Making Mobiles (Schiffer Book for Artists)

I am rereading this book again in the second week I have had it. This book provides the best information I have yet encountered on the art of creating mobiles. Not the cutesy one hanging over a baby's crib but the outstanding kinetic art created by artists like Alexander Calder. The step by step descriptions at the beginning of the book makes the learning curve for creating this type of metal art very easy. If you study the descriptions and projects in this book you will understand the concepts of kinetic sculpture and should be creating your own pieces as soon as you can find a local sheet metals supplier.

First time through this book, I thought it was a little light on "real" information. Then as I started to think of ideas that I might want to create, I went back and found that really there is a lot of information in there to help you make it happen. I would like to see more pictures of the samples from different angles, to better see how the pieces fit together. For me, this book has been a worthwhile purchase.

While I'm sure this is a fabulous book -- the photos are numerous and precise, the directions are, too -- I am returning it because it is only about making mobiles with metal.The product description does not mention this at all. A review mentioning "sheet metal" appeared after I put this book in my shopping cart; if I'd seen that earlier, I would not have ordered this book.What I was looking for was basic instruction on the design of mobiles of any materials, especially cardboard, cut paper, and whatever else I can concoct for starters. I will try the Tim Rose book now.

I am an experienced mobile maker, and I bought this just to see what others are doing/saying. This book has LOTS of good illustrations and examples, even if it is somewhat focused on a particular type/style of mobile. His photos of making loops and forming rods is better than others I've seen. However there is also some information that seems superfluous like how to use a file or how to mask and paint your mobile parts (if you can't figure that out yourself, this book won't help you).I wouldn't recommend this book to someone who has zero shop skills or experience (might be over their head), but I WOULD recommend this book to someone who knows how to use some basic tools but has no idea how or where to start when it comes to making a mobile. There were even a few ideas shown that I found intriguing as a veteran mobile maker.I wish the book had more to say about style and options, but I understand that since the possibilities are endless, that might be a tall order. I also see room for improvement in book design, as the two-column per page format of this book is...utilitarian...but that is a design conscious critique by a picky consumer (me). All told, seeing how this one artist goes about making this one kind of work has value, and I found the book to be respectable and worth the cost.

This is one of the best books for details on creating mobiles in the style of Alexander Calder. It's a pretty limited field when it comes to locating books on this subject, as I was extremely happy to have found this. For those frustrated about a lack of design details, how do you design a kinetic sculpture until you know what weights you are working with? Balance points? I have always designed my mobiles as I made them - start at the bottom and work your way up, balancing as you go. Great book!

Exactly what I was looking for. I'm getting into constructing metal mobiles, and needed a book that focuses on both skill building and recommendations for useful tools/equipment. There's no "fluff" here - the book gets straight to the point regarding construction methods via text and color photo examples. There's not much on design, but that's not the focus of the book - it's all about good construction technique, so that whatever design you come up with will be solidly built and long lived. Highly recommended.

This book is well done, and is filled with very helpful color photos. It's biggest potential weakness is that about 50% of the content is about the specific technique that the author has developed over the years for creating his mobiles. This involves aluminum sheets, small aluminum welding rods, and aluminum rivets, which essentially requires access to a large commercial metal wholesaler that is willing to deal with retail customers; allowing them hands-on examination of their materials to discover what will work best. This option isn't available to me, but even though I've decided to go with a different technique (galvanized wire and edge-drilled 1/8" Luan plywood) I don't regret buying the book. The most valuable information was on making the wire connection loops and adjusting them to achieve balance. This information gave me the confidence to build my first mobile. I also found the section on painting useful.btw - Since artistic design is not one of my strengths I needed a way to compensate. I've discovered that there are many mobiles for sale on the Internet, and if you download a photo of a design you want to replicate and use a free program named Rasterbator you can create a full-scale printout of the design with any desired dimension. The design is printed in a tiled fashion on multiple pieces of paper that must be taped together. The taping is a little tedious and the result is a little "fuzzy" and requires some hand touch-up, which can give you the satisfaction of modifying the design with your personal touches such that it is not an exact copy.

Incredible book for beginners. Great photos and step-by-step instructions. One of the best "how to" books I've ever read regardless of the topic.

This book explained the construction of one particular mobile as far as I could judge. It was to be a gift and I had hoped it would be about how one would go about composing a mobile.

Happy

This is the most disappointing book I have every bought. I was expecting it to be full of ideas on how to make different kinds of mobiles, instead it concentrates on making just one mobile throughout the whole book and the pictures/photos are of workbenches, hammers, screwdrivers etc etc. It focuses on this one mobile, made from metal and goes through each painstaking process with boring photos of each and every step. I would definitely NOT recommend this book to anyone, sorry to the author.