Ive seen / read about a special ( security ) software tool, before, for generating those 'patterns' and details. ( But, Well, Sadly enough, I cant remember the name of that suite. )

As for digital resources / collections, you may want to consider Aridi and Dover.
> www.aridi.com/vol8.htm
> www.aridi.com/vol24.htm
> store.doverpublications.com/0486999394.html

Dav

Here is a site that offers some respectable designs, but no where as intricate as the work on those historic certificates.

Here is an amazing book, The Art of The Market, a shame they dont have some pix of the inside pages. I spent about an hour in a bookstore drooling over this. May be of some use to you.

Thanks for the notes. I had ordered Art of the Market last night from amazon, but had seen it before.

I am surprised that someone like dover or pepin press doesn't have something like this. I see it used frequently such as on materials for GMUND.

> I am surprised that someone like dover doesn’t have something like this.

Did you actually read my post / reply, then? :)
Seen the link to store.doverpublications.com/0486999394.html?
( Soo, Actually, Dover does offer something quite similar. )

Dav

If you analyze what going on in the patterns you can learn to make them in photoshop via filters from lines & pattens made in Illustrator. With the right filter pack in Illutrator I think you could do the whole thing in Illutrator itself. I'll see if I can find something I made this way if you want to 'roll your own'.

I love this stuff! Looks like it would be fairly easy to make in Illustrator if you could be bothered to get good with the blend tool, which sadly I've never gotten around to doing. But sorry, you'll need to fill me in on what you mean by "swipe book"?

Hmm... A couple of years ago I came across a little freeware programme that created this sort of thing and exported them out as .eps files. I can't remember what it's called though... I'll have a look through my external drives.

Illustrated History | Doodleblog

If you're on a Mac, take a look at Excentro. It's a guilloche generator application. The free demo lets you do everything but save in Excentro's native format, though it easily exports to Illustrator.

Wow, this looks pretty fab! Thanks!

Ah yes, Excentro!

Illustrated History | Doodleblog

Thanks for all the info. Excentro produces some perfect patterns that are easily exported. I imagine this is similar to methods that banknote producers utilize these days.

I believe banks combine mechanical (computer-driven) and hand engraving as a security feature.

Nigella, a swipe book is one of those books of out-of-copyright (or uncopyrighted) samples that one can scan (or use the cd sometimes provided) and use or adapt, you can imagine the ratio of useful images to the less than useful and useless.

Tim

This isn't a tutorial, but a lightbox from iStockphoto. Vector Engravings.

What you want is available as the "Certified Borders" series at MyFonts, in which the frame components are broken down into the equivalent of letters in a font alphabet, which makes everything easier to control and compose:

http://www.myfonts.com/search?search%5Btext%5D=certified+borders