John--I am also building a boat from Nick's book. I found that the process of lofting the forms from the offsets gave me a much better understanding of the boat's shape. Even if you buy the forms or patterns from Nick, draw a couple yourself. See how close they come to the ones you buy. My guess is that you'll be closer than you think, you'll appreciate Nick's work more, and you'll see some of the subtlety in the boat's shape that wouldn't be apparent otherwise.