It was a bit of a process to get the process of piecing this thing together just right. I started out in, I think, the correct fashion by creating each individual page separately. Then I built a print sheet where the pages would be organized into foldable pieces. Since it was such a short document, I wanted everything to fold together instead of stacking folds next to each other. Honestly, I don't know enough about book binding to know which would be better. I do know that it took me some mental gymnastics to get the placement of each page right for this method of binding. The one distinct problem that I ran into was getting the number of pages correct. Each page technically housed four pages. Therefore, the sixteen-page document I had generated was actually lacking two pages.
Wait.
But how?
That was my initial thought. I need four pages per folded sheet and I have sixteen pages. That's perfect. Except I wanted to use a transitional medium to connect the pages to the cover. This medium needed a surface to attach to on the front and back of the book. Which is to say, I needed two blanks to bind the book the way I wanted to. Thus I actually needed eighteen pages for the book to layout correctly. I had to generate two additional "fluff" pages at the last minute to get the project to layout correctly (and also correct the four-page layouts I had already established. I got myself so confused trying to get the layouts just right that I eventually had to draw myself a diagram just to keep it straight.
In the end, it only took four separate printings to get the project just right. And this also included a second mistake I made along the way: bad medium. Fortunately, I discovered this mistake while attempting to bind one of the sixteen page documents, so I had good excuses for a reprint to correct the book and solve two simultaneous problems. So what was the bad menium? Felt. When I saw the felt, I thought it would be perfect. It is sturdy, easy to cut, retains its shape, doesn't fray and glues well. However, it is also incredibly thick. So the connecting medium ended up being thicker than the entire book otherwise, which made for an awkward product. I found that using some thin cardstock worked far better for the connecting medium on this project.
Sadly, I don't have a picture of the finished product, because I always forget to take pictures as I am working on projects. We had some faux leather on hand ("leatherette" or some such) which made for a very nice soft cover.
Another lesson I learned along the way was that Super 77 spray is not ideal for binding a book. It works great and creates a tight bond. However, laying out the pieces to spray and then attach was also awkward for me and led to mis-alignment. I found that using a glue stick provided a much more precise and controllable situation for piecing the book together. I used clear gorilla glue for the back edge of the binding while attaching the cover, but then discovered that gorilla glue will bleed straight through printed paper - even with a gloss coating. It didn't destroy the end result, but in the future I will likely not reuse gorilla glue or even superglue for the cover. Or, if I do, I will have to use some kind of wrap for the bound pages to make sure things are bound well but not being destroyed by the binding agent.
Ah, and now I remember another lesson learned. The sizing of my pages caused problems. I used a 4 inch width so that I could print the whole project on standard 8.5x11 sheets of paper, double-sided, so that eight pages would fit per sheet (cuts down on printing costs too). a 4 inch width is problematic, though, because it is just a bit wider than a standard, consumer stapler can handle without mangling the pages and placing the staples in sometimes unpredictable spots (not a very pretty binding). I ended up needing to use a long-arm stapler to actually bind the pages in the top-to-bottom layout I was aiming at. I think if I had left even more margin on the inner edge of each page and stapled them in a left-to-right fashion I could have avoided that need, but I am not sure which version of binding is more effective in the long run.
Summary: I know nothing about binding a book, but I had tons of fun putting this project together. I thought the final product looked really, really nice. If I get a chance to photograph it (already handed out to the affected player), I will add the picture later. For now, I can just include the images of each page (which I am also proud of - an afternoon of writing and design work).
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