Book a Trip to Las Vegas

"Unstoppable Tuff-Girl, Sketchbook No. 2, Cover"
illustration: Carmine red Col-Erase pencil and black India ink on Bristol board.
13.97 x 21.59 cm (5.50 x 8.50 in.)
2009

Closer than I was before, yet much more to go. This bound collection covers about three and a half years of Tuff-Girl related sketches, rough drawings and doodles. If all goes as planned, it will be 48 pages including 36 black and white pages, a gate-fold poster, a single fold activity page, and the four pages of the cover.

The technical aspects have the pages printed in signature of four consecutive pages each on once-folded letter-size (8.50 x 11.00 in.) sheets. Rather than being saddle stapled like the average comic book magazine, the interior pages are stacked together and stapled front to back near the spine. Then the cover is glued at the spine around the pages in square-bound fashion.

The revised goal is to print and bind 125 copies by September 14. Entirely a hand-made undertaking, I think 125 is quite sufficient. At least the labor is free.

Cover price: a competitive $10.

I can offer no more commentary about the process of book design and binding.

About the actual artwork contained, with most of it I'm at peace, which is to say I don't have that itch to re-draw them. They are what they are. The cover and the gate-fold, however, both gave me the darnedest trouble, because, I suppose, they're the main selling features.

Check here again in 13 days. We'll see how it goes, won't we?


Oh, and if you like the Las Vegas sign logo, this is how I did that:
I used the power of computer image manipulation. First the sign was roughly incorporated in the layout in light pencil. From photo reference of the actual "Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas" sign, the "Tuff-Girl" version was designed flat, front on. Over a low-resolution scan of the rough pencil art, the logo was manipulated to achieve the desired perspective effect. With that printed out, it was transferred in pencil into the tight pencil drawing, and the whole finished with black India ink. -- Easy.