I visited an antique book dealer in York yesterday. I dont think he was particularly happy about it, but he allowed me to take some pictures of his 18th century biology and botany books. Above are some Lithographs of human biology illustration. They are really detailed, because back then it was the only means of recording this kind of information. Now with the advent of technology these books arent so neccessary, but their accuracy is still great in terms of detail and the page layout is something I can still consider for the publication I am currently producing.
I got alot of insight into how to layout a page in this mannor because of the amount of different books about different species of animal that were available to look at.
Some hand coloures copper plate etchings here. It took me back to my previous course where alot of my work was driven by this print process and made me think it would be great to produce an etched image for my publication. The line work is very fine, and the approach I am taking because of different research sources I have been informed by, obviously my ilustration is going to look different, but personally I dont think you can beat the classic 18th century illustration.
I found these pages which are all from the same book, which catalogues insects. The catalogging is absolutely comprehensive, and would have obviously been a very useful, functional tool for bugspotters of the 18thC.
This set me off thinking about extra pages I could add to my book such as a page, with every illustration on it, with the animals split into their different species families and their seperate Genus's layed out in almost a Darwinesque/ infographic hybrid tree of life. This research has definately blown the content of this book wide open again, which is great because it all goes towards making the book far more substantial.
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