Looking More at Page Make Up—Part V: More Fun with Photocopies

Above: This is the "sister" piece to yesterday's post. I enlarged and posterized a 19th century photograph found in an antique store, by copying it repeatedly on a toner photocopier. Read below for more information. Click on the image to view an enlargement.

Please read Looking More at Page Make Up—Part IV: Playing with Photocopies to learn why I had these copies in the first place and put them in my journal—OR short version, my toner copier died and left on Monday, so this is a bit of nostalgia. (You'll also want to read that post for the exact steps I followed, which were the same.)

At any rate, this spread (which actually falls chronologically before the image in yesterday's post) is another example of gluing a photocopy into your journal and playing around with it. (For instructions on how to glue paper across a spread see my video on How to Support Glue Seams in a Casebound Book. That's not why I was doing it on this spread, but the method is the same.)

As mentioned above, all the steps I followed for the man-spread were followed here. In fact I worked on them at the same time, simply allowing for paint drying time before turning the page. Actually this blue paint is the reason I started painting the two spreads with fluid acrylics. I had a lot of left over pale blue paint from working on a dog painting. I wanted to use some of it up. It appears on this page and then I also used it to color a spread in the new journal which was already sitting out and waiting to go. (I like to work ahead on my backgrounds.)

Some points to note about this page spread:

1. I used 140 lb. watercolor paper (that I had painted with acrylic paints and inks to use as decorative cover paper) for the collaged additions of her "coat." (If you would like to see how I used this paper on the cover of a book visit, "What I Did Last Weekend"—the book in the top right corner uses this same paper as this woman's jacket, though from a more "purple" area of the 1/2 sheet.

Note: I like to paint my own decorative papers for use when I'm binding books. It makes the books more personal to me and the covers also end up representing a sense of season or feeling to me when I select them for use. Typically I will paint whole or half sheets of 140 lb. watercolor paper. I always save the scraps because they are useful for tiny books and also for collage.

2. Watercolor paper in the 140 lb. weigh is pretty stiff. Look in the gutter at the base of this spread and you'll see a portion of the "jacket" that crosses the gutter. In general you want to avoid having only a sliver of heavy weight material cross at this bending point—because it is difficult to get it to stick down on the opposite page and stay stuck! Of course you can put aside the glue stick and get out the heavy guns—PVA. But I'm rarely pushed to do that. To make this little tag of heavyweight paper stay put I covered it with a strip of almost transparent green paper, which had a checkerboard pattern. The green goes nicely with the colors in the collaged papers and in person the subtle texture is more pronounced and adds an interesting textural element, even where it crosses the text columns. (It is subtle enough to not inhibit reading.)

3. The blue paint I used for this spread was "leftover" from a painting session. I'd stored it in a paint cup in a Ziplock plastic bag overnight. There was a moist paper towel in the bag, but even so the paint was thickening up a bit. The paint went on thicker than I like and even when dry it added a plastic, and slightly sticky feel to the surface of the page. Before collaging the "jacket" parts onto the spread I used a ultra-fine grade of sandpaper to break up the surface slightly. (I went over all parts covered with the blue paint, with light pressure and a circular motion. You cannot see the sanding even when looking closely in person—the mess behind the woman is brush strokes.)

Tip: If you are having adherence problems when gluing sometimes it helps to rough up the surfaces you're gluing with a little bit of sanding. This is particularly useful if you are using coated-card or coated-paper stock, or if one of your surfaces has a slick acrylic paint surface. Be sure to remove any dust particles that are generated before you start to glue. And in general I have to say—it is ALWAYS BEST even when sanding only a small amount, to WEAR A MASK! (Yes, I always do.)

4. After the translucent green paper was added and dried in place (wax paper inserted into book, book weighted beneath other books, as described in yesterday's post) I used a white gel pen to make some more dots on the front of her dress, where it was only black on the photocopy.

5. As mentioned above, I worked on this page simultaneously with the man-spread from yesterday's post. So when I was cutting collage papers for the one, I also made a tracing of the other and cut papers for it. The point of all that was to bring two spreads up to readiness for other work. I might have ended up painting other images on the spreads or filling the spreads with other collaged material. As it happened I ended needing the spread beyond these two for a series of photos I took when the junk collectors came. Writing on these pages and finishing up this journal became the focus and priority. Like the other spread, writing in columns seemed appropriate because I had a lot to say and because it made sense with what was going on across the spread.

So there you have it. More thoughts on page make up and how I build a spread. Let me know if you find this type of post helpful, interesting, or not. If there is interest I'll do more of them in the future.

Comments

[Karen Sandstrom]

Hi Roz - Yup, these posts are really interesting in terms of prompting thought beyond what we (well, I should speak just for myself) tend to do on a habitual basis. Also, though I'm always drawn to the journals of others who incorporate lots of different textures, I tend to need some inspiration to try it myself. And of course the work itself is just beautiful to look at.

[Roz Stendahl]

Karen, I'm glad you're enjoying these posts. I too have favorite approaches and materials. I find that one of the best ways to jostle myself out of them is to switch up formats, so I use journals of a variety of sizes—sometimes square, sometimes portrait, rarely landscape (because they are difficult for me to hold while standing and working, the long width tends to flop about). And I also find varying the papers I bind into my journals helps me in this manner too. Some journals have watercolor paper, some have printmaking paper which works differently with the different media, and so on.

Thanks for writing in to let me know.

[Cheryl]

I also find it interesting to read about how your journal pages evolve - how you don't have a plan for them when you start and how you don't have to finish them all at once.

[Caity O'Connor]

Yes, please, Roz - I love reading your process posts! What will you do without a toner copier? They're getting harder to find around my way, and bubblejet prints don't play well with liquids, not matter how "dry" i use my paint.

[Roz Stendahl]

Cheryl, I'm glad you and Caity enjoy the posts, thanks for letting me know.

Caity, I'm on the look out for another toner copier. My friend Karen here in town found one for $300 (I don't recall the brand as I didn't write it down) and I would have to spend more that that to get one that did larger that 8 1/2 x 11 inch paper. Becky did 11 x 17 inch paper and it was great because I could do all my handouts for my classes as little booklets. I loved doing that! But Right now I have to focus on some other purchases. I think a new digital video camera is key so I can do some of the tutorials I want to do.

We'll see, in the mean time I have to just lump it. After years of being really, really spoiled.

I know what you mean about the "jet" printers. My inkjet is pretty good with waterresistant or waterproof inks (don't now how they are rated, but it doesn't really work well on thinner paper, it's for making photographic prints. I use it for comp prehensive layous and prints.

Everything is a trade off. If I find somethin I will definitely write about it here.

Becky cost $3100.00 where I got here. Now they come all set to link to your computor so there are other postitives. Technology marches on!!!

Roz

[Roz Stendahl]

Oh, Cheryl, I forgot to mention, sometimes I do work straight through and finish a spread in one sitting, especially if I am out and about sketching at the zoo etc. But I do think that I like to play around and let other thing just all "accumulate."