Tania N's Senior Project Blog

Project Title: Inspiration: Public Libraries
BASIS Advisor: Maya Cave
Internship Location: Mesa Public Library
Onsite Mentor: Cory Black, Volunteer Coordinator



Project Abstract

Since I was young I have been going to the library. From the Red Mountain branch of the Mesa Public Library with its many community services to the main branch of the Phoenix Public library with the many levels filled with books and most all in-between, I have spent time at each. From this has came a love of books—their scent, the feeling of turning a page, the slight texture of printed ink, and the soft texture of the edge of a well worn page—I love it all. And from this comes a desire to help others find and understand this love. For my project I hope to volunteer at the library in order to gain experience in the maintenance of one’s functions and further understand their role in the community. Individually I plan on writing and illustrating a book and for such there are few better places for practice and inspiration than the library for all art is derived from something and a library has both books and people to pull inspiration from.

    My Posts:

  • Binding a book

    So how is a book constructed? At the most basic level it is simply gluing the pages with content (text block) into a cover made of a more durable material, a technique often seen in paperback books. This carries a slight downside in the fact that it is terribly fragile but easily mended at least.... Read More

  • Illustration

    So, illustrations are a lot harder on a canvas seventy-seven and a half times the scale you're used to working on. Or more specifically the shading is, sketching is familiar enough as it's already the base of drafting a sprite. I was hoping to use cell shading since it's what is familiar but while the... Read More

  • The last day of the internship

    Tuesday was the last day of the internship and as such filled with tearful goodbyes, or at least goodbyes. Of course it's not actually goodbye, just a drastic cutting back of hours, but even then an extreme change still has an impact. On the broader scale the internship has been quite successful, at worst it... Read More

  • On Paper

    At first glance you might be wondering, "Paper, why write on it? It's just pulped wood isn't it", which as a sentiment is overly dismissive of such an important tool and as a statement is only partially correct. Paper historically has not used wood pulp as wood is hard and difficult to pulp to be... Read More

  • Cashier training and timescales

    First, some fun facts about the library, well only one fun fact. The not so fun fact is that the main branch of the Mesa Public Library is a grand lodge of the Freemasons; I'd add a picture but Wordpress isn't cooperating right now. The plaque is at the North-West corner of the building if... Read More

  • On the book and literary history.

    So, science fiction. It's a great genre with truly great authors, from Asimov to Leckie, Lem to McCaffrey, some of the greatest and most imaginative works of fiction have come from it (or fantasy, though given how much history the two share you can't consider one without the other. Even Asimov's Science Fiction magazine included... Read More

  • The last couple of weeks and I need to actually do these weekly

    These last couple of weeks have been the epitome of busyness; between colleges schedules changing daily, and issues with the stress related it's all been terribly horrible. Aside from that there's been plenty of work done at the library. First, was my official project, organising the science fiction and fantasy stacks. If you're familiar with... Read More

  • The last couple of weeks, slightly late

    The last couple of weeks have been rather busy at the library with a donation drive on the ninth and then the sorting of all the books resulting from such. The drive was quite successful with seventy-six donations resulting in a few hundred books (I haven't looked at the numbers but given it was three... Read More

  • A Week at the Library

    Now, a week has passed wherein I worked at the library. Most days are the same with hours of sorting books into fiction or nonfiction, then more finely by which type of nonfiction each book is. There has been more as the latter half of last week was spent packing letters; hours upon hours of... Read More

  • Finally Got Access And Started!

    So, it's been two weeks and corporate has finally updated the e-mail attached to this account, why did it take so long? Who knows, but water under the bridge etc. Anyhoo (it’s in the dictionary) it’s been two weeks so what’s happened? A lot of waiting has happened as working for the City of Mesa... Read More