I love pop up anything and collect alot of pop up books. Not only as reference for my own Crankbunny work but mainly just to enjoy! I've never being formally trained in paper engineering, I look up to Robert Sabuda and Matthew Reinhart. Each of them are pop up gods and they've brought back the art form in many fresh new ways. I love love love how all their enthusiasm for the 'pop up arts' spills out with each page turn. Each book seems to get bigger and more complicated and amazing. They sometimes teach classes at Pratt Institute and run their business in NYC with a gazillion little paper cutter gnomes running about (ok, its a small staff of gnomes).
Here is a wonderful movie I recently found of both of them going through a recently finished Fairies pop up book (it's awesome - see I'm loving fairies now!) and also holding one of my favorite books that they did with Tomie DePaola called "Brava, Strega Nona!".
Inside the Pop-Up Studio from paul b on Vimeo.
The fairy book is called "Encyclopedia Mythologica: Fairies and Magical Creatures"
Excerpt from Robert: "....that's why pop-ups I think have survived and are really being embraced because it's magic without electricity. You know what I mean? When you turn the page of one of our books, you think, "Oh my god. How is that even possible?" and it's between two boards that make a book and that's a rare thing in our lives today to feel, very rare...."
Here's a link to it -- click here --! I highly recommend reading it.
Also here are some pictures from : Brava, Strega Nona!: A Heartwarming Pop-Up Book
Their studio also has a blog which is fun to read - http://popupstudionyc.blogspot.com/
Most of their staff write the blog posts, so its interesting to see their work as it progresses on projects and also their outside interests too! It's not all about pop up people - it's about imagination!
In this video both of them describe their process and how their work has evolved. What I love most is when they start talking about the interactive experience behind the pop up book. How again, its almost magical yet so simple, and there's no electronics involved.
