[FM Discuss] hand bound manuals/workbooks

[Anne Gentle]

Welcome Cara. I love these! I'd like to order the OLPC one for my bookshelf
please. :) It'll also be great to take to talks I give to writers about Book
Sprints and writing with wikis.

I like the interior page print and the spine. The covers look spectacular
also and I like the rounded corners on the covers.

The fact you can swap out with new printouts is really cool. I'm reminded
of  set of O'Reilly books I saw at SXSW Interactive a few years ago, where
updates to the book could be inserted into specially designed binding
covers. Neat!

Anne

 *Anne Gentle*
annegentle at justwriteclick.com my blog <http://justwriteclick.com> | my
book<http://xmlpress.net/publications/conversation-community/>|
Twitter <http://twitter.com/annegentle>



On Tue, Jul 28, 2009 at 1:00 PM, Cara Bell-Jones <
carabelljones at googlemail.com> wrote:

>
> Hi there
> Firstly I'd just like to introduce myself to the list - I'm currently based
> in Berlin working freelance for museums and galleries and generally making
> ends meet! In February I helped stream events for the transmediale festival
> and then took part in a book sprint to document the process, I really loved
> the experience, the concept and potential of people coming together from
> different disciplines to create free manuals for free software.
>
> More recently I've been working towards making hand bound manuals, with the
> following aims in mind: (please see below for links to pictures of the
> prototypes)
>
> 1. possibly incorporating book binding in to book sprints, with
> contributors screen printing their own cover and binding their manual as a
> keepsake or present.
>
> 2. distributing the manuals to independent book stores for approx 20euro
> cover price (within the manual there would be a mini manual on how to make
> and distribute your own books, promoting an open business model).
>
> 3. targeted fund-raising, a limited edition of books would be made to sell
> for 50euros in order to raise a specific amount (e.g. 3,000) to fund a
> particular book sprint. Each book can be inscribed with something
> like..."this book contributed to the pure data book sprint." (I'd also take
> a bit of money to cover the time I spend making the books too!)
>
> I just wanted to see what people thought about how the manuals should look,
> feel, cost etc.
>
> You can see a few pictures of prototypes here:
> http://adam.engagetv.com/fm_pics/
>
> any comments good or bad will be really appreciated :)
>
> notes on pictures
> * 'blue,' 'book1'/'holdingbook' and 'spines' are screen printed with just
> one colour at home - but I've access to a printing studio where 5 colours
> can be applied quickly and easily if we have more detailed covers designed
> for the books (which would look stunning!)
> * 'book1'/'holdingbook' is Japanese bound with raffia
> * 'inside_cover'/'inside_page' is printed paper glued in to hide the tape
> that you can see in 'workbook_open'
> * binding screws can easily be removed so that updates can be added to your
> book after purchase - suitable for the workbook/exercise book idea
>
> a few other things...
> * I bought materials from art shops so these books have worked out quite
> expensively at 10-13 euros each.
> * the board used for the cover is 1.5mm thick 1800g/m²
> * I cut the board and paper (and rounded corners) by hand in these examples
> but will borrow/buy guillotines/cutters if making neater copies for sale.
> * these books took about 30mins to make each (this should decrease when
> making greater quantities, using guillotines etc.)
>
> please comment to the list with any thoughts that you have on this
> thanks :)
> cara
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