Bookbinding at its core ain't really all that difficult once you get the hang of the process. I want to show you a simple and efficient method I use to go from the vague feeling of wanting to read a book, to reading a physical book.
Potentially the most important step of the process. If one wants to make an empty book for writing and drawing, this step may be skipped over.
Other places I've heard has an inordinate quantity of E-books incluse Anna's Archive and Library Genesis, however their licensing is ambiguous, so it is up to the user to navigate responsibly and at their own risk.
This step can be skipped if one wants to make an empty notebook. Alternatively, LibreOffice is a Free and Open Source Software that lets you write your own texts that can be exported to a pdf document.
In LibreOffice Writer, under "Format/Page Style/Area/Hatch", customizable lines, dotted, or gridded pattens can even be made for an assortment of notebooks of your choosing.
Step 3 (Imposition) will require a document in PDF format, so if we have any other E-book formats we have to convert it to PDF. Calibre is a Free and Open Source Software that manages your E-books and lets you convert a variety of file types into PDF for imposition.
In Calibre, select "Add books" and select your E-book saved on your computer. When its listed in the library, select the book, and click "Convert books". In the Convert book menu, select PDF for "Output format".
The most crucial settings are in the "PDF output" menu in the sidebar. We would do best playing around with the following settings:
Finally, one useful hack to stop blue hyperlinks in the pdf from printing as blue underlined, go to "look & feel/Styling" and add the phrase "a {text-decoration:none;color:black;}" under "Extra styling". Headings and everything else can also be customised in the same way for those in the know.
With our PDF, we will need to make them printable in the form of a book. Many approaches to do this. My favourite is Bookbinder JS.
Once again, these are the crucial settings:
Printing can be expensive, it can also be cheap. Printing services can get brutally expensive though, so if you want to read more than one book, get a printer. Ecotanks are eco friendly. Consider, some printers have a advertised multiple-thousand page refill capacity, and a book, if formatted nice and dense, will run you no more than 20 pages, shorter ones no more than 5-10. I reccomend challenging yourself to cram as much properly legible text into your books as possible to save paper though, and do nicely to Mother Nature. Flip on short edge.
Quarto or octavo? Cut your papers to size. Quarto takes one cut widthwise, and octavo takes one cut lengthwise and one cut widthwise. To find the line to cut down, fold the papers in half like they taught you in school. If you know the origamist's method to cut papers by folding instead of scissors, I reccomend that too, its faster and more accurate then cutting, but leaves a nice soft edge that can't give papercuts. If you're fancy use a paper guillotine.
If the signature format is correct in last step, folio, needing no cuts, will take 4 pages per signature, quarto will need 2, and octavo just the one. Overlay papers so that they're in the correct order, (page numbers would be very useful for this), and align and fold all of them in half together to make the signature. You have to fold them together so that the signature takes on the correct shape, and to save time.
Once all signatures are folded, get a spare piece of paper, the same size as you signatures (Will be available if you made an extra flyleaf you don't want to keep. Otherwise, you will need to make one), and make markings on the long edge of the paper where you want to add sewing holes into your signatures. You will be able to use this as a ruler by putting it in the middle page of the signature, and poking along the spine crease with your sewing needle where the markings are. You can make these markings in the extra paper by folding and penciling on the fold. I do my holes at the 1/2, 1/4, and 1/8 points on the spine, for 5 holes total.
With the holes ready, you will need a needle and thread to stitch all the signatures together. I reccomend doing a chain stitch, which you can learn here.
Many other stitching methods exist, and if you want to show it off to the world, you can finish the book here. Once stitched, the book will be perfectly readable and usable, especially after resting a heavy book on it overnight to let it close flat.
2 types of cover: hardcover and softcover. I will leave this as a challenge for the bookbinder, however put simply, for a softcover we can print the cover to size with card, fold it, then stick it to the sewn text block from last step with ample PVA glue. Hardcovers get more tricky, and will need some kind of hard board, cardboard could work for this but isn't great, and a textile to cover the board. The boeard will need to be cut into 2 cover sections and a spine section, and the textile will need to be wrapped and glued around the 3 sections. Then the endsheet can be glued to the covers on each side for a finished hardcover. Headbands and other decorations may apply.
Thanks for reading <3