I just recently finished this exciting recover of the paperback Call of Cthulhu role playing supplement book, "Ramsey Campbell's- Goatswood, and less pleasant places", published by Chaosium.
The finished book measures 11.25" tall by 8.75" wide and 1" thick. the new hardcover was created with paper covered chipboard, in the usual manner. There is not much new in the way of construction technique for this project, so I didn't bother with any construction photos.
The finish is a mottled dark green and black with copper highlights. The most striking and unique features of this project are the front title plate and frame, and the rear goat's head silhouette applique. Both are of my own design. They were made from chipboard, and have been given the same antiqued copper finish. They were intended to look very old and dirty. The whole cover was made to have a sort of unhealthy antique appearance.
The tack heads that dot the appliques and which ring the edges of the book are much easier to see in the larger version of the photos (click through). They are real metal brads that were pushed through the cover and cut off at the back.
The title plate was printed on a special paper made from coffee leaf. It has a natural red blotchy parchment like color that did not require any dying or antiquing. I glued it to a piece of card stock to give it more body and then glued it to the back side of the frame.The bookmark is black cloth ribbon.
The inside front cover has a blank book plate (also known as an "ex libris" plate) for the owner to fill out at his discretion. This is the same book plate that I used in the Shadowmanor.com journals that I did not have pictures of, so just in case you were wondering what it looked like, here it is. The book plate was sort of an afterthought (it was a left over from the Shadowmanor journals) and I don't really think the coloration goes that well with the end papers I chose. Perhaps in future versions I will try something else.
This project was very hard for me to get off the ground. It sat dormant in the early stages of production for over a year because I just couldn't wrap my head around what I wanted to do, design wise. Even as I forced myself to move forward on this, I was very uncertain of the design. It wasn't until I came up with the title plate frame that things started to come together for me and I started getting excited about it. Now that it is finished, I am quite happy with it, and I think I might even do another one just like it (or very similar).
This item will be going up on ebay very shortly (perhaps even today). The original book, without modification, has a cover price of $28, so it will not be cheap, but I think it will be an excellent unique and usable display item for someone who is serious about his or her Call of Cthulhu books. I have a whole line of these recovered supplement books planned and which I hope to have finished in time for the holidays. I also have another three or four Cthulhu Cycle books that will be ready in about a week, so keep watching my ebay page if you are interested.
Update: I posted this item on ebay, and it sold within an hour. It is one of the top two fastest selling items I have ever listed. I never even got around to sending out a notice on my email list (I'm sick right now, so I took a nap). I did post about it on Yog-Sothoth.com.I don't normally list these kinds of items for international sale, as I hate dealing with international shipping. But this time I did. This book will be headed to England. I hope I charged enough for the shipping.
No comments:
Post a Comment