Sketchbooks at the Ready

MechaByrd · Post by **MechaByrd** » Sun Mar 14, 2004 9:23 pm

Just curious as to what kind of notebook everyone is carrying around with them. What would you say is the ideal sketchbook to have with you at all times?

I haven't found a portable sketchbook I liked. I really like composition notebooks, as far as the way they are bound [sturdy yet flexible] and the size [about 18X26cm / 7X10in]. I like that they are put together with a string. You don't have a spine to wrestle with. And I absolutely hate anything spiral-bound. The only thing is that they are lined. Moleskine books would be perfect for this, if they only came in the rght size. Does such a thing exist? I've been searching for sewn/stitched/thread-bound sketchbooks/journals all over

MB's topics are poorly written, out-of-step w/ the community, boring, and consequently short-lived.

Superlance · Post by **Superlance** » Sun Mar 14, 2004 9:33 pm

I have uh... an imagination!!

Psiogen · Post by **Psiogen** » Sun Mar 14, 2004 9:36 pm

I'm currently using a hardbound 5.5x8.5 inch sketchbook. Sturdy 'n' portable. It has a Shins sticker and a character from a Chick tract stuck to the front.

Chaos Cricket · Post by **Chaos Cricket** » Sun Mar 14, 2004 9:42 pm

I've got a black hardback 8.5"x11" sketchbook currently in use. I've also got an older sketchbook of a similar variety already full. And a spiral hardback one also full. And God only knows how many loose drawings in folders and laying around all over. But the sketchbook is the repository of ideas and concepts and storylines, mostly. And it serves me well.

Brockway · Post by **Brockway** » Sun Mar 14, 2004 9:46 pm

Actually, I use a cheap plastic clipboard with a stack of card stock in the clip. No blue lines to deal with, a nice hard surface, and if I draw something good I can ink and scan it easily later.

MechaByrd · Post by **MechaByrd** » Sun Mar 14, 2004 9:53 pm

Superlance wrote:I have uh... an imagination!!

Off topic in one post; phenomenal.
Yeah, I pretty much expected this. My tastes are pretty strange and I am picky about the dumbest things; I am my own niche market. Market research cannot hope to reach me in my eccentric spider-hole! I will grow a beard, and superglue rubberbands to pennies, so that they can be hung on ppl's doorknobs.

But really, have you ever seen a sketchbook like the one I described?

My robot caught fire due to unstable motor-control architecture. Counfounded CompE majors don't know what to do with more than five volts. I'll teach you to send my project careening across the competition grounds.

SL, what is that even supposed to mean? If you're going to go off-topic, pick a new topic. Is that what GD is nowadays?; a great tangle of non sequitur comments?

Well then I'm all for it.

Plaid elephant cheese, Ozy! Banana!

Superlance · Post by **Superlance** » Sun Mar 14, 2004 10:04 pm

MechaByrd wrote:
Superlance wrote:I have uh... an imagination!!
SL, what is that even supposed to mean?

Uh, it means I only have a huge 24x36 sketch pad which is not very easy to carry around?

MechaByrd · Post by **MechaByrd** » Sun Mar 14, 2004 10:15 pm

Superlance wrote:
MechaByrd wrote:
Superlance wrote:I have uh... an imagination!!
SL, what is that even supposed to mean?
Uh, it means I only have a huge 24x36 sketch pad which is not very easy to carry around?

Well, buy a smaller one! What if a better H-Bridge motor controller board layout pops into your head on the way to breakfast? You can't easily pull a 24X36 pad from your knapsack and beat a teammate with it!

Paraskeva · Post by **Paraskeva** » Sun Mar 14, 2004 10:45 pm

I've got one of those wire bound, 100% recycled mannila books, comes with like 200 pgs.
I used to have 7 or 8 filled 100 pgs of those large blank 8.5x11 books elementary students use, plus 3 more of those bigger sketchbooks filled as well...
Then my parents threw them out....

Now i have only one sketch book left, and i have to start all over again,.. new stuff. But i have lost some dear friends this way.
Life sucks when you live at home and sketching is relatively frowned upon all the time...especially when i could be so-called applying myself- meh, whatever.
God said
"Do not love the works of your own hands to readily, for they have their origin in me..." Don't remember which of the good books that's from, but it looks like things could get pretty philosophical right about now.

Tim · Post by **Tim** » Sun Mar 14, 2004 10:55 pm

"None of the above."

Regular, run-of-the-mill, 8.5x11" loose-leaf computer printer paper, baby!

Heffaloop · Post by **Heffaloop** » Mon Mar 15, 2004 12:06 am

I don't have a sketch book... I just doddle on any available paper and then trace over it with drafting paper for the 'good copy'

KittyKatBlack · Post by **KittyKatBlack** » Mon Mar 15, 2004 12:13 am

I have a standard 8X11 sketchpad spiral bound at the top. It's awesome for scanning, since I don't have to fight with a spine. It was a $1.99. For 100 pages, that's not all that bad. (Actually, I bought two, just incase I never found them again and ended up using the first one up.)

BERSERKERCREW · Post by **BERSERKERCREW** » Mon Mar 15, 2004 12:17 am

hardbound 8x11, always ripping out pages tho,

can't stand the wired one, does more damage when u rip rip riiiiip!!!

Mr.Bob · Post by **Mr.Bob** » Mon Mar 15, 2004 5:21 am

You say portable sketchbook, so I'm taking that as the thing you take around with you to draw on.
I've got a proper pad for drawing my more dedicated and serious stuff (like my webcomic) but that never leaves my house, seeing as its A3 and all (It's spiral bound in case you're interested, and it has the puntured page deal to make tearing out the pages an easier task). But the drawing pad I walk around with is one of those palm sized tiny pads with peel-off pages of which I've got a great big pile of - all stol..uh.. borrowed from my waiting job.
I'm not one to lug around a bag everywhere I go so that I can just carry a book. Nope, not me, I carry something which I can put in my pocket. It's mega useful for quick-sketches, doodles or jotting down ideas. And even when I don't use that note pad I usually just use printer paper, exercise books, file covers, beer coasters, lecture notes or somethin depending on loaction and availiability (which all now have to be kept together in a larger plastic folder to prevent any of my ideas or storylines from getting lost)
I do have a proper sketchbook though! Hearing Cricket's description, I'd say mine is just like his - but I've hardly ever used it.

How typical is that?
I've draw everywhere and on anything but my sketchbook!

LAGtheNoggin · Post by **LAGtheNoggin** » Mon Mar 15, 2004 6:04 am

Cheap as chips stitched A5, one hundred pages for 99p and comes in two blocks of easier to carry fifty pages, my kinda' portable!

I used to lug around an 135gsm 50 page A5 spiral bound (my preferred choice) but the paper was of such high quality I wouldn't touch it, if it's not cheap I won't draw on it. I also carry a small boat load of loose scrap paper folded to A5, even cheaper still but it does the job. Completely useless for scanning though (more often than not it's free paper the printer spewed out).

Mostly I prefer to sketch in Photoshop if I've got the choice which is about as cheap consumable wise as you can get ^_^

SuperSnob · Post by **SuperSnob** » Mon Mar 15, 2004 6:07 am

I had two that were exactly the same: coil-bound, slightly smaller than 8 1/2 x 11", 100 pages (double-sided). I finished one at the end of December (and that marks the VERY first time I've EVER finished a sketchbook) and have been slacking off in drawing in the second one (but I'm working on drawing These Days, so, uh, it's okay...?). Not only that, I bought a NEW one on Saturday which is slightly bigger and has 75 pages single-sided. For that one, I plan on only using one side of the page and trying to PAINT, cause I'm gonna learn how to paint if it kills me.

The first two had extremely ugly neon pink covers, so I made them uglier by covering them with electrical tape and sticking red/yellow and/or green lettering and Factory logos to them with packing tape.

Edit: For the longest time I was using a 200-page hardcover book which I quit using because I couldn't seem to fill the damn thing, and it was a bitch to scan anything out of it. Thus my switch to coil-bound books: they actually lay perfectly flat on the scanner.

Turnsky · Post by **Turnsky** » Mon Mar 15, 2004 6:25 am

a Quill Visual arts dairy, which is A4, and spiral bound, 120 pages of blank goodness.. and the pencils love it..

but, i also use a wacom graphics tablet too.. but seeing as the whole thing is more than a foot square, it's not portable..

i use a green clipboard with a max-payne 2 sticker on the back and some sheets of spare paper for inking..

Jops · Post by **Jops** » Mon Mar 15, 2004 7:25 am

I use simple paper for printers that get archived in a blue file.
No actual sketchbook.

Bright spark · Post by **Bright spark** » Mon Mar 15, 2004 7:30 am

spiral binder book, glue bound book, little pocket book, lecture pad, computer paper...

Basically what ever I have on me at the time.

YarpsDat · Post by **YarpsDat** » Mon Mar 15, 2004 7:49 am

For drawing I use regular, A4 printer paper, I put into a clipboard.
But for carry-around sketchbook I use...
regular, A4 printer paper, folded three times (that makes it A7?)
Then it's small enough to fit in palm, or any pocket, and sturdy enough to write on.
When all the available surfaces get covered with sketches, I unfold it, and refold in a different way. When it's all full, I add it to my ever groving pile of folded A4 pages, and take a new blank page to make anew sketchbook.

Price: less than a cent a piece. ^_^

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