring book on paper creativity I have ever come across. I wish that it would be given a better title to do it much greater justice. Anyway, I love and am grateful for the fact that I have many of the great paper work in one bound physical copy instead of an electronic list of various paper artists’/designers’ websites. I highly recommended this book for anyone who loves the look and feel of paper anywhere and everywhere.

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Two Books: ECO BOOKS vs re-bound

I just wanted to give you the differences and similarities between these two books. Let me start with similarities first - here's what both books have in common:

1. 144 pages

2. handmade books from materials destined for trash cans

3. One book artist, Rhonda Miller, has the same submission in both books - cereal box books. However, instructions for her cereal books are found only in ECO BOOKS.

4. Credit/gift card books are in both books but done differently by two book artists.

5. Both have photo illustrations, and their instructions are mostly written in text. However, Re-bound has more close-ups and more detailed illustrations.

Now here are the basic differences:

1. There are 40 books with instructions in Eco Books. Re-bound has 16. However, Eco Books were designed by 23 book artists, and all of the 16 books (with instructions) in Re-bound were done by one book artist. Problem with Eco Books is that the instructions for several type of stitches are at the back of the book.

2. A good number of books (13) in Eco Books were bound together with Coptic (single & multiple). Coptic stitch is not easy for beginners - none of the books in Re-bound requires Coptic stitch.

3. Re-bound is divided by chapters; Eco Books is not but there are "separators" i.e. an interview with a book artist, a list of reuse centers (can be dated pretty fast - I checked out one of them and it moved), a short story about a workshop in a third world country, and information on recycling paper.

4. Re-bound has one separate gallery section for multiple contributions by book artists; Eco Books has several "mini-gallery" sections throughout the book.

5. The spine. Re-bound is the real winner, hands down. See photo and you will see why. Re-bound's pages and cover are thicker and stiffer than Eco Books.



My favorites:

1. Re-bound - wide variety of binding styles, tabs book, paint by numbers canvas used as book covers, and another book cover woven with cut strips of potato bags. There's one really cool book in gallery section - it's made with soda/beer tabs!

2. Eco Books - dental floss box as scroll book, coffee codex (done with coffee filters), book preserves (small books in a jar), egg carton & produce tray used as covers. Lots of cool ideas.

What about the prices? They're pretty weird. Let me show you what I mean...

If you're buying them at full price in US:
Eco Books is 22.95 and Re-bound is 24.99.
Therefore, Eco Books is cheaper than Re-bound in US.

But, in Canada,
Eco Books is 29.95 and Re-bound is 28.85.
So, Re-bound is cheaper than Eco Books in Canada.

It seems weird to me. Not only that, if you buy them in Amazon.com, Re-bound is only 88 cents more than Eco Books, and I think that Re-bound is a better value only because of the nice spine.

So, I'm assuming that the question you have in mind: Which book do I recommend that you buy?

Well, as far as I am concerned, the real question is not which book but whether I would buy both books. Yes, I would buy both just because they are really different, and I got a lot more ideas from two than one. They're both great.

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First Impressions: Unboxing Wacom's Intuos4 Small Tablet

Right now, I am taking DJ Pettitt's on-line image-editing class, Memories and Manipulation, and althought this is not required for her class, she mentioned Wacom tablet. So, one day, as I was looking for other things at an office supply store, I noticed several tablets from Wacom. I decided that I would read on-line reviews of the Wacom tablets.

Wacom Intuos4 Small Pen Tablet

After I read the reviews, I decided that Intuos4 would be the best one to start with as I need it for my commercial work. I have been waiting for a long time to get one, but have been dissuaded by the high cost of tablets and software packages. I got it last Thursday (January 7th), and instead of adding one more review to a huge pile of reviews already written and published all over the Internet, I would give you my "first impressions" visual style by slowly "unboxing" and take one thing out at a time...

Oh - that's not a pencil sharpener - it's a pen holder and a storage for the pen nibs.

In addition to the above items, I bought professional pen accessory kit and 4 port hub - I needed more USB ports as I have only two.

I started to use it last Friday, and I LOVE it! I should have gotten it a long time ago, as it did speed up the processing of the photos for these three blogs. I'd rather not write a long review as I am still learning how to use it, and there are plenty of reviews in Amazon.com's - click on the link below. There are other sites as well - just use your favorite search engine.

Wacom Intuos4 Small Pen Tablet

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Product Review: Paper Toys

Paper Toys (Deluxe Metal Box)

Since I bought this box from Amazon.com, I decided to review it as a "product" instead of "book" even though it does contain an instructional book. I love this metal box, and the back of the metal cover seemed more interesting than the front. The contents are well-protected - a thick sheet of foam is on the top.

With the foam sheet removed from the box, you can see the book, sticks, strings and other things.

The last remaining pieces are large "cards" - the pieces are perforated, thank goodness! I love the fact that it is in four languages - very European.

Enough pieces to assemble 8 paper toys.

I picked the easiest one. The rest of the toys are a bit more challenging.

Here's the completed one:

It was an interesting experience - it's almost like being in a paper-engineering class. The toy box was not quite easy - I recommend that you practice folding, glueing and assembling with other easier paper model kits first. Also, the best glue for this kit is the super tacky white glue. You can order this paper toy kit from Amazon.com by clicking on the photo or text below:

Paper Toys (Deluxe Metal Box)

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Book Review: Fantastic Recycled Plastic

You may wonder as to why I posted this photo below in this book review. Keep on reading, and you will see why it was placed here.

Just before I went to the Wildacres Retreat last November of 2009 for Nature Printing Society Workshops, I was reading one book,1000 Ideas for Creative Reuse: Remake, Restyle, Recycle, Renew (1000 Series)which I have written a book review that was published in another post. One of the artisans' work caught my eyes - it was David Edgar's fish. I had forgotten about the book until I walked into a canteen on the lower level of one building and saw this fish below. I gazed and gazed at this creation, and I wondered to myself as to whether it was the same person who created the wonderful works with recycled plastic.

So, I took a picture of the above creation with the hope that I would check to see if it was the same person as the one I saw in other book. Few days after the retreat was over, I got home and looked up on the Internet to find more information about this person. I found out from his website that a new book came out, so I immediately ordered it from Amazon. I am a very happy owner of his book, and here's my book review.



Fantastic Recycled Plastic: 30 Clever Creations to Spark Your Imagination
Lark Books
November 2009
Paperback, 144 pages

I discovered this book on the Internet after I saw David’s Plastiquarium creation (Wildacres Cascader) at Wildacres Retreat Center in Little Switzerland, NC last November of 2009. As soon as I saw this book, I ordered it right away. I found it to be one of the most informative and creative how-to books on creative repurpose and reuse of the plastic bottles and containers.

The authors start with David’s account on how he started to work with recycled plastic, and a brief history of plastic. W ell-detailed technical information on the packaging resins was provided on their characteristics, properties, and identification codes (1 PET, 2 HDPE, to name a few). With these plastics as medium in mind, explanations were provided on the use of various cutting, forming, and fastening tools in the art or craft projects.

The chapter on the basics is very informative and full of details – even the anatomy of the bottle is identified and explained. Basic techniques on deconstruction, fastening, and forming are presented in both text and photos. The rest of the book is focused on projects that were grouped based on the following categories: jewelry, dimensional figures (birds, fishes, insect, sea lives, and reptiles), holiday decorations, lighting and toys. Each project-based chapter has a gallery of other artisans’ works that are very fascinating, clever and inspiring.

Many years ago, I have done one craft project that involved cutting up a few bottles, but I have never produced anything like the ones in the book. When I first opened the book, I was blown away by what can be done with these plastic bottles, and I am inspired to come up with more creative use or design.

Several templates are provided at the end of the book, and also provided is a list of artists/craftspeople who contributed their work for the galleries in the book. However, their e-mail addresses and/or websites were not listed, and I would have to use search engines to find them if I wanted to contact them for purchase of their work.

From reading one of the last pages, I discovered that David and Robin developed the proposal for this book during their summer residency at Wildacres Retreat Center. If I had not seen his creation on the wood paneled wall, I would not have known about this wonderful book. Even though you might not be inclined to start any of the projects, I still recommend this book for helping you see these “discarded” bottles in a new light – as an eco-friendly medium for creative reuse projects.

You can see more of David's work in his Plastiquarium website - click on the gallery and you will see a fantastic fish collection.

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Update for Fellow Readers & Users

Happy New Year to you! I hope you had a nice New Year's Day reading lots of books or trying out new products, and indeed, it was a great start for me. I'm so excited about the new year as January is always my favorite month: lots of new products to try out (I'm getting Wacom Intuos4 tablet soon!!) and lots of new BOOKS!!

I just got great books in the mail and from the museum shops that I visited last Saturday (Jan 2). I am now enjoying some of them, but I'm now taking an on-line class on Photoshop given by DJ Pettit, and wow, it's really great. Oh, most of the photos in this blog were processed with Microsoft PhotoDraw, not Adobe Photoshop or Elements as many people thought. I am now finding Photoshop Elements 8 (a.k.a. PSE8) to be much more powerful, and I'm trying to harness its humongous power.

Anyway, I am currently working on a multiple posts, and I decided that I would publish a bundle of them as "e-mag" instead of publishing them singly. In Andrew's Creative Life blog, a table of contents containing links to various posts in three blogs ("e-articles") including this one will be published. I am also planning to publish them as biweekly issues - sorry, twice a month, not twice a week. Of course, they will always be positive, colorful, exciting, inspiring, informative, and educational! Stay tuned!