My first paid programming job was a HyperCard program for a literature course at my high school. It was like creating an electronic pop-up/movable book.
As an occultist, I love old grimoires and scrolls, and finely crafted esoteric books. As a a designer of interactive multimedia, I receive inspiration from ways of interacting with paper: pop-up and movable books; paper toys, tools, crafts, and masks; paper automata; etc. I have often wondered why there are not more pop-up and movable occult texts. I have a fantasy of developing an entire ritual practice around paper crafts, tentatively titled Frater Papyrus’ Prodigious Paper Paradigm — a paragon of peculiar practices in prophecy and prestidigitation provided by the plentiful and playful plasticity of paper and parchment.
Here are some re/sources that turn me on to this sort of thing:
- Altered Art: Techniques for Creating Altered Books, Boxes, Cards & More
- Astronomy instruments made of paper
- Beginner’s Book of Modular Origami Polyhedra: The Platonic Solids
- Book + Art: Handcrafting Artists’ Books
- CARDIAC paper computer
- Esoteric Book Conference
- Genuine Origami: 43 Mathematically-Based Models, From Simple to Complex
- How to Make Paper [Musical] Instruments
- Make Your Own Working Paper Clock
- Making Mechanical Cards: 25 Paper-Engineered Designs
- Movable Book Society
- Paper Automata: Four Working Models to Cut Out & Glue Together
- Paper circuits: 1, 2, 3
- Paper Engineering and Pop-ups For Dummies
- Playing with Books: The Art of Upcycling, Deconstructing, and Reimagining the Book
- The Pocket Paper Engineer, Volume I: Basic Forms: How to Make Pop-Ups Step-by-Step
- The Pocket Paper Engineer, Volume 2: Platforms and Props: How to Make Pop-Ups Step-by-Step
- Pockets, Pull-outs, and Hiding Places: Interactive Elements for Altered Books, Memory Art, and Collage
- Pop-up and Movable Books: A Tour through Their History