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Due to magic not existing, not wanting to just copy shit directly that I can find on google and other image aggregators, and not being someone with enough artistic ability to make money off of it, I plan to do this over a very long time and try to create the content almost entirely alone outside of maybe (MAYBE) commissioning some of the more intricate parts I will just be totally incapable of drawing myself if that happens. I'd also like it to not use English (I'm thinking about just generating some lorem ipsum and then coming up with letter replacement(s) for the alphabet, that way it still looks like it's written in a real language(s), but I don't have to come up with a full working one).

Also, I'm sure this isn't the first time someone has attempted something like this. A few very basic google searches over the last couple months have turned up a lot of "wicca" (I must admit I know very little on the subject of wicca) books or various "spell books"/"books of shadow" that seem more like silly things you give to kids that are into harry potter or teens who think they can use magic to put curses on the people they dislike in high school.

looking like 2/4 now

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(Paragraph continued)
I want to avoid that sort of thing if at all possible. I have found a couple great one-off shots of books that have some really neat designs (pic related in the OP image), on the left), and I think this would be something more along the lines of what I'd like some of the most detailed pages to look like, with others having maybe a simple image and then text and diagrams about it, or pages that are mostly text after a diagram)

If all this seems a bit scatterbrained and unorganized so far, I apologize, I'm trying to organize as much information about this as I can before I decide to just jump straight into it. I'm hoping I could get any general pointers or suggestions for how to go about organizing something like this in a way that doesn't make it look like a textbook, but more like something someone would be using as a magic journal as they study the various types of magic and magic related subjects, more like a work in progress to be organized better at a later date.

I've considered organizing it into sections, but that seems almost too structured and rigid, like the text book I mentioned earlier, but I also don't want it to be a mess of ritual circles mixed in with plant study and then the next page being a diatribe about how the common way to cast a fireball is all wrong and the following way is the proper way to do it.

Nevermind, it all just fit into 3 posts.

There was that thing I saw not too long ago that had a bunch of ritual circles and shit. I don't know if that's what you're looking for, but I remember some spell shit that was made on /tg/

>>44889631
I would be really interested in something like that if anyone could link me to it, or tell me a bit more about when it happened so I can look it up on the archives.

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>>44889550

Here's some inspiration from a real-life version. Codex Seraphinianus, a book containing many illustrations of the bizarre and surreal, all written in a language that doesn't exist.

A whole book is a huge undertaking, and would be a good project for a dedicated artist or group of artists.

Still a half dozen to a dozen scattered pages or scrolls wouldn't be too hard. Borrow and steal from every resource to help save huge amounts of effort and help it come together, sanskrit or even aurebesh for a made up language, pictures of other art projects and fantasy art (so long as you don't plan on selling it), and bizarre natural forms geological, biological, astronomical, and whatever.

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>>44889710
Thanks, I'll look into the book.

Also, I'm using "book" pretty loosely, I must admit. I honestly think I might be able to knock out two dozen pages before I hit a personal creative wall in a pretty short time span, but this is something I plan to just work on and add to over time.

I'd also prefer to not directly copy the creative work of others, even if I don't plan on selling it, but I do want to say thanks for your advice.

>>44889828

Oh, don't just steal. Well, do and don't.
Stealing at first is a great way to work into it, to get into the medium and understand your limitations and what skills you can bring to the table. The great master painters learned by directly copying and studying the works of the previous master painters. Even those who seem to have flaunted the rules of art and narrative have only done so because they've dived into it so they can understand the rules.

Anyway, it should be easy enough to make it your own. You've got tons of books of weird artwork from which to draw inspiration, whole alphabets of alchemical and religious symbols from dozens of different cultures from Greek alchemy to Norse runes to the entirety of the chinese alphabet. Shit, check out Weta Workshop's District 9 concept artbook. The alien letters really fuck with your head because they seem so familiar but you can't place them at all.

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>>44890006
I see what you mean now about considering using others art as a starting point for judging what I'm going to be capable of.

I'll see if I can find a copy of that book online somewhere that I can download. Most of the images I'm finding so far are of the weapons and the aliens themselves. But something like that sounds like great inspirations.

Thanks for the help so far /tg/.

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Going to hope to keep this off page 10 tonight. I'm not going to try and bump it for days on end, I'll stop when I get to bed.

Going to post a few more images as I do with a similar style to what I would like to create.

>>44890762
https://www.reddit.com/r/45thworldproblems/comments/14f8ig/date_4r1f1aparapherñalia_a_tome/

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>>44891074
Intradesting. That thread is a bit confusing, but that link to the imgur album has some great stuff in it; thanks.

>>44891151
I actually just ran across a PDF of that, or at the very least an excerpt of it. Gonna take a look at it after I glance though a few other books/things I downloaded. Thanks for the suggestion.

>>44891236
>Intradesting. That thread is a bit confusing, but that link to the imgur album has some great stuff in it; thanks.

For more inspiration check out the terms "asemic writing" and "abstract comics".

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>>44891259

https://mega.nz/#F!AE5yjIqB!y7Vdxdb5pbNsi2O3zyq9KQ

I know you said you DIDN'T want any wiccan stuff, but I'm sure there's something in here that'll inspire you.

>>44891259
>>44891354
>"asemic writing"

Huh, I didn't know this actually had any sort of name. Thanks. I will definitely be using something at least vaguely similar to this idea for text in some parts.

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>>44891376
>DIDN'T want any wiccan stuff
I didn't really mean to imply that if it came across that way, I just wanted to stay away from something that I saw (based off my very limited experience and knowledge of the subject) as something more religious or takes itself more seriously as a real thing, if that makes sense.

Thanks for the link though. There's a lot of stuff in there and I'm sure there has to be quite a bit of content I can use for inspiration.

>>44891440
Yeah, that's what I assumed you meant. Also thanks for reminding me I have had this exact project on the backburner forever.

>>44889550
>>44889573
>>44889596
Immensely jealous that I didn't think of this. I think I may also take on this challenge if you don't mind.

Also, what kind of book are you thinking about using? Or perhaps will you be binding your own?

>>44891594
Probably just binding it myself. I'm going to be starting with sketches on just regular old printer paper. When I'm happy with a hand full of them I might start looking at larger square sheets or something that I can later add to some kind of "book" or just store them in a binder for the time being.

I think I should have elaborated a bit more in the first posts about this. I'm thinking this will just be something I'm working on though out this year and I'll see how I feel about continuing it as I get more work done and life permits.

Feel free to work on a project similar to this too, I'm not monopolizing the idea or pretending to have any sort of ownership of it.

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>>44891393
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Book_from_the_Sky

https://generativeletterism.wordpress.com/

Also look into what is called "generative", "procedural", or "algorithmic" art as well as "ergodic literature" and "cybertext".

Hacker culture is filled with the occult.

>>44889550
I wish you luck, op. I've been wanting to do something like that for a while but just never sat down to actually make anything. Mostly I don't know what I would fill it with.

>>44891763
>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Book_from_the_Sky
That's one hell of a book. 4,000 original glyphs meant to look like Chinese, but aren't. That's pretty impressive just in itself.

>>44891956
Wait until you hear about Martian Chinese.

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>>44891956
>>44891975
>Unker Non-Linear Writing System
https://s.ai/nlws/

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>>44892062
I appreciate the link, but this is getting to be a bit over my head. Still a neat idea...if I'm understanding it, that is.

>>44892108
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQ1_IbFFbzA

>>44892108
yo, you should Check out:
Asemic writing
Beale ciphers
Book of Soyga
Codex Seraphinianus
Copiale cipher
Oera Linda Book
Rohonc Codex
Rongorongo

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>>44892264
Gonna head off to bed. Thanks for the suggestions. I've got them copied down and I'll look into them a bit more tomorrow.

Thanks for all the great suggestions and interesting links /tg/, I hope to get started on this pretty soon after a bit more planning and some sketching.

Googleing "grimoire" will give you a lot of examples of the stuff you're trying to do

>>44892466
oh, And search "pnakotic manuscripts" too

what ever happened to that dudes work that ended up in /diy/?

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Not related to magic aside from what takes place in the new testament, but the Book of Kells is beautiful and might be able to inspire some of the art in your project. The designs are incredibly detailed so I doubt any amateur could copy them effectively, but maybe if you glance over it you could incorporate some ideas?

>>44891640
When it comes to structure i would first write the book on loose pages, witout any particular order.

Simply when you have an idea write i down, make a page or two.

When you think you have enough look through them, organize them and bind it together.

A very easy way to bind a book is to clamp all your neatly staked books together, and make some shallow cuts in the back with a saw. Than you take a string soken in a glue and put bits of it in the cuts.
That's how most of old books were boud

>>44889550
Sounds like a pretty neat idea. Since I already have a constructed language, set of glyphs and spell notation system for my setting, I could probably do this with some work.

I'll try to draw up a page later in the day when I've got the time.

>>44889828
Check out the Lesser and Greater Keys of Solomon, if you haven't already. "real" grimoires, as much as any of that stuff was ever real, and old, from the 1400s.

I'm an artist who works in a /tg/ related field and I've been thinking of doing a project like the OP myself, to fit in with what I've done with my nWoD game. I was thinking it'd be like 100 pages though. All art, sketches, notes in various languages, "found manuscript" style like dinotopia (but with less journal entries and narrative). I am starting it on the side and if it ever gets anywhere I'll take it to Kickstarter or something, IDK books are easy to make.

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>>44893791

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>>44893812

>>44893677
My question is off topic, anon but what did you use to create your script for your language, or does it use a pre-existing alphabet?

>>44889573
Wica is pretty much a made up religion. Wicans got the old Celtic gods and want to go back to that kind of religious culture, with some rituals, love for nature, gods of nature, etc.

But studying is hard, so instead they made up shit and took what they liked because cool Celtic culture and shit.

Long story short, it´s a made up religion carved out of the carcass of the old cults that some people follow as a more nature-related religion because Christianity is too mainstream. Some of them go full nuts and also believe the part about magic rituals.

Mostly common between teenage girls and neo hippies.

There´s other groups that actually respect what they´re supposed to be following. Check out the Norse or Greek ones, following their respective pantheons. It´s still people trying to be original, but at least they actually bother researching their shit.

Also check out the Voynich manuscript. It´s an old book full of weird pictures, many of them of things that don´t exist, and written in a cyphered/unknown/made up language. Nobody knows what it´s supposed to be or why the fuck would someone make it, because it dates back to a time where writing was too expensive to just make a made up book.

Would love to do something like that, but I draw like shit.

Good luck, anon!

PD: I see Voynich already showed up. In that case, take a look at the oldest cultures that left us things written. Mesopotamians had pretty cool symbols - let alone the writing. Cuneiform, in case you don´t know it.

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tl;dr.

One thing to look at is Launet's Necronomicon
http://www.goominet.com/lovecraft/

You'll definitely want to pick up a few nibs and a selection of inks, then practice a little. Maybe even learn a medieval script.

Plan your book out well, then decorate the unbound pages. The advantage is that you can still fix mistakes, even feed the page through the printer. The problem is that you always make four pages in one piece, 2 from the front and 2 from the back, and it requires some basic logistics. Then watch a tutorial on bookbinding, sew together the pages in 'books', sew the books together, add a cover and construct a nice envelope, maybe use leather with an imprint.

These old books were often collections from different contexts and completely unrelated authors. Many researchers simply added their book onto the volume their work was based on.

You can have different languages, levels of involvement, unrelated topics, it just has to look right and avoid breaking suspension of disbelief. So take your time contriving it. Make sketches and mockups. Prototype each page. Make sure it all flows together, and only tells stories you want told.

A few topics to include may be
>Botanical drawings (wikimedia has a few), humorism
>Astronomical maps and tables
>Astrological context, forgotten signs of the zodiac, horoscope
>Da Vinci's Vitruvian Man
>Bernoulli's Spira mirabilis
>Euclid's Golden Ratio
>Circle of fifths and basic well tempered harmonics

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>>44891393
Shorthand is quite cool too. Gregg gives a very nice vibe if you don´t let too much space between words.

>>44895522
I already had the sounds of the language down, so I just scribbled some glyphs on paper. Some of them are vaguely based on the latin letters.

My base was our 26 letter alphabet, but as the vocabulary of the language becomes bigger, I see which sounds need their own signs.

>>44895773
Ah alright, thanks. I'm trying to do a horrid mishmash of my native language and transform it into a runic language. Having a hard time making the symbols for it though.

>>44889550

If you want to make a fake magic book, here is what you do.

Two steps. The first is to use a written language that no one is going to recognize in order to preserve mystery. You can either come up with a bunch of fake symbols yourself and use simple letter substitution, or perhaps use Enochian (a fake language made by a 16th century english dude for his occult journals, claiming that it was the written language of god's servants).

Once you have a fake language to use, when the time comes for text blocks use that fake language to fill the pages. Try and actually use it as accurately as possible when it comes to sentence structure and stuff, if you just mishmash random characters together its going to look fake.

Before you do that, though, you need to come up with your magic system. If you want the system of magic laid out in the book to make sense, then the mythology of that magic needs to be internally consistent. You don't want to be switching from chemistry based alchemy to demon summoning to invoking the world tree all in the course of a couple of pages, that's just going to look nonsensical. But if everything looks like it draws from the same sources and you have recurring themes and imagery, it will feel much more coherent even if the reader doesn't actually know what the words mean.

>>44889550

This is the best fucking idea I've seen on/tg/ in years. Bravo, anon.

I'd also suggest real religious writing from history. Kabbalah, illuminated talmuds, Hindu sacred texts, and medieval Christian manuscripts. Old Greek and Egyptian works on philosophy, science, and mathematics.

Also, if you're still getting your feet wet, why not write it as a scroll? It can be as long or as short as you want, and you can decorate the rollers and case when you get writers block.

>>44889550

For the text, take a page from the bible and frame your text as a series of allegorical stories rich in symbolism and metaphor.

Then use Google translate to change it to a non-european language. Then put it in a character set from still a different language. Add lots of illuminations and diagrams.

>>44895524

I agree with this but some of the texts are still potential sources of inspiration.

>>44889550
>>44889573
>>44889596
Here are some "real world" magical texts:
http://sacred-texts.com/grim/index.htm

Fun website for worldbuilding and getting inspiration,btw.

>>44893054
Yeah, I don't really know anything about binding at the moment, it's not really all that important at this point either, but thanks for the idea. I'm going to look into it more when I actually have some content worth binding.

>>44893677
Best of luck to you, Anon.

>>44893791
>Check out the Lesser and Greater Keys of Solomon
That's a pretty good idea, thanks. I'll add those to my growing list of things to look into for this project.

>>44893812
>>44893836
I really should play a modern day setting in Seattle some time. That looks like fun.

>>44895524
Yeah, I've got a running list of books mentioned so far, notes about writing styles, and suggestions for languages that have fallen out of use. Not sure just how many different writing styles I'll be using in the end, but having more ideas to pull from is never a bad thing. Thanks for your suggestion.

>>44895536
>A few topics to include may be
Thanks for this suggestion on topics, and your suggestion on the organization. I figured it was going to end up looking something like that (unbound pages being organized later). The part about pages being both front and back is admittedly something I didn't think about; I'm glad you pointed that out.

>>44895574
Idea added into the list. Thanks.

>>44895977
>Enochian
That sounds like a fun idea for some areas, I'll look into that a bit more.

>>44896038
Thanks, I've been kicking around the idea for some time now and I think I'm finally going to actually start it.

I'll look into the idea of a scroll for some early practice, that's a pretty good idea to see if I'm actually creative enough to fill quite a bit of space (Still probably going to draw out most of it on loose paper, and just tape it in or something, but it will be a decent measurement for how much content I can create I think.

>>44896836
Thanks for the link. I've added it to my growing list of inspiration/notes/existing magic books

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>>44897090
>http://www.goominet.com/lovecraft/

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OP, look up Medieval medical texts like Women's Secrets by Pseudo-Albertus Magnus. The Voynich Manuscript, which someone has probably suggested to you, is great for coming up with the look of that sort of thing.

Also also, check out boustrophedon writing. It's an Ancient Greek term meaning "as the ox plows." It was typically only used on stone, but it's very interesting. Here's how it works:
No spaces, no punctuation.
The first line runs left to right, the next line runes right to left. The third runs left to right, and so forth.
>
<
>
<

Additionally, the letters also reverse direction each altering line.

In addition to looking rather cool, it allows the reader to... read much faster because instead of stopping to start each new line, the person reads continually. That's where the "ox plowing" thing comes from. When plowing you go from one side of the field and back, you don't cross the field, pick up the plow, and start over from the original side again.

Also also also, boustrophedon takes up less room.

Might be something to check out, at least for small sections of text where the "author" of your text is trying to get a lot of info out at once.

>>44897287

SATOR
AREPO
TENET
OPERA
ROTAS

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>>44889550
If you want an alien-looking language that you can directly translate, use Beowulf Old English. 90% of everyone you meet will look at it in utter disbelief.

>>44897287
Huh, I'm surprised I can read that as easily as I did. A very interesting premise and definitely something I could see using in something meant to be a bit more archaic or cryptic within the "book".

>>44897254
Added to my growing list. Thanks.

>>44897161

Torah scrolls are written using sheets of vellum sewn together with silken thread. So doing it page by page is absolutely compatible with making it a scroll.

Incidentally, looking up how torahs are scribed is a good source. They have to be made ritually, using ritual materials, by hand. They can't be mass produced. And they're made by individual scribes rather than corporations. So there's a huge market for supplies and materials that you can use.

Keep us posted with pics on your progress!

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Also: latex

>>44897749
Interesting, I wasn't aware of that, but I guess that does make a lot of sense. I'll have to see about finding some of that material somewhere around my area or online.

I also want to state again just how slow this project is probably going to be. I definitely don't mind taking pictures and making an imgur album or something, but this isn't going to be something I put together over a month or anything.

>>44897840
If you make an album, post a link.

Look up scans of the Discoverie of Witchcraft by Reginald Scot and the Malleus Maleficarum (der hexenhammer) by Heinrich Kramer. Kinda the exact opposite of what you are looking for but could provide useful insight.

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>>44897287
I hated that thing at the university. It took fucking forever to translate. Still better than the Byzantine lower case.

Can´t find a decent picture, but it looked pretty similar to this one, only everything looks more rounded and you never know where one letter ends and the next begins. Specially because often there´s two letters written at once.

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>>44893677
First draft, pretty specific to my setting. Doesn't look that great, that's because I didn't have any tools around and I didn't want to go all out without the systems behind it being fleshed out.
This is like a student's notes or a text book. It has a very clean look, because I just made it.

Imagine you're some guy studying magic. You copy some scrolls or listen to your master, and then you make an entry of a spell into your spellbook. You practice that spell or visit some lectures and you learn new stuff about the spell that you add to your notebook.
Maybe you find materials that make the spell work better, or you change the casting procedure. More and more stuff aggregates, you add references to other books or extend pages to hold bigger diagrams. Maybe you started with your father's used book and have to update stuff or replace lost pages.

Over time you go from just a standard book to some weird, obscure shit that only the guy who made it really understands.

But it turns out these things take a lot of time to start. Things should get better once your template is done and you're used to writing another set of letters.

Not having to draw your circles of pennies also helps.

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>>44899738
And the version without comments.

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>>44899816
It's a good start.

Are you familiar with illuminations?

>>44899975
Well, I know about them. I just wouldn't use them because I'm actually pretty bad at drawing. I can draw simple shapes every computer could generate and that's about it.

Having illustrations and some colours would probably be pretty neat.

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>>44889550

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man this thread is relevant to my interests. I bought a journal from a convention, and I've been dying to make it a proper Chaos Tome.
got the sheep and everything

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Probably the one final bump/post from me to keep this thread alive (but I will still respond to further posting if anyone decides to continue posting). Just going to run though my basic outline of how I'm going to get started on this project. Also, on my way home today I picked up a couple of cheap books on Medieval Calligraphy and one of line art of plants and wild flowers.

So to start, I've had a number of dip pens and nibs for a while already, so I think I'm going to start practicing with those again (as well as basic calligraphy technique for practice).

After that I think I'm going to start looking into the various writing styles and techniques so many kind anons posted in this thread and figure out which ones I'm going to incorporate into this project, or at least borrow ideas from. I think I'm also going to start writing out a basic alphabet replacement for English for other filler text.

After all that is said and done I think I'm going to finally start sketching out ideas and create a handful of drawings and see how I feel about what I create.

Thanks for all your help again, /tg/, this has been an incredibly insightful thread. When I finally do start producing some actual content I think I will take a few pictures and catalog this a little bit. When I do get around to that I will probably make a thread and link to wherever I'm uploading the images (probably imgur or maybe I could catalog it on a tumblr page or something, I dunno).

>>44904851
Looking forward to it.

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If you have any questions about invented languages, I know resources for lots of them.

>>44897311
Now say it backwards!

>>44905874
Not OP, but what do you think of Ithikuil?

That is some top-tier autism right there, in the best of ways.

>>44889550
Neat project. I'm an artist-type and I'd love to help you out with some illustrations etc. if you'll let me. I'll do it for free if you're cool with loose deadlines

lolanthe.art@gmail.com

>>44905874
Yeah, sure, if you're willing to shoot me some links for pretty much anything related to invented languages, I'm more than willing to take a look at them.

>>44907959
Took a glance at that project out of curiosity. That's super involved, and that person clearly has a passion for language. Very neat idea, but as they get into, in the FAQs, it doesn't sound like a practical language for every day use.

>>44908500
I very sincerely appreciate the offer of help, but I do want to state again that I'm probably not even going to pick up sketching projects for this for at least a month. I would hate to accept your help only for me to drop you a line sometime after I get sketching planned out, some basic pages done, figure out where I want to take it after that, and many months after I start, contact you to ask if you're still interested; which is how I think this project is probably going to go.

I will drop you a line anyway if you're still interested, that way at least my contact information will be available should you decide you feel different later.

>>44908921
I've no problem with waiting. I'll help out whenever that time may come around.

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>>44907959
As one of the moderators of /r/ithkuil, I think it is the language that G_d Herself would speak if She existed.

>>44908921
http://www.frathwiki.com/Sajem_Tan
reddit.com/r/QueerConlangers (Check the side bar)

>>44889550
Tome, not tomb

>>44889596
Honestly, i had a similar idea on the backburner. Like, "will probably never get around to" backburner

Ni no Kuni has a spellbook that certainly looks the part and has good formatting to work off of, but definitely feels incomplete/kiddiefied due to mainly being a supplement for the video game.

Serpent's Tongue uses spellcards, hand gestures, and a unique but readable language to create wizard duels and coop play. If you can actually learn how to cast properly, you'll really feel like someone casting magic from a binder full of spells.

>>44910745
>Discordianism
[absolutely disgusting.png]

Also, how well do you know the language?
Could you help me with the translation of "A Frank Exchange of Opinions" ?

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>>44911006
I myself have not attempted to learn it, but you can post on the subreddit. There is a small team of people making programs for the language to expedite translation.

>>44910969
>Tome, not tomb
My mistake.

>Ni no Kuni has a spellbook that certainly looks the part
I've got that game sitting around here somewhere. Perhaps I'll pick that up to take a look at it, or maybe just see if I can find a video online or something. Thanks for the idea.

>>44911006
>"A Frank Exchange of Opinions"
Knowing just a little bit about that language, I find this really funny.

>>44911247
Will do, thanks anon.

>>44911260
Other phrases I want to translate
"Actions speak louder than words"
"Might makes right"
"Hold my beer while I ramp this"

>>44911260
>Perhaps I'll pick that up
You can probably find a pdf of the book online somewhere. The physical copy is pretty damn expensive.

.....game is meh. Not great, and I can evem find a number of reasons why it's not even good, from a design perspective. The story is the ghibli style of kiddie but more serious than the average young adult story. But boy, are they good at setting the atmosphere.

>>44911372
Personally, I would like: "Your waifu a shit!"

The fact that the language is stated to be 100% objective with no vagueness able to be inferred just makes it perfect for things like that.

>>44911260
Also, >>44895536 linked it i think,

But the guy who did Magic Circles went legit. Search for The Runed Age.

>>44911457
"My opinion is ultimately subjective, but your opinions is worse regardless"
"You sure convinced me with those hot opinions fagtron"
"While you were deciphering these glyphs, I swapped out your dice with rigged ones"

>>44911404
I meant I have the game around here somewhere. Was there an actual spell book (like, stragity guide sorta "book") that came out along side it? If so then yeah, I'll probably just grab a .pdf of it if I can find it.

>>44911459
I grabbed that .pdf in the post, if that's what you were talking about. If not I copied the link they posted as well as all the suggestions at the bottom. I have a huge notepad file with some messy notes I wrote out last night and part of today. I conceded to my inability to organize notes on the fly and just decided to "save page as" every so often for this thread so that I have a copy stored locally.

Supposedly Hymmnos from Ar Tonelico has a fully functional language, but writing it down is completely impractical due to tje number of strokes involved

>>44911582
>ni no kuni
Collector's edition has a physical book, although it's possible to get one off amazon. I dont advise it.

>magic circle
That pdf is the free prototype that the guy made. I'm just informing that he has a finalized, purchasable version released not too long ago.

Although i personally feel that 70% of the spells are needlessly complicated ways to kill someone.

>>44911690
Ah, I haven't had a chance to look though that pdf yet, but thanks for the heads up.

>>44904851

I really hope you're a grill so I can have a crush on you.

The coolness of this idea plus the level of work you're putting into it are awe inspiring.

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Bumping with the best I can do for now. Too tired and want to read all of this tomorrow.

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http://conciliarityoftepat.deviantart.com/art/The-Great-Gatsby-in-Yuktepat-585545714

>>44911915
I am not a grill. Thanks for your words of encouragement though.

>>44911965
That is a very silly letter replacement chart, but I almost feel compelled to do something with it, perhaps not on this project, but somewhere. Saved regardless.

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>no toki pona yet
It's a great space filler. Pic related says "Your waifu a shit"

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>>44912193

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>>44912237
Toki pona's living heiroglyphs

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OH! I just remembered. You might want to take inspiration from avant garde musical notation!

Search the term "graphic score" or "graphic notation".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71hNl_skTZQ

>>44912410
Man I have enough trouble reading regular music notation I'm not ready for this shit

>>44912410
Music notation completely escapes me; avant garde music notation as an drawn art form isn't something my brain would register as acceptable. I like that you're thinking outside the box on this one, but I need this brought back inside the icosahedron.

>>44912410
I think art has successfully gone so far as to become not-art.

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just go straight sumerian bro

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>>44912597
>>44912698
>>44912718

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>>44911592
This is pretty much the case. If you want to look into AT-related languages that are actually (sort of) actually writeable, take a look at Emotional Song Pact/Keihansokaishi and/or Ar Ciela.

Both of them are significantly more fucky when it comes to actual language construction, but I'm not sure that'd be something you're actually concerned with?

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>>44912842
Ar Ciela.

>>44912876
Keihan. It's written as letter clusters sort of like hangul, so I'll do a little demonstration of that next post.

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>>44912926
oops, let me actually post an image this time.

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>>44912959
And an example.

ah=kui-chen-uia zen-yy-nr noh-iar-ne kyu-la-du;
Gathering the pieces of a shattered star,
ah=jen-fa-uia zen-yy-nr nay-nei-ne sye-iy-du;
joining the colors of the broken lives,
ah=mao-uia zen-yy-nr rei-ne uru-du;
following that which the broken hearts rely on.

Also, did I mention this language is super fucky?

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>>44913222
>Also, did I mention this language is super fucky?

I don't think anyone in this thread is just now coming to this realization. That's still a neat writing system though.

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You'll cowards don't even smoke spellbooks.

>>44913283
There's a font that handles the letter clusters automatically, but you have to use it in a program that gives support for discretionary ligatures (I use Classical Text Editor myself), if you want to plan out whatever it is you're writing ahead of time.

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You want a really nice one, try Tenno. The letters change based on the ones that come before and after.

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>>44913336

>>44913336
>The letters change
This is my nightmare.

>>44912193
I thought they hadn'd decoded those hieroglyphs yet? Also Mongolian and Glagolitic alphabets are pretty nifty, as are ciphers like pig-pen and that one where you write your message on a strip of material wrapped around a rod of a certain specific circumference,

>>44913595
They haven't been fully deciphered but there's a pretty decent amount translated both written and spoken. Gotta love cognates, man

>>44913645
Links to guides to how to write what little we know pretty please? >>44913372
That's how a lot of 'cursive' writing systems work (Arabic, Mongolian, etc), English does it to an extent too, just phonologically instead of graphically speaking.

>>44913812
I reckon this is about as good a place to start as any

https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Category:Sumerian

>>44914140
I was talking about the Mayan....

>>44914235
My bad. That's not Mayan, that's toki pona.

Glyphs here: http://tokipona.net/tp/ClassicWordList.aspx

They have translated Mayan though.

Mayan here: http://www.famsi.org/research/pitts/MayaGlyphsBook1Sect1.pdf

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>>44914454
>http://www.famsi.org/research/pitts/
Apparently it's two books in four sections. They're all on here, along with some dictionaries/coloring books

Pic related

>>44889710
I happened to be near a Barnes and Nobles earlier so I figured I could go in and ask them if they had this. None in stock, and none online either. Not to mention online it would have been ~$88 and in-store it would have been ~$125.
What the hell is that thing?

>>44915664
An old, out of print, weird book.

You can probably find a .pdf online. I think I did and it's just in one of the folders I set up for this project (along with all that wicca stuff, fucking 33gigs of it).

>>44915677
>33gigs
Adam?

>>44915740
John?

>>44915740
>>44915746
Donkey!

>>44889573
>outside of maybe (MAYBE) commissioning some of the more intricate parts I will just be totally incapable of drawing myself
Don't do that. Instead, get skills. A nice fountain pen, for example. You can get a decent set of them for under $20. That's enough for caligraphical purposes. Design a script where stroke order matters, and your text will end up looking quite good. Writing right to left will make it feel more arcane to westerners too, if you can do that and have it feel natural. Vertical writing can be easier to do and gets a similar effect, especially if it's joined up (like old Mongolian) to avoid looking like moon runes. Also consider having a second script to use in an especially caligraphic matter for items of particular importance, like how the Kartvels use Asomtavruli. Also notice how I used "Kartvels" instead of "Georgians", using unconventional wordchoice helps a lot too; gives you an air of the foreign. Use about three different colors, mostly one, occasionally a second, and rarely a third, for specific functional or aesthetic purposes.

Also do a lot of geometric stuff. A ruler and a compass can be used to make an incredible variety of shapes, and add a golden spiral to that for non-circular curves and shit'll get real arcane fast. Hell, just write about mathematics and natural sciences like that and you'll get a real mystical looking thing fast. If you check out actual mysticism and use your book as a journal thereof, you'll get the kind of magical tome that people actually believe in, a hundred years later. If you document the meme magic like /pol/ spreading Ebola and TV crashing a plane, then even more so.

>>44889596
>how to go about organizing
Initially, don't organize it much. Write down whatever comes to mind, in roughly related quires, and don't bind the thing until you're done. That'll leave it overall organized (kinda) but each segment will be disjointed. Put a date to things where a date would seem relevant, such as documenting any actual magic you attempt or claim to attempt. Don't write a table of contents, but have a quire dedicated to introduction which you write in initially what your purpose for the book is, what the sections shall be, and thereafter use as a kind of a journal of the process of writing the book itself.

>>44892108
It's a deep rabbit hole. Take your time with it. Something as complicated as the Unker is probably only to be used for actual spells, not for just writing. It's perhaps suitable for the Asomtavruli equivalent, though the exact use would be different since it's longer, by natural structure, and takes up more space.

>>44916063
Lefty detected.

>>44900118
>I'm actually pretty bad at drawing
Don't worry, so were many of the monks who did them historically.

>>44916143
What's leftist (or left-handed) about that?

>>44916063
>fountain pen
>Writing right to left
Have you ever used ink? It smears.

>>44916318
Doing this takes substantial care, of course. If not using it, definitely go top down. Or non-linear but that's hard to make look natural unless you're doing mostly diagrams anyway.

>>44916318
Try being left-handed when school forces you to write in ink for five years.

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>>44892062
>>44892062
You might also be interested in this mathematical system. It represents numbers as multiples of powers of sequential primes, rather than as multiples of sequential powers of a given base. That makes it handy for advanced math, but on the other hand addition and subtraction require the use of the natural logarithm.

>>44916534
Cruel and arbitrary, normative, also impractical.
Being left handed I mean.

>>44916540
Ah, I remember trying this out.

I think it's a great way to store a really big number in a small symbol, better than scientific notation for that singular purpose, but fuck no I'm not doing math with it. I deal with way too many numbers that are not easily factored and are sometimes complex to boot.

>>44916540
ALL I CAN SEE IS LOSS.JPG

>>44895524
>Wica is pretty much a made up religion
Unlike the others?

"I'm a prophet and God told me shit"

>>44917086
Yes but no. I´d argue that there´s a big difference between an ancient religion that developed through centuries as an effort to understand and justify the world, or even a dream/heat stroke/dementia/powerhunger induced "I´m a prophet a God told me shit" religion that people buy into for the same reason, and the Wica, which is taking the old thing (which actually had a reason to exist) and removing/adding/modifying stuff as you like to make it fit what you like.

The Celtic cults, even Christianity, developed organically, because people needed them. The Wica is a purely artificial construct which was developed because some people felt like being a little more different than the rest but without being too different.

>>44917189
>Christianity, developed organically
Why open that can? It can't go anywhere.

>>44917246
Let´s put it simple: Christianity is not as "organic" as the old cults, but still it spread because people believed in it. People actually believed and still believe there´s this one God who´s all powerful and loves you but wants to test you and that´s why the world is awful.

Pretty much no one actually believes in the old Celtic gods anymore. Wicans neither. They often have no idea of the pantheon. Most of the religion itself is long forgotten, because the druids didn´t left shit written and the Christians have been demonizing it all for almost two thousand years.

Wicans claim to follow the old ways, to recover the old cults focused around nature. Yet they don´t preach to the old Celtic gods, they don´t believe any of it. It´s just a nice tag that makes them look alternative. Some women love to call themselves witches because they do some small rituals to honor the Moon and attract good luck. Some people go full retarded and actually believe they can make someone fall in love with a magic ritual in their room. And even those still don´t bother at all to respect the ways, morals and traditions of the religion they´re supposed to be following.

I´m not talking about Christianity, I think it´s one of the most boring religions to ever exist.

>>44889550
>notes
The best way to make this feel authentic is likely to rewrite pages over and over again. Draw a few pictures and write some texts to accompany them. Then come back a while later and write more text in the margins, erase words and entire sentences, and underline others. Some pages you can leave like this, others you can copy, except you rewrite them so that the marginal notes become part of the larger text, and then you repeat the process of adding in notes. Other still you can destroy and then recreate from memory or add in notes or speculations about in the margins of other pages.

All this serves to create the feeling of a book that has been compiled during a long stretch of time and that has been added to by several authors.

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>>44917378
>but still it spread because people believed in it.

Uh, not quite, the holy roman empires, all three of them, forcibly spread christian by the sword and then forcibly stomped out pagan belief in europe

>>44918422
Perfect.

>>44916063
I mostly meant for any actual drawing I needed/might need. I can learn to do script/calligraphy well enough to make it look half way decent, but I'm no artist.

However, another anon further up in this thread did offer to help with some of the art/illustrations, but anything that advanced is still quite a ways off, as I'm going to start with designing text and getting good with my dip pens again.

>>44916075
>and don't bind the thing until you're done
Yeah, that's the idea I was getting from others, and it makes a lot more sense than trying to draw this in a book already.

>>44918950
You´re forgetting the whole initial stage where Christianism was brutally repressed, yet still spreading like a wildfire.

Then the emperor made it official and that´s when what you´re saying begins to happen. But at the beginning it happened all on its own, because people voluntarily converted.

Leaders saying "this is our religion now" out of the blue doesn´t tend to work. Just look at Amon and his attempt to remake the Egyptian pantheon with a new, all powerful god at the top. He got murdered shortly after.
If the Romans had gone the same way, just saying "this is my shit and now its yours too", things would have probably gone in a similar way. But, instead, it started a mini civil war of sorts with a fuckload of Christian churches fighting over tiny details and declaring everyone else blasphemous, until the emperor himself pointed to the Catholics and made them the official version. This kind of shit wouldn´t have happened if Christianism didn´t already have a fuckload of followers by the time it was declared official.

Also,
>HRE
>all three of them
There´s only one Holy Roman Empire and we could discuss whether it was holy, Roman or empire at all. The other two are simply the Occidental Roman Empire and the Oriental Roman Empire, later known as the Byzantine Empire.

>>44905874
what do you think of Toki Pona.

I'm half intrested in learning it if I find someone to learn it wiith me.

>>44918950
>>44920944
alright, that's enough of that. This is a thread for magic, not religion.

File: Polaris.pdf (4.12 MB, PDF)

4.12 MB PDF

>>44921234
You´re right. Sorry for the off topic. And my manners, I tend to get carried away.

Here´s something to compensate. I often read a little of this book when I need inspiration building lore for something. Maybe it helps. It´s also quite a nice game, if you can get in the right mindset and are lucky enough to find other three guys who also find it interesting.

>>44921234
To be fair, it's often very difficult to separate the two. The split between magic/religion is very much a D&Dism.

Lots of historical magic assumed you generally were calling upon some sort of supernatural entity or power, engaging in rituals of supplication and/or appeasement, and most are wrapped in layers of religious practice.

>>44921449
While that is in fact true, that conversation had nothing to do with the intertwined nature of magic and religion and had everything to do with arguing about the spread of religion.

>>44912280
>>44912193
toki pona can use cute animals as letters?
neat!

having 120 word you can have each animal menaing a snigle word! What was the numbe rof orignal pokemons? 160?

File: Polaris - All Men are Bro(...).pdf (6.8 MB, PDF)

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>>44921424
>Star Light Star Bright Edition
Wait what's the difference between that one and this?

>>44889550
This sounds like a fun side-project for my Homebrew

>>44921533
151

>>44889550
Isn't the page on the right a flying lotus album cover

>>44889550
Hey Op, read the short story "Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius" by Jorge Luis Borges if you ever get to point where you feel like you can't continue. It certainly inspired me to try to do what you are doing the first time I read it. Best of luck.

>>44922335
Yeah, it's from Codex Tor by Leigh McCloskey.

>>44922481
Thanks. I'll add that book to the list. I have a ton of material to look though for inspiration now thanks to this wonderful thread.

>>44897417
old english was utter shit until king whatever stole everything from the french

>>44917378
>>I´m not talking about Christianity, I think it´s one of the most boring religions to ever exist.
Check out the christian mysticism that deep catholics get up to in the Song of Swords threads.

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I love how everyone (including me) tried to write their very grimoire one day
Also, in the cool diagram section, I'd suggest that OP takes at look at mosaïc.
It's a /tg/ setting with a very cool and easy to understand spell making system
Here's link with more links inside:
https://1d4chan.org/wiki/Setting:Mosaic
>pic related is a Mosaïc spellbook

>>44921203
It is pretty cool.

mi unpa e mama sina

>>44924123
neat I acutaly undrstood that.

well you rmother too.

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I also though about doing something like this. But I'm far to lazy and uncreative to get it acutally done. Or even to begin it.

>>44911459
Ho fuck, he actually got shit done? Nice.

For writing/alphabeth/runes you could look at phyrexian from Magic the Gathering. You write top to bottom, with a line going through each character, at the top/start of a sentence there is a line topping of and at the end of a sentence you make a little hook. At least that's how I think it works, since WotC hasn't released what they have on phyrexian.
http://i.imgur.com/iCOL8Uh.jpg

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Please tell me this thread is getting archived.
I'd love to come back to this idea at a later time when I have more resources available to me.
It would be awesome to make it from scratch or from an leather journal.

The idea of playing a wizard with a legit looking spell book sounds fucking awesome as all hell.
Also just cool to have lying around the house as a trinket of sorts.

>>44926122
All threads on the most popular boards are archived by one of the many sites that run 4chan archives. You can also right click and "save page as" which will download an .htm file of the page as well as the content (pictures) of the thread.

>>44926194
I am just now learning this.
How would I find this thread on suptg?

More over, I thought .htm files required the page to still be active - or not deleted - to still work?

>>44926194
There is to mention: Back when I saved Chan pages as html it only grabbed the thumbnails so >>44926122 you should get the good images seperately.
Also, like he said there are archive pages. 4plebs archives /tg/ for example

>>44926289
Nono, if you save them locally it saves most of the content. to find it on an archive, either save the postnumber or search for a term that is in the OP and limit the search to op posts

>>44926289
http://archive.4plebs.org/tg/thread/44889550

>>44926289
Well I just opened a .htm file from 2012 and it worked just fine, so I think it should work fine.

>>44926296
Huh, I just noticed that it only saves the thumbnails. Oh well, there are a variety of ways to download all the full sized images in a thread if you really need them.

>>44926374
>>44926336
downthemall plugin

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>>44917189
>Christianity
>not a cult which took the old thing (which actually had a reason to exist) and removing/adding/modifying stuff as you like to make it fit what you like.

>>44926336
>>44926374
Learning something new everyday.
Also, thinking of all the threads I had open for one reason or another, when a "Update and Restart your computer" appeared.

>>44926372
Much obliged.

>>44926499
Pagan scum pls go.

t. fedora tipper

File: Games_for_Goblins.pdf (3.97 MB, PDF)

3.97 MB PDF

I'll contribute some stuff.

Cannot fit it, but I'm fond of "The Later Blue Tome of Amaxathroth the Cursed". It's CC-licensed and available from DriveThruRPG free, but I think the publisher is no more ("Principia Infecta").

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And now some pages from Guillermo del Toro's sketchbook.

>>44927481
Wow. If the movie thing fell through, he could make a good webcomic.

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You should look into the Huld Manuscript and the symbols of the Galdrastafur.

>>44928022
added to my ever growing list. Thanks.

>>44927481
This is some great stuff. Thanks for posting these, keep 'em coming if you have more.

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I'm pretty sure this is juxtaposed with a photo or something.

I know this is more a discussion for content, but for those who want to make the book itself I found a few videos that can help.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sJrfOb1Qkts
I know it's cutesy but her info is good.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sRXjYxrsQeE
This guy does other styles.

>>44926621
What the fuck did you just fucking say about me, you little bitch? I’ll have you know I graduated top of my class in Mossad, and I’ve been involved in numerous secret raids on Syria, and I have over 300 confirmed kills. I am trained in gorilla warfare and I’m the top sniper in the entire Israeli armed forces. You are nothing to me but just another target. I will wipe you the fuck out with precision the likes of which has never been seen before on this Earth, mark my fucking words. You think you can get away with saying that shit to me over the Internet? Think again, fucker. As we speak I am contacting my secret network of spies across the USA and your IP is being traced right now so you better prepare for the storm, maggot. The storm that wipes out the pathetic little thing you call your life. You’re fucking dead, kid. I can be anywhere, anytime, and I can kill you in over seven hundred ways, and that’s just with my bare hands. Not only am I extensively trained in unarmed combat, but I have access to the entire arsenal of the IDF and I will use it to its full extent to wipe your miserable ass off the face of the continent, you little shit. If only you could have known what unholy retribution your little “clever” comment was about to bring down upon you, maybe you would have held your fucking tongue. But you couldn’t, you didn’t, and now you’re paying the price, you goddamn idiot. I will shit fury all over you and you will drown in it. You’re fucking dead, kiddo.

>>44928314
OY VEY

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I'd also recommend the Ni No Kuni spellbook. There is probably a PDF on the net.

It came out only in Japanese since it was an extra with the Ni No Kuni collectors edition, but that just makes it more mysterious.

>>44927968
That's cheating using the Voynich...

>>44928978
If you look closely you will see that it has actual decipherable words in it, and that it is still part of Guillermo del Toro's notbook.

>>44928974
>every kanji has a reading guide
That's the age target for this?

>>44930122
Suggested E10+ here in 'murica.

>>44928974
There was english versions, but only a pitiful amount. Last time I checked, you could buy the book for like $200 USD

>>44913287
huge props for mm7 spellbook

>>44928197

Oh yeah, Bishop Cathedral, I've had him in my dreams as well and it was comforting.

Besides the art aspect, if you're going to make a good book you also need to have something good to put in it. Should we work on a viable magic system?

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>>44931349
http://www.cantrap.net/spellwork/wizspell.html

>>44931379
See
>seem more like silly things you give to kids that are into harry potter or teens who think they can use magic to put curses on the people they dislike in high school ... I want to avoid that sort of thing if at all possible
We're looking for credible and internally consistent mysticism. So more Unknown Armies than D&D.

>>44912176
>I am not a grill
Can I crush on you then?

>>44931579
>Can I crush on you then?
Go for it, not like I can stop you.

>>44912410
I AM INTENSELY UNCOMFORTABLE

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>>44912410
>"""Art"""

>>44931622
>>44931660
>2016
>being a plebeian

>>44889550
I used to do something like this when I was little (Like, 10).
I had one of those little black and white notebooks and I filled it with drawings of designs and pictures of figures I saw in my dreams. Thinking back on it, it'd get kinda avant garde sometimes (I drew a sketch of a hooded figure, and kept digging into the outline of it with a pen until I had carved the picture through 4-5 pages, then I drew different designs around it on each page.)

I think my mom threw it out cause she thought it was creepy, but it might be packed up in one of the old boxes in my attic. I'll go look, and see if I can post pictures if I find it.

>>44931745
Fuck off /mu/, your taste is shit.

>>44931745
I'm not saying it's bad, I'm just saying it's terrifying.

>>44931745
Go away /mu/, people are allowed to like things here.

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>>44931746
Couldn't find the full journal, but I found a few scrappings that I guess I never ended up putting in with the rest. More guy living under bridge than ancient wizard, but I might as well share.

>>44931755
No, your taste is shit. See >>44931745

>>44931429
Hermeticism?

>>44933239
>What shall we use as our new magic system, remembering that it must be internally consistent, and specific enough to fill a book?
>"Magic!"

>>44912734
Cuneform on paper is pointless.

>>44934277
can be represented as rubbings or stamp from clay tablet

>>44921992
Didn´t know there were several, but on the second page it says yours is MMV and mine MMIX, which I guess means 2005 and 2009.

I´m scanning through quickly and can´t find any other differences, but I´ve found a blog post by the author saying that each edition has between 25 and 1000 units and is slightly different than the previous ones, because the game keeps changing and evolving in his head.

Can´t find anything about the actual differences, though.

>>44928101
What the fuck am I reading. Maybe I´m missing content, but half of it doesn´t make any sense and the other half is rather poorly written.

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>>44935068
It's Guillermo del Toro's Necronomicon which started out as a collection of material for a horror film which never happened and was leaked, possibly to create some fan hype.

It isn't a finished work like pic related.

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I didn't see anything saying you didn't want to use a real language (besides English) but why not Korean? The alphabet is just as easy to pick up as Russian, and its pretty fun to write, too.

http://www.ryanestrada.com/learntoreadkoreanin15minutes/

>>44935275
I've always been meaning to devote a week or two to getting the Korean writing system down.

>>44889550
>Hey, /tg/, so I've been kicking around the idea of creating a "book" that would fit within a fantasy setting as a spell book/grimoire/magic tomb. This would be more of an art project than it would be anything else. I would like this book to look like it would have been something assembled by someone who was already familiar with magic and had a pretty good grasp on it.
Are you familiar with Codex Ser--

>>44889710
Fuck.

This is excellent, and you can get it for like £50 in a giant single volume edition these days, I got a copy off Amazon for £45. A significant section seems to be describing some kind of weird physics, and might be relevant to your interests.

>>44897287
>In addition to looking rather cool, it allows the reader to... read much faster because instead of stopping to start each new line, the person reads continually. That's where the "ox plowing" thing comes from. When plowing you go from one side of the field and back, you don't cross the field, pick up the plow, and start over from the original side again.
You know, I wanted to say "but why, you look at a chunk of words at once not letter-by-letter," but then I remembered the period. IIRC reading at the time mostly was out-loud, piece by piece? Even people who could read mostly couldn't just look at a bunch of text and know what it meant, they had to actively read it? It would make that writing style a lot more useful.

At least, that's what vague memories of half-remembered pop-history tell me.

>>44897417
If you want a way to use arcane terms for everyday stuff, google uncleftish beholding.

http://anglish.wikia.com/wiki/Uncleftish_Beholding

Slight catch: a bunch of fucking nazis are into it these days. But it started out meaning well, Poul Anderson was a cool dude.

>>44917378
>Wicans claim to follow the old ways, to recover the old cults focused around nature.
Well, except the mainline Wiccans, who are quite aware their religion dates from the 60s. Problem is they're a mystery cult, so most of the offshoots claiming to be Wiccan literally can't know the details of the religion because only a couple of the offshoot groups ever knew them.

>>44938111
At first (and even now) writing and reading was a very vocal activity. The first things the Greeks wrote down were theater plays and similar things, which were an important part of many rituals.

At this time, people didn´t really write to preserve information (and many were reticent. There´s even philosophers who complained that it might make people forget things because they´re allowing themselves to forget them while keeping them in a brittle and vulnerable medium). They wrote to pass a message which would usually be read aloud later on.

As such, they didn´t really give a flying fuck about anything. Early Greek texts, for example, completely lack any kind of spelling rules, orthographic signs, spaces between words... They just made a solid line of letters and then read it aloud.

Also yes, it is perfectly possible to be able to read something out loud yet not have any idea what it means if you just look at it. In my teenage years I wrote a diary using Tolkien´s quenya script - just a simple letter substitution system with a couple changes to better fit my language but still respecting the vocal placement over consonants. It took me a few days and a few pages to be able to write without having to look at the cheat sheet (except for the most uncommon letters), and in a couple weeks I could write without any problem, although it was still slow compared to Latin script due to lack of muscle memory.

Still, even though I could write rather fluently, I was unable to read any of it. At some point I wanted to read an older entry and it was hell. I had to check the guide for almost each fucking letter, and then again on the next word, and the next. I gave up and never read again what I wrote - I only wrote further.

It´s been six years or so and right now I´m transcribing it because it might shine some light on some hard stuff that happened back then that has been torturing me until very short ago.
1/2

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>>44939643
Thing is, it took me a few hours of practice until I became able to read it more or less fluently. Which on one side makes sense because I haven´t touched this stuff in six years, but on the other surprises me quite a lot - I had to specifically train reading in order to read. In the past I trained writing and that´s what I could do. They´re completely disconnected skills.

Furthermore, starting is slow. I always struggle with the first word or two, but then it´s like something "clicks in" and I can read the whole paragraph in a single go. But if I have to stop because of a weird word or an uncommon symbol, or just a paragraph change, then I lose track and have to "start up" again.

Which also means that I´m completely unable to just read a few words here and there. It´s very hard to immediately recognize the symbols unless I´m already reading.


I guess that´s how they used to do it. They just started, then read the whole thing to the public, or to themselves if they were trying to memorize it to act it out later on stage.

By the way, I had to translate some Ancient Greek written in that letterletter style back at the university. It was surprisingly easy once you got used to it. It probably helps that Greek is very strict about suffixes and almost every word is either an article or finishes in a handful of easily recognizable letter groups. The brain kind of splits the text on its own.

Took a quick picture. Sorry for quality.

>>44889550
>inb4 ops book is used post nuclear apocalypse to cast Magic by tribals

>>44939944
Truly that would be something I could only hope for; creating a book so convincing that some ignorant person actually mistakes it for a real spell book.

>make a fake spellbook
>fill it with satanic imagery
>infuse the paper with fire-proof solution
>plant the book at the steps of local mormon/baptist/any other random fanatic church
>look like fanatics try to burn the profane thing
>IT DOESN'T BURN
>looks on their faces would be most priceless

Rolled 18, 42, 42, 29, 25, 42, 12, 32, 35, 34, 32, 3, 32, 30, 25, 24, 33, 12, 3, 40, 14, 30, 19, 1, 6 + 200 = 815 (25d42 + 200)

>>44889550
That is really sweet.

>>44941713
Fund it.

>dice
Just testing, it's been a while since I've done that.

>>44941713
>not making it so that it burns for far longer than it should, in a deep and unholy red, but never wastes away.

>>44941994
that's beyond basic chemistry i know

bump!

What's a good reference for one person creating an entire writing system on their own, aside from Tolkien? I'd like to look at a few for inspiration.

>>44948367

The keyword you want to google is "conlang" - there's an entire nerd sub-culture based around developing writing systems like that.

>>44948367
Ithkuil.

Tî akt’asalb abjatļud.

>>44913336
>Tenno
Jesus christ that just made me feel a bit queasy

>>44948367
>>44949359
>>44949558
Also, search the word "neography".

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>>44913336

Tenno? As in Warframe? Is this what the devs are doing instead of fixing the game?

>>44942930
Would not be hard.
Make the "paper" out of something extremely heat resistant like marlon, coat it in some fire retarding substance for extra measure, then dip the thing in a combination of magnesium oxide and lithium chloride.

>>44950159
sorry that should be marko not marlon.

I've never really tried working out my own conlang before. I mainly stick to english, but I know enough of other languages to not want to stick my own speshul snowflake into my brainspace.

But how common is this?
>consonants, vowels, and a third type called "modifier" or something
>all sounds that change how a letter is pronounced like th and ch are categorized as modifiers, and they can't be used as consonants for ease of understanding.
>in the same way, strokes are categorized. One has straight lines, another curved, and the third enclosed shapes.

>>44952874
th and ch are still consonants, anon.

What you're thinking of are called diactrics, and don't count as a third type. Here, familiarize yourself will all the sounds humans can make.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Phonetic_Alphabet

>>44953448
That's not all the sounds humans can make. It's all the sounds humans are documented as making as a component of language.

>>44953448
>>44953448
>don't count as a third type
I mean making them specifically a third type in a new language, with their own specific letters so as not to be confusing.

>>44953448
digraphs, a diacritic is totally different.

>>44953494
Why would they be a third type though? How would that be less confusing than treating them the same as other consonants?

>>44953518
for example, doublecheck. For someone not used to english, they may have problems figuring out whether it's double-check or doub-lec-heck or some other division. In this case, by making "l" and "h" a third type, you will always know that they cannot act as the start of a syllable/word. You lose out on any actual words that start with l and h, but then that's why this is a conlang: we're making things from scratch anyway.

>>44953618
That's not "third type" that's way more complicated. Also, in that example, the l does start a syllable, it's a l̩ or syllabic /l/, and so it's the start, end, and middle of the syllable.

>>44953682
so it's not common to do things this way?

>>44953695
No, of course not. The common solution to ambiguity like that is to just not use a digraph for ch, but to give it its own glyph, and to avoid non-phonetic spellings like we've got in "double".

>>44953731
well thanks, then.

>>44953746
If you want to look at "third types" that change letter pronunciation though, do look at diacritics. There's a lot of languages where they change the sound a lot, though they're more common to vowels than consonants. Vietnamese and Hebrew are examples of languages that do this to a particular degree, and Korean (Hangul script) has syntax that specifies where in a syllable the sounds fall.

That said, your idea of sounds with specific syllable positions using an alphabetic script rather than a syllabic one is interesting, and I can't think of a language that uses it aside from those which were adapted to the Latin script by Europeans.

>>44953848
I don't intend to pursue this any time soon, though. I just tried listing ways to make a conlang
>easy to pronounce from just the script
>have clearly defined roles for each symbol, to prevent common mistakes
>is familiar to me(alphabetic, although I know my way around chinese to a degree)
but the base description I came up with felt too...."generic". As if someone considered it already. So I asked if someone did.

>>44950159
>then dip the thing in a combination of dmso and lsd

>>44948367
MAR Barker did that for Tekumel.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsoly%C3%A1ni_language

Should we make a new thread?

bump

>>44959045
If you guys want a new thread to discuss languages further, or when this thread falls off page ten and you'd like to continue discussing the idea of this thread, feel free to make a new thread.

I'm busy with re-teaching myself to use my dip pens, and practice actual calligraphy in preparation for writing whatever made up letters I'm going to be using.

This was an incredibly successful thread and I can't thank everyone enough for all the help, inspiration, and interesting discussion it produced.

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>>44959045
Let's wait for autosage.

As long as OP, or anyone else for that matter, has developments from their project, a new thread would be indicated. Otherwise I'm not sure what else to discuss. It takes getting shit done and posting pictures.

We could make a thread collecting links and resources. Kinda like this one, but structured.

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I once filled a Moleskine with the random notes of a mad scientist who had disappeared from an asteroid station in a setting not far from The Expanse. But the game didn't work, I foolishly built it on Starship Troopers which uses d20.

It contained pages outlining concepts like main sequence stars, MOSFET gate design, Tokamak fusion containment, ring laser gyroscopes, nuclear decay sequences, the Fibonacci spiral, ... It was littered with palindromes and each page had a hidden part of a code.

>>44960626
>main sequence stars
Oh, Be A Fine Guy, Kiss Me.

I use a Midori notebook for my elite dangerous exploration logs, which tend to have shitty sketches and notes about random stuff mixed in.

>>44960145
I think people shared most of what there is to share.

Binding a book in leather with pagan symbol on the cover.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aT5toj4EG8o

>>44964892
What the fuck is going on in this picture.

>>44965872
Sewing

>>44965872
I think it's poorly demonstrated, but that top set of strings there is the final "stitch" at the top of the signature. The one in the back has quite a bit of additional loose string, and I think the guy who made this is tying the string that's coming out of every signature after the first to that string to stabilize them. At least that's how I'm reading this.

bump

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>>44964981
Really cool shit

I'm trying to find some cool shit that would occupy a magic book

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yzYtOG-1wug
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MBBmv1Vsjjs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eiQxhUMEPdY

Found this on YouTube by searching "how to draw magic symbols." Its actually a form of English cursive but it looks pretty neat.

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLmSUTHzWYMaNL-7DZ1jhFh1tf5pea9h5i

>>44968545
Search "Elian script" and "pigpen cypher".

>>44968545
I like the letters and the words, but I don't care for his number system so much