Vanishing fore-edge paintings

2022-05-2917:4113419www.foredgefrost.co.uk

What is a vanishing Fore-edge Painting? Unlike the spine and covers of a bookbinding, the page edges are not usually decorated, however… A vanishing fore-edge painting is where the leaves of a book…

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What is a vanishing Fore-edge Painting?

Unlike the spine and covers of a bookbinding, the page edges are not usually decorated, however…

A vanishing fore-edge painting is where the leaves of a book are fanned and an image applied to the stepped surface.

If the page edges are gilded or marbled, the painting miraculously disappears when the book is relaxed. When the book is fanned again it magically re-appears!

In addition the leaves can be fanned backwards or twisted, allowing yet more paintings to be applied.

In the case of thicker books they can be split and divided, offering the chance of adding still more decoration.

SINGLE fore-edge painting

ALL EDGE PAINTINGS where the book is twisted to reveal the top and bottom page edges

TWO-WAY DOUBLE fore-edge paintings where the pages are fanned in both directions

SPLIT DOUBLE where a thicker book is divided

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Comments

By UberFly 2022-05-301:40

I have nothing smart to add to this other than this is very cool and I've never seen this before. Thanks!

By bombcar 2022-05-2918:362 reply

I suspect gilt-edging is cheap to add now (the Barnes and Noble “classics” in hardback have it and they’re not very pricey) - I wonder if a modern process could be designed to “print” these fore-edge paintings.

By eurasiantiger 2022-05-2921:282 reply

It would be difficult. The modern mass-produced book is first bound/glued and then cut to size, and consequently has page offset tolerances measured in millimeters. Something like this would require printing precision and page offset measured in microns.

By jfoutz 2022-05-305:221 reply

I'm not sure - if you're willing to tolerate more gunk on the edge of the pages. say the book is cut +/- 2.5 mm - each page has .5 of print on the edges, and each page image shifted by .01 mm (or whatever is appropriate). cut the edge wherever, it'll work out.

Glued edge registration needs to be super consistent though - micron accuracy. Maybe you mean the page on the binding/glue needs to be super accurate. I guess, yeah, if pages shift in binding all bets are off. So if there is a shift, or different pages expand or contract under binding differently than their neighbors, that would make it super hard.

another approach might be printing right on the edge of the cut pages, let the ink diffuse into the side, then apply the gilt over that to hide the picture.

Neat problem to armchair. I'm not really willing to put in the time or money or both to figure it out. So ultimately, I'll take your word.

By andreareina 2022-05-305:39

I think the printing process itself lacks the requisite accuracy. If it were in the cutting I'd expect to see more instances of the cuts being crooked wrt the printed matter.

By xwdv 2022-05-2922:211 reply

I expect to see it mass produced in a few years.

By _nalply 2022-05-306:142 reply

It's a niche feature on a declining medium.

Probably not.

(By the way, I didn't downvote you.)

By leto_ii 2022-05-306:35

I don't think physical books are really a declining medium.

As Taleb would put it, they're 'Lindy' [1].

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lindy_effect

By xwdv 2022-05-3016:47

Declining mediums are great for adding niche features because the people still buying them are enthusiasts who will tolerate higher prices, thus you can add features like this to increase the appeal.

By kbob 2022-05-2919:51

For single copies or small batches, I'm thinking an inkjet printer could be modified to print the image, and a clamp designed to hold the pages in place during printing. I'm not sure how to apply the gilt. Maybe with a paint roller?

By robocat 2022-05-306:191 reply

The painting is added after the book edge is cut. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fore-edge_painting

There’s a YouTube of a guy doing it by hand.

By chrisseaton 2022-05-308:322 reply

> The painting is added after the book edge is cut.

As opposed to being built into the paper like a tree ring?

By thfuran 2022-05-3012:191 reply

The text is printed before the book edge is trimmed and the words aren't built into the tree.

By chrisseaton 2022-05-3012:53

I don't understand what you mean - the text isn't literally on the cut edge, like this image is.

By saati 2022-05-3012:101 reply

Everything else is printed before cutting.

By chrisseaton 2022-05-3012:532 reply

The surface this image is on does not exist until the cut is made.

By webmaven 2022-05-3016:00

> The surface this image is on does not exist until the cut is made.

Not so. The painted surface is the pages' surface, and definitely exists prior to the cut. The surface that doesn't previously exist (the pages' edges) isn't the one being painted, it is gilded instead (which serves to hide the painting when the book is closed and the pages at rest).

By sophacles 2022-05-3014:26

It's easy to imagine that this can be made by printing the edge stuff along with the text then precisely cutting.

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