I bind books :)

I do assorted art things, but bookbinding is my favorite. I do fanbinding as an imprint of Renegade Publishing.

[dragontreebindery]

Hi! I'm Rain, and I'm a bookbinder!

I do fanbinding as an imprint of Renegade Bindery @renegadepublishing

I also do custom notebooks and journals, do commissions (check my bio for availability). Message me for more information becuase I don't have a separate page set up for that at the moment.

I'll be posting more pictures of my work here in the near future!

[scratch-meowt]

my hottest take

[keeper-of-the-flames]

Counter point, those machines can make me a peach sprite.

[pusheenthenerdcat]

guys did you know the tech in that nefangled machine revolutionized preemie healthcare

[maimonideznuts]

[pusheenthenerdcat]

yeah the guy who invented them made incredibly precise infusion pumps (as opposed to gravity fed ivs) which not only meant they could give medications to teeny tiny babies safely, it's also used for insulin pumps and portable dialysis machines. the key element is that it's a peristaltic pump so the liquid stays in sterile tubing for safety

(unholy drink cloaca uses it to dispense precise amounts of flavored sugar syrup)

[hedgebotherer]

Then how the haters loved him,

As they shouted out with glee,

"Unholy Drink Cloaca

You'll go down in history!"

[renegadeguild]

Renegade Bookbinding Guild 501c3 Announcement

The Renegade Bookbinding Guild is proud to announce we are officially a 501c3 educational nonprofit! This is a significant and exciting milestone for Renegade! Renegade’s official non-profit status allows us to support the growth of our various events as they become more money and resource intensive. Renegade's focus as a nonprofit is on building community, providing education, and promoting preservation of written works.

To read more about this very exciting announcement, information is on the Renegade Bookbinding Guild website, along with details about the updates to guild membership.

501c3 Status Update

Renegade Bookbinding Guild's current board can be viewed at the link below.

The Board

Renegade can now receive tax-deductible donations!

Donate Here

Renegade will NOT move any resources behind a membership "paywall" or in any way limit current or future resources in the Renegade Bindery Discord server.

Renegade is currently recruiting volunteers to assist in the Binderary Mods & Website Designers roles, among others!

Volunteer Applications

We also have a new logo! Thank you to @starblightbindery and @runawaymarbles for their respective work in how our logos have developed over the years.

[gender-trash]

publishing companies will be like ~ooh this is a hardcover oooh it's so durable that will be $35~ and then you see the actual book and it's like. "perfect"-bound with endbands glued on crooked and a completely plain paper cover under the dust jacket. my dudes this shit is a mass market paperback with delusions of grandeur

[gender-trash]

now THIS is a hardcover

[just-evo-now]

what does this mean

[gender-trash]

i can explain in more detail with pictures when i get home from work, but executive summary:

both trade paperbacks and mass market paperbacks are usually constructed via perfect binding, where you take a stack of loose-leaf sheets and dunk the spine edge in, basically, hot-melt glue (low-temp thermoplastic with a little flexibility to it). stick a cover on the outside of that bad bitch and you're done. very easy and cheap to manufacture, but not durable; not only does the soft cover provide no protection, pages can fall out individually if the glue fails for whatever reason. (i don't have a picture handy but just grab any mass market paperback off your bookshelf and look at the spine)

typically, or perhaps traditionally, when binding a hardcover ("case-bound") book you assemble the sheets into signatures, which are sewn to each other to form a text block, like so:

(well, admittedly, using both linen tape and french link stitch is sort of the belt-and-suspenders of textblock construction. in my defense though look at the fucking size of this tome) but the point is that even before you've gotten around to gluing anything, the textblock hangs together and functions as a book, albeit an unusually wobbly one -- so if the cover completely falls off or something, the rest of the book still hangs together.

the other method of construction i see on many mass-manufacture hardcovers and some trade paperbacks is that they've folded the signatures and sewn them individually (one at a time, not to each other) -- this is easy to do on a specialized sewing machine -- and *then* potted the spine in glue, like you do for perfect binding. this is less liable to lose pages if you fuck up the spine, because instead of each page being glued in individually, they're sewn together into signatures which provide more glue surface area apiece. (i can post a picture when i get home...)

uhh oh yeah endbands. endbands are the little decorative bits that get glued onto the textblock before it gets cased in -- this is in itself sort of a cheapo mass-manufacture imitation of more traditional sewn endbands, which actually provide some structural stability; modern glued-on endbands are really just decorative. here's a picture of a sewn endband on an example book from the bookbinding museum in sf (left), and a different textblock with endbands glued on (right). (the latter also has mull glued onto it, which is like... starched cheesecloth, kind of? you can use kozo paper here too; it also helps stabilize the spine for extra durability)

anyway on mass-manufacture hardcovers i often see really half-assed endbands that are glued on crooked or slightly undersized or something and i'm like "are you even TRYING" (they are not)

and also usually on recently manufactured books the entire case (the "hard cover" of a case-bound hardcover) is covered in paper, including the hinges, which is a terrible decision because the hinges are the part of the book that MOST needs the durability, being The Primary Moving Part. at least fucking cover the spine and hinges in bookcloth i beg. please. for me

[just-evo-now]

sorry loser you lost me at this

get a real programming language dork.

[gender-trash]

thats why im using it as a clamp and not as a book :p

[gender-trash]

@just-evo-now i am back home! where my books live!! so i can take pictures of the bindings :D

a couple of perfect-bound paperbacks:

the benefit of perfect binding, such as it is, is that all the pages can be aligned with each other and the spine is nice and square. (the other benefit is that it is cheap.) but if you're folding pages into signatures you're always gonna get some creep where the inner pages of the signature extend a little bit further towards the fore-edge [edge opposite the spine] than the outer pages do; you can either leave it like that for a deckled edge or trim it off for a neater finished look. (personally i am not a huge fan of deckled edges but Madame La Guillotine can only handle so much book, you know)

a paperback and a hardcover with the signatures-potted-in-glue style (i wish i knew what it was called):

i quite like the green endband on this hardcover! matches the cover nicely, is an appropriate size, aligned well, etc. (in addition to gluing them on crooked, the other common Endband Sin is to make them too damn short and it looks ridiculous)

the cloth-bound hardcover from the first image in this post, pub date 1978:

as you can see, it has much more flexibility than the potted-in-glue style (which can bend a little bit, but cracks if you open it too far), because the signatures are sewn to each other, with some kind of mystery green paper glued over them for stability (and, deeper in the spine, brown... something. fabric?? some of my other vintage books seem to use thin brown canvas...). no endband, but honestly it doesn't really need one.

and! here is a 1945 pocket handbook for engineers (you know, with useful integrals and trig tables and unit conversions and stuff in it) in norwegian, which was falling apart when i got it (i picked it up on the cheap with the intention of hopefully fixing it someday):

the cover is nonfunctional and the stabilizing paper on the spine has gotten so crumbly as to be useless (i got about halfway through peeling it off), but the textblock itself is in pretty good condition, because the signatures are sewn securely to each other -- if you squint you can kinda tell they used kettle stitches on the ends and chain stitches in the middle and i thiiink the chain stitches are where the loose loops on the top came from. anyway, i can pretty much finish peeling off the old crumbly paper stuff and glue on some new kozo paper (and ensure the loose loops are tucked safely away/glued down) and this bad bitch will be ready for a new cover!

[macleod]

I am really going to have to start paying attention to book binding going forward.

[esoanem]

(via @trans-cuchulainn )

[griseldagimpel]

How does one tell what binding is used if one is ordering online?

[dragontreebindery]

Experimenting! Part coptic binding, part embroidered cover, all bees. Hoping to create other designs in the future.

[dragontreebindery]

Sometimes I make things that are not books, which usually involves patching together a design from photos online and fiddling with it until it works. I have a draft of the overall design that I can send to anyone interested (dm me) and I am considering posting the proofed version whenever I finish it.

[dragontreebindery]

Back into binding with some tiny book earrings and keychains! These are available for purchase, and commissions are also open.

[dragontreebindery]

Hello there!

After moving and having to find a new printer, I am once again open for custom book commissions! Print books*, journals, tiny book earrings, props, you name it!

DM me for details.

*Subject to permission of rights holder. No profit is made from fanbinding works.

[gayvampyr]

i hate that every time i look for color studies and tips to improve my art and make it more dynamic and interesting all that comes up are rudimentary explanations of the color wheel that explain it to me like im in 1st grade and just now discovering my primary colors

[gayvampyr]

“red and green are opposites 🥰” cool now how do i paint a tree with pinks and blues without it looking like a child’s finger painting or incongruous blobs of rainbow vomit

[gayvampyr]

ok i can’t explain it very well but im looking for tips and techniques for rendering art like

with specifically the highlights and colors being hues that compliment each other, don’t distract from the scene, and make it more interesting/visually appealing

is it too much to ask

[moreclaypigeons]

gonna drop some sources I have saved on Pinterest! I don't know if these all link back to the original sources so apologies for that

cohesive but still contrasting

This kind of talks about color and composition

This is a bit about landscape specifically

Values & composition

Contrast in composition

Balance in colors & values

This one's more for palette building but I think it's useful and can be applied to the other ones

Cohesion within compositions/lighting

"Chromatic fringe" - I also see people using this with shading, they bring in a transition color that is a different hue than the base color or shadow, it makes it so that less vibrancy is lost and it doesn't get muddy!

This one specifically has a lot of process behind the style of painting you're looking for!

Also one of my favorite artists who makes bright and colorful art like this is Not Sorry Art on TikTok & YouTube, her website is here and it's<3 my fav. She has some videos where you can see her process

With the oranges painting you put as an example, I noticed they painted the lighter values more toward yellow - they also exaggerated the hues of the undertones of the photo, so I'm guessing they either did it in their head or bumped the saturation up to get a closer look! I really love these paintings you shared and I definitely share your desire to paint/draw like that :)

[gayvampyr]

thanks this is super helpful! /gen

[wow-very-emo-such-bands]

What people think why i became a bookbinder: Oh she wants to explore her artistic horizon with those pretty leather bound books of hers. She even gives them out as gifts to her friends. It most likely helps her with anxiety or maybe she just wanted a more special costume made notebook.

Why I actually became a bookbinder: I just illegally downloaded and printed out several of my favourite fanfics and books and started binding them into books cuz I love reading them but looking at screens for too long gives me headaches.

[dial666]

op youre fucking big brained oh my god

[wow-very-emo-such-bands]

If you want to i can send you a link to some of the Tutorial videos i started binding my fanfic books.

[cyanidevamp]

PLEASE SEND ME THE LINK I WANT TO DO THIS SO BAD 

[alexstyx]

PLEASE SEND LINKS OP PLEASE I BEG YOU

[wow-very-emo-such-bands]

@laughuntilourribsgettough @starduststyx upon request: A tutorial playlist for my personal favourite bookbinding methods

Longstitch binding

https://youtu.be/a_LZ-BWhH_Q

2)Japanese Binding

https://youtu.be/j-r6c_trSxY

3) Belgian Binding

https://youtu.be/w-oct9Ttp1g

4) Coptic stitch binding

https://youtu.be/TdHo8NtDOXc

5) Case Bookbinding

https://youtu.be/Av_rU-yOPd4

[dragontreebindery]

Also check out @renegadepublishing for more resources and guides for binding, typesetting, and more!

[startledoctopus]

https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/articles/2022-05-04/most-transgender-children-stick-with-gender-identity-5-years-later-study

[quailfence]

[Image description: Text that reads “But to dig deeper, Olson and her team focused on more than 300 children who had undergone a social transition.

About two-thirds were transgender boys, meaning boys who had been assigned a female gender at birth; about one-third were transgender girls.

Solely on the social transition front, Olson noted that over five years only about 7% of the children transitioned back at least once.

By the end of the study period, 94% of the kids continued to identify as the gender they had embraced when first socially transitioning. (That figure includes the just over 1% who had at one point re-transitioned back to their birth gender, before then returning back again to the gender to which they had initially transitioned.)

Of the 6% who did not stick with their initial transition, a little more than 3% described themselves as non-binary by the end of the study period, while just under 3% said they identified with their birth gender. (Identifying with one’s birth gender was notably more common among kids who had socially transitioned before the age of 6.) “Interestingly, we are (italics) not (end italics) finding that the youth who re-transitioned in our study are experiencing that as traumatic,” Olson noted. “We’ve been finding that when youth are in supportive environments — supportive in the sense of being OK with the exploration of gender — both the initial transition and a later re-transition are fine.”

Indeed, “socially transitioning youth are [simply] making the same ‘decisions’ that cisgender children are making, in that they are seeking clothes, hairstyles, names, accessories, activities and playmates that reflect their gender identity and the resources in their community,” said Matt Goldenberg, a psychologist in adolescent medicine with the Seattle Children’s Gender Clinic.” End description]

@a-captions-blog

[kyraneko]

Huh, it’s almost like almost the entirety of negative trans experience is based on bigotry and dysmorphia and letting people be themselves without mistrusting them about whether they mean it enough is actually really fucking helpful.

Not that “we can’t let you transition because what if you change your mind, you might become as miserable as you are now with much the same opportunities for fixing it” ever made any sense as a concern in the first place.

“But you might regret it” is largely a front for “I’d rather you be miserable the way I want you to be than risk you being happy in a condition I don’t want you to be.” They’re projecting. They are so worried about you regretting being trans because it mirrors how THEY would regret you being trans, and your happiness wouldn’t be enough to get them over it.

[fencehopping]

Hubble Telescope image vs. James Webb Telescope

[pangur-and-grim]

honestly the older I get, the more I value kindness. everything is confusing and hard, the best thing we can to is be nice to eachother even if that’s cheesy!

[dragontreebindery]

the smallest of books

[dragontreebindery]

smolest of smol

[dragontreebindery]

may i ask how did you do the inking for your newest book? it looks fantastic, stark and even across the pages!

I'm glad you like it, thank you!

I've been interested in doing proper gilding, but that's a lot more materials and skills than I have at the moment, but ink on the edges still gives a bit of that effect.

First off I trimmed my textblock down to a nice smooth edge. My personal approach to this is to use the blade from a hand plane-- since it has a flat edge and fits my hand nicely--braced against my press.

Shiny. [Image description: the textblock of a book between the boards of a finishing press. The block is trimmed to be smooth and glossy.]

Then I tucked my textblock in a sheet of wax paper (to keep my press clean), clamped it, and used a bit of foam (a sponge would also work, I think) to apply small amounts of India Ink at a time. I found that thin coats spread quickly over the edges works best. You don't want ink to soak into the pages.

[Image description: the textblock in a laying press, between two sheets of wax paper smudged with black ink. The block is coated with black ink, still damp.]

The ink dried pretty quickly, and I did several thin coats, then left it in the press overnight.

When it was dry I buffed it with some scrap fabric (still while pressed), then gently bent the block to release the pages.

[Image description: the finished textblock laying open on a wooden work surface, with blank pages and edges inked black. It lies on many narrow strips of paper from trimming and has a silicon scraper, a bone folder, a bottle of black ink, and a small stained piece of foam in the background.]

It turned out very pretty and I spent the next week yearning for fancy inks.

[dragontreebindery]

Another notebook; this time experimenting with some ink on the edges of my textblock.