Category: Moleskine accordion

Day 306 -Reportage?!

2 Comments

Happy Mothers Day. 

Last nite we went to the annual Pops under the Stars with the Augusta Symphony. I drew about thirty pages and half an accordion book. It was a lot of fun and felt like I really was in the groove. Pages of sketches of the conductor. They are so energetic. Just wish we were closer to see Maestro Z better. 

So here is part of what I drew. Can’t wait to slap some paint on these. 

   Sketching the orchestra warming up!! 

Maestro Z 

The conductor was very energetic!!  

Sketching the orchestra warming up and some of the crowd. 

  More Sketching the orchestra warming up

  Henry loved it. His first fireworks and he thought they were amazing. 

  One of my favorite sketches. Lee Anne.  
The crowd nearby. 

More later. Gotta run. Mothers Day company coming!! 
Thanks for reading!! 

Margaret XXX

Day  280 -Making Accordion Books

2 Comments

 

Why make them?? Because they are the easiest book to make because no sewing is involved. 

And because you can do this with them.  

My Sennelier USKsketchbook.

 Nice heavy paper but only one length of paper.   Too short. Another reason to make one.  Dull black cover. 

 

 210″ small Moleskine accordion 

Or the famous moleskines. Again a dull black cover. Great length but the paper is terrible now that they are outsourced to China. Watercolor and pens will bleed they to the back so you can’t use it.   

So now that we know why we need to make one lets get started and gather our supplies. 

 Supplies

Book board or heavy cardboard

2-3 sheets of All purpose paper such as Stonehenge. 

PVA glue

Fabric for the covers – cotton muslin or sateen

Bone folder

Rulers

Pencil

Exacto knife or carton cutter

Optional

Self healing  mat

Parchment paper. Glue won’t stick to it. 

Let’s get started!

Sorry not to have better photos. I am out of town. No wifi no fabric or glue. I will update this when I return home hopefully next weekend showing how to cover the book board. 

Measure the width of the paper. 

Divide the width of the paper by 3 or 4. I made books ranging from 5″ – 7 1/2″ tall. I got three to four strips out of each piece of paper. 

Most books are 3 1/2″ x 5 1/2″ tall or 5″ x 7 1/2″ size. 

 

Folding the paper 

 Measure and mark your strips. It’s easiest to cut them with the Exacto  knife or a rotary cutter but I like the look of ripped paper edges.

 

Ripping the paper.  

 An easy way to get the torn edges is to fold your paper across the width and crease it with the bone folder. Then SLOWLY slide the bone folder along the crease ripping the paper. Roz Stendahl (Www.rozwoundup.typepad.com) has a you tube video on how to do this. http://youtu.be/pzlXHZ0f3kg Amazingly easy. 

 

  The paper accordion folded. 

 Next fold your strips in half. Crease with the bone folder. Mark your fold lines either every 3 1/2″ or every 5″. Fold like a fan or accordion.

 Joining the pieces. There will be a tab of extra paper left on each end of your strips. Remove the tab from one end.  Cut the other tab down to a 1/2″. You will use this to glue the strips together. 

PUT THE GLUE ON THE BACK OF THE STRIP WITHOUT THE TAB AND GLUE THE TAB TO IT. AS IN THE PHOTO. 

BE SURE YOU GLUE ALL THE STRIPS TOGETHER ON THE SAME SIDE OR YOU WILL HAVE SOME TABS ON BOTH SIDES. YOU WANT THEM ALL ON ONE SIDE. 

 

 If this frustrates you you can also use Washi tape to join your paper. 

 

 You can glue as many strips as you want together. The small  moleskines have 210″ of thin Chinese paper in them!! The larger moleskines have 124″ of thin Chinese paper. 

Just remember that heavier the paper is the fatter the book. 

Cut the cardboard covers 1/4″ bigger than your paper strips. Cut your fabric about 2″ bigger than your cardboard pieces. 

Spread glue on the board evenly.  Be sure to cover the whole board. and apply the fabric. Smooth the fabric with your bone folder removing any wrinkles and bubbles in the fabric. 

 

Mitering corners /Gluing sides. OPPS a wrinkle. 

 (This photo is from a tutorial I did on how to make a pamphlet stitch sketch book.http://scquiltaddict.blogspot.com/2014/10/day-96-sketchbook-part-2.html?m=1)

 Miter and glue the corners. Trim the fabric diagonally down before you fold and glue the corners. 

Neatly glue the sides down. 

 

  

 Glue the paper to the covers.  (I am not happy with the wrinkly paper. In later books I glued paper over the fabric covered board to make the end papers smoother. 

You are done. 👍 See not so hard. 

This webpage has great instructions with pictures. http://www.designsponge.com/2013/03/bookbinding-101-accordion-book.html

Thanks for looking!!

Day 278 – The Flying Biscuit

Leave a comment

  

Staying in Gatlinbirg with no wifi. Should be interesting. Going to see if this will post. I can see a wifi tower so maybe it will go. 

This is my breakfast at the world famous Flying Biscuit home of the creamy dreamy grits and mile high biscuits. Also as my friend Marsha says a vehicle to put butter in your mouth. 

I drew the sketch with a Kuretake brush pen loaded with Carbon Platinum black. Love that pen. Think refillable Pentel brush pen.  Heaven right.

 I colored it with the Caran d’ache  watercolor crayons. The bases are washes of watercolor using the caran d’ache crayons. Layers of color were  scribbled on the base watercolors with any color that I thought would look good aka show up. After I was done painting I reapplied lots of ink including cross hatching. 

The section where the name Flying Biscuit is written was a problem.  The name didn’t show on the red background. So I scribbled a lot of lighter colors over the dark red and rewrote the words. Now they show up well. 

Thanks for looking. 

Day 273 -The last post of my Bayeux Tapestry

11 Comments

something new tomorrow. 

 

 I thought that my Bayeux Tapestry would fit in this tv cabinet which is huge. NOPE. The TV is a 50″ one. I mean the book is only 210 inches. Just shy of six feet. But I think it looks cool there anyway. 

  

Sennelier Urban Sketch Accordion with heavy paper. 

I found a temporary replacement at Binders. A nice heavy Sennelier accordion book but it’s only about a yard long. Not quite the impact of the long moleskine.  However that paper is much better.  Heavy nice paper. You could draw on both sides I think with no problem.

Bytw I also found out that Moleskine has outsourced all their books to China. The not so great paper is really terrible now. I won’t be buying more.  I am going to bind one. 

How hard can an accordion book be!?  I got some light weight BFK Rives paper, some Stonehenge and some of Binders brand like Stonehenge to give a whirl too. Exited but will have to wait till I get home because I don’t have all the tools here to do it with. Hence the purchase of the Sennelier book. 

In the meantime here is a closeup of all the panels. Promise last post of the moleskine. Done with Pentel brush pen, colored Pitt brush pens,  tombows, flesh watercolor and flesh gouache. 

 

Evans Towne Center walking track and dog park

  

   Evans Towne Center walking track and dog park

  

Evans Towne Center walking track and dog park

  

Evans Towne Center walking track and dog park

  

Evans Towne Center walking track and dog park and Inner Bean 

  

Inner Bean 

  

Inner Bean and Edgewood Target Atlanta

  

Edgewood Target Starbucks Atlanta

  

Edgewood Target Starbucks  Atlanta

Day 272 My Bayeux Tapestry Part 2

Leave a comment

the last panels of the book. Actually the first ones that I did. 

  

270 inches long  Moleskine accordion 3.5×5″

  

This section was drawn at the Evans Towne Center Park and the dog park there. I love the walkers swinging their Arms and leaning forward. The people with their dogs are also a favorite. Bicycle guy rice by twice before I decided to draw him. And of course he never came back after I started him. Oops!

  

An overlap. Some of this was drawn in the Earthfare parking lot while I waited for my friend to carpool to life sketching at USC Aiken. He rest was drawn at the Inner Bean. 

Thanks for looking!! 

Day 271 – A Bayeux Tapestry?! Part 1

13 Comments

A friend, Neil Foster, dubbed it my Bayeux tapestry and oddly it does look a bit like it. 

 

 7 feet of Moleskine accordion book. Colored with Tombows and watercolor  markers. Drawn with my Pentel brush pen.  

 And the question is – do the back??! 

I could hang it on the wall the way it is now.  If I do the back you can only ever see one side  and some of the watercolor and pen did bleed thru to the back. I could cover it up by writing all over the background. Too many decisions.  I m not going to think about it. It will tell me when it’s ready. 

  

I did the last 35 inches at the Edgewood target Starbucks in Altlanta which is most of this panel. The first five people were done at the Inner Bean in Augusta. 

  

 Most of these figures were done at the Inner Bean in Augusta thought here is a big overlap of figured. 


I drew this in four sessions. These are the last two. A lot of fun. If only the paper in the moleskine were better. I have been looking for better paper while I am in Atlanta to possibly make my own. I will keep u posted. 

TIP: Run and buy a tube of flesh gouache.  I used Winsor Newton. That was the only gouache sold at Utrecht Dick Blick where I went today.   A God send for the pen strokes that went astray. I LOVE IT!! Covered all the boo boos. And I always find a good flesh color in gouache is a pain to mix. 

Oh another tip. Walkers can make the best people to draw swinging their arms or the dog park people standing around yakking. 

Will post part 2 tomorrow. 

 Thanks for looking!