Tale-ing Fragments #11: Expedition log, second entry

Hi everyone,
I'm back with the second entry of the botanical expedition journal, this time I'm sharing a double page spread with a bird theme. Like with the first page, I filmed the process of making these two and you can find the video on my YouTube channel or right here:

I'm still playing with the formats of these videos, trying to figure out the best way to make them interesting and informative for you. This time I focused more on the layering of the pages, skipping some of the basics (like inking of the pages, which was covered in last week's video), and tried to make it short and to the point. The narration is more about the ideas behind the details and less about explaining each action I make, so more about how I decided what to do than about what I'm doing.

So, for example, with the right page I talk more about the logic of layering and what each element adds to the composition and story.

This page continues a lot of the themes that were set in the page I shared last week, like the specimen bags, so I explain what continues last week's page and what's new. I also talk about layering and using different generation stamping to get more interest and character for your project. In this case it's all about getting that faded worn look.

 I do try to have a technique focus in each video, and in this one it's stitch book binding, which I used to make the ‘Nests and Eggs of Familiar Birds’ booklet in the left page.

Some of you might recognize the cover as an ephemera piece from Tim Holtz's Idea-ology line. It fit with the bird theme of these pages and I thought it would be cool to make a small booklet out of it, as if it was a guide book that the journal owner used in his work. I only added a few pages that I found online, just to give the feel of it, but I really love the result.

So far the pages I made are still about setting the scene, so all the information we have is about our guy's work: collecting natural specimens, maybe sending them to a lab or research institution of some sort. Next week we’ll start seeing more hints about him and build his story.

As I mentioned, this form of sharing my work is very new to me and I'm still experimenting with the style of the videos and other elements, sort of an expedition of my own :) 

I'd really love to hear what you think and what you'd like to see, should I cover more pages in each video? Do you like the shorter version or prefer to see the whole process from beginning to end? If you have any questions I'd be happy to hear them too!

I hope you're enjoying this so far and that you'll join me again next week,

Take care and have a wonderful weekend!

xx

Naama