pop-up books – John O'Leary

British International School Budapest

April 7, 2017September 13, 2017 by N4 Sketch Pad, posted in 3D, Books, pop-ups, Schools, workshops

Back from Budapest where I spent time working with the kids and staff at the British International School. I was helped by the school’s wonderful librarian who acted as my wing-woman for the entire 3 days and made sure everything ran to schedule.

After my initial school talk, I ran a series of workshops with all classes where I showed the children how to make their own pop-up books.

A pattern for the sessions emerged fairly early on when I matched each class to a mechanism, guiding them through the process so they all had a completed pop-up framework ready to go. Following a discussion about their storyboard ideas – the blank storyboards were sent ahead of my arrival – I used some of their material to demonstrate how to convert mechanism into fully illustrated 3D scene. Some of the images show these, others show the children’s work-in-progress.

The school places huge importance on reading and runs several initiatives to encourage the love of books. At a certain point each day, everyone drops everything to read for five minutes. The doors were also being decorated as book covers while I was there – check out the Detective Paws ‘door cover’.

Pop-up Beard Book

January 23, 2017January 23, 2017 by N4 Sketch Pad, posted in Books, illustrations, pop-ups, workshops

If you like beards and pop-up books and have young children, then this is the workshop for you.

Make your own beard-themed pop-up creation in my next hands-on, half-term workshop at the Florence Nightingale Museum. For my return visit to this lovely venue located within St Thomas‘ Hospital, I’m taking my inspiration from ‘The Age of the Beard’ exhibition currently on show there to deliver three 1-hour family sessions encompassing 3D paper skills, design and illustration.

Learn how to make pop-ups with moving parts and how to assemble a finished book.

The workshops are suitable for 5+ with parents and carers. Adults will be encouraged to take part but don’t worry, no experience necessary and results are guaranteed. Materials will be provided, you just bring the creativity!

The workshops are free but normal entry fee to the museum applies. Booking is recommended.

Family Workshop: Pop-up Beards!
Wednesday 15 February, 11.00-12.30, 1.30-3.00 & 3.00-4.30

Admission
This workshop is free with admission

Booking details
Places are limited, to book please visit https://billetto.co.uk/en/users/the-florence-nightingale-museum-trust

Venue
Florence Nightingale Museum, 2 Lambeth Palace Road, London SE1 7EW

Spooky Ride

October 31, 2016November 3, 2016 by N4 Sketch Pad, posted in Books, illustrations, pop-ups

Happy Hallloween! Here’s a video of Spooky Ride, my first ever pop-up book, published by Tango Books way back in 2001. Spooky ride was the start of a long and fruitful relationship with Tango Books that still continues. The paper engineer for the project was the very patient Matt Johnstone whom I bombarded with questions at the time. It wasn’t until pop-up book 2 that I took on that role myself, picking it up as I went along.

I’d seen a funfair ghost train in Finsbury Park and wondered how that could translate into 3D book. The final book has one continuous train track running through holes in the pages, out the back of the book, round to the front and back in again – so you can read it over and over and over and over… My brief was to base the illustration style a little on ‘Funnybones’, keep the colours pure and make it scary! – well, sort of, it’s a children’s book.

tango-spooky-ride-vampire-3-grey

Pop-up Flashback – small book selection

August 15, 2016September 14, 2016 by N4 Sketch Pad, posted in 3D, Books, pop-ups, theatre

The video shows pop-ups from the second children’s theatre production I co-created for Wordpepper which finished it’s final tour earlier this year. The show was presented by Half Moon Theatre in association with Apples and Snakes.

I made 19 pop-up books in total for the show, from very small to extremely large constructions which opened up to form the set. The video shows a small section of the smaller ones. These presented a type of illusion, being made to look like full books but often containing only one pop-up design to illustrate a moment in the show.

Popping up in Stopsley

February 29, 2016September 15, 2016 by N4 Sketch Pad, posted in 3D, pop-ups, Schools, workshops

I was back in Stopsley Primary last Friday to see Y4’s finished pop-up books and to talk to the parents about the 2 day project. After learning a number of basic techniques on day 1 and sharing them between classes, the children went on to develop these in their own individual ways to produce books combining text, images and pop-ups.

I felt they had achieved a fantastic result and there were plenty of examples of where the children had experimented, come up with original ideas and managed to figure things out for themselves.

One girl inverted the large V fold to create a parallel plane on which to stick a palm tree – hard to explain but it makes sense if you look at the picture (last one) – and I’m not quite sure how she figured this out. One boy created an arch based on the vertical V fold which probably would have been too complicated to teach to that age group in the first place. Unfortunately, no picture for that one but the point is they were able to come up with their own designs and techniques using what they’d been shown on the first day – very impressive!
Also worthwhile mentioning the wonderful teachers who took part in this, in particular, Jason Sutch who co-ordinated the project.

Stopsley Primary

January 7, 2016 by N4 Sketch Pad, posted in 3D, Books, pop-ups, Schools, workshops

First school of the year tomorrow at Stopsley Primary in Luton for a 2 and a half day project in pop-up book design.

Day 1 will consist of learning the basics. Each of the 3 Year 4 classes will learn techniques which they will then share between them before my next visit. Images show the ‘manual’ I’ll be leaving to guide them and to show the starting point for day 2 when we develop the books further.

Treasure

July 17, 2015September 22, 2015 by N4 Sketch Pad, posted in Books, illustrations, pop-ups

What I like about Illustration Friday is that it gives me the chance to revisit some of my past work. This week’s word is ‘Treasure’. The picture shows, what else, artwork from pop-up picture book no.2, Pirate Treasure Hunt, published by Tango Books.

World Book Week 2015

March 9, 2015 by N4 Sketch Pad, posted in 3D, Books, pop-ups, Schools, workshops

Back-to-back schools last week for the week of World Book Day. A lot of advance planning is always required for these but the enthusiasm of the kids and their eagerness to dive in and get creative always make it all worthwhile. This year’s schools were St. Pauls in Friern Barnet, All Saints in Fulham, Coppermill Primary in Walthamstow and St. Pauls and All Hallows in Tottenham. Here’s the montage: