Morrrrre.....

Some more book cover development to add to the collection.

As you can see I've been playing around with the colours. I'm still not decided upon any colour schemes. We'll have to see how the bookset looks once it's complete!

Oo what's this

I made my very own barcode! :D Well, I copied it from an existing one, but I still made it, and it looks AWESOME!

I've never made book covers before, but from what my brain tells me, I don't want to include too much detail. Although I'm designing and will be printing these, they're still only proposals. I think perhaps a barcode will be the only detail I include.

Covers in progress

I'm sitting here, continuously copying and pasting covers for me to tweak just the tiniest bit to get it looking exactly how I want it to.

Whilst I've been faffing around being incredibly picky with the positioning and whatnot, I'm starting to re-think these colour schemes. I'm unsure as to whether I want to keep the covers the same colour or not. I'm kind of liking the idea of having different colours for the covers, and keeping a continuous colour scheme across the imagery and possibly text. My mind's just baffled!

Signage

I've been nabbing a few images off the net which I've then been applying my typeface to create potential signage for the Museum of Garden History.

They're a bit naff at the moment, but then again, they're only mess arounds, just to get an idea as to what I want to produce.

I'm not sure on the whole 'writing on the wall'. I think I might try using three-dimensional objects which will display information.

I will take a trip to a few museums to see what they have to offer. Perhaps this'll give me more of an insight as to what I can do!

Peg alphabet

I've made a typeface out of pegs for some reason. I wanted to attempt to think about one of my other briefs (alphabetical reference). It took two days to photography and edit the pegs, which in a way I kind of regret.

I do like the typeface, but it really could have been done so much better. I took the photographs outside, just before it started raining, so the lighting kept changing. I've altered the colours and lighting a little in photoshop after cutting them out, but some of them look so random.

To be honest, I don't think I'll be using these or re-doing them. It took way too long prepping them, and they don't actually have any relevance to my work whatsoever! It was one of those random moments.

Colour palette

I want my books to look as though they belong. I want them to work together as as a set, so I will need to keep some things similar and some the same. I want to keep the background colour the same, which, at the moment, is black. I will change the colour of each image, though I am at the moment putting them in the same place on each cover. The composition will be very similar across the books.

...

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe..

I've got a few ideas with this, which could potentially somehow work across the other designs. I've done the same as I have with the others, when I use one single image which is half on the front page and half on the smaller inside flap. I've also tried using two images which go together. The first image on the front page leads towards the second. I'm not exactly sure how it'd work on the others but I guess it's one of those things I'll have to get my thinking cap on for again.

My take on things

I decided to get my book covers on the computer. I'm still in the early stages of designing and I've still plenty to get up, but I thought I'd get what I've been doing up so far.

I've been reading through the plots of each story, to give myself an idea as to what happens in each book. I've been highlighting key words in each plot which has been helping me gather images. I want to use key images which represent and sum up each book as good as possible.

I really like the idea of showing only half the image on the front cover, and having the other half on a smaller flap on the other side of the front cover.

The Voyage of the Dawn Treador...

I'm really keen on using an image of a ship, or perhaps a specific part of a ship for this book.

The Silver Chair...

I didn't want to use the obvious answer to a book cover titled 'The Silver Chair'. There's a lot to do with an owl in the book so I wanted to use this approach.

Leafy

I felt like I hadn't really put myself out there when experimenting with nature. I brought it to me rather than me going to it and using it in it's natural surroundings.

I started playing with the leaves in my garden which were previously green. They turned a beautiful pinky-red colour then fell off the ivy thing. :( I thought it'd be nice to have a go at writing one of my quotes with them. So I did. :) I didn't finish a whole quote in the end though. It was way too long. Plus the wind started to pick up and kept blowing the leaves away. :(

There's a horrible bundle of weeds, leaves and stems outside my window which the ''gardener'' decided to leave the other day. I had a little rummage and had a play with the half decent bits I could find. I made letters out of these too. I think it looks lovely. The letters aren't completely formed, though there's still enough information there for us to be able to tell what the each letter it supposed to be.

I still agree with the previous post regarding a more suitable typeface for the quote, but I've had a quick go at making it look more like a poster.

I've added the logo I designed as well as a website I made up which would lead to the virtual museum I'll be proposing.

I'm kind of struggling to decide what else to put on. I'm unsure as to what information definitely needs to go on a poster. I'll probably leave it at this to be honest. The website will contain all the information about the real museum anyway, so that'd do that trick. I don't want to overload it with bits of information.

I'm still in need of a strap line. I'm trying to think of something catchy rather than just something boring like 'visit the museum of garden history.'

Leafy quote

I've been playing around with the typeface I created.

I've got a load of quotes which I'll filter to just four. I'll be using these on the posters which would be used to create an interest in the museum.

I think this looks lovely, though I think a more appropriate style of type would be better for this quote. These leaves aren't very wintery.

Yep, I like this. :)

Natural typeface

I thought it was about time I made an entire typeface seen as I've done a fair few experiments with only few letters so far.

I've created an alphabet out of leaves.

I think it works quite well. I've only just noticed the 'r'... it's lower case. I knew I'd bloody do that. To be honest though, looking at it, I think it doesn't look half bad. I don't think it looks that obvious and stands out from the rest (though it might do now since I've mentioned it) I still think it fits with the others. Perhaps I can play on the mistake? In a way I've made it a little more interesting for myself.

Settled

I've developed my logo and I'm finally happy with it!

I was so set on the idea of making it look 3D because of the whole virtual museum stuff, but I think if it were to be 3D it wouldn't look as though it belonged at all to the real museum.

I think it looks fine like this, and as though it fits with the museum and what it's all about. By making them 3D, it would really lose the realness.

Logo revisited

I wanted to give the whole virtual museum a break and do a some more designing for the new identity I'm creating; after all, this is why I'm doing this brief!

I want the logo to look fresh, futuristic but still have that natural feel about it. I don't want to get too sucked into the whole virtual world where everything's metal and shiny; it still needs to relate to the real-life museum.

I've been developing another logo; my third one! I'm really enjoying playing around with it, though I'm finding it hard achieving the look I want.

I'm still in the experimental phase, what with colours and such, but for now I've been working with a very light grey. I've been trying to achieve a 3D slick metal-like look.

I created parts of which will make up a leaf shape. I feel by having a leaf shape automatically gives the logo a natural feel (and I don't mean just visually). A leaf is probably the most commonly used shape for logos which represent gardens or something similar. I feel by breaking it up into parts gives it a technical look.

Plan of action

Take one step back..

I've come to realise my alphabetical reference for people with dyslexia is way too broad. There are so many types of dyslexia so whatever I produce wouldn't be available for all.

I have again, gone back to my brief, and changed it back to the original target audience; children.

Petal type

I was so determined to edit each letter I'd created out of these flower heads that I didn't realise how long it'd take me until I'd finished the first one. I decided to scrap that idea for the time being seeing this is only an initial idea.

I still wanted to see what it'd look like to make whole words out of the letters, so for the sake of just seeing, I gave it a go.

I like it, but I want to keep pushing the typeface designs. At the end of it, I want to have at least four finished typefaces for a range of poster advertisements, so I'm really going to have to pull my finger out and get creating.

At the moment anyway, this does look rough because of the shoddy background. The final typefaces will be all nicely edited and will look a lot more neater.

Covers for books

After presenting my briefs at the crit on Thursday, I found out I had to more or less re-write them all. I struggled to write the lot in the first place, so I wasn't too surprised when I was told they're too vague and had to be a lot more focused.

So I'm starting off with this; 'covers for books'. (Inventive title eh!) Above is the original I wrote during summer. Below is the newer version. As you can see, I have chosen an author and have specific books I want to research into and develop new covers for.

Since re-writing this, I've become a lot more interested and motivated. I can't wait to get designing!!

Great

Tutorial today went a little too good for my liking.. I've more or less got to re-write my briefs! Wahay. :| I guess it's not too bad considering I've only been working on one. When I wrote them I didn't want to focus them too much on specific things (just like the briefs were given aren't) Nevertheless, I got slated.

I've decided I'm going to continue the one I'd done a fair amount of work on. That's my museum brief. I'll have to visit the others.

Fun times!

Using the heads of flowers, I create a typeface. At the moment I'm experimenting with various flowers, grass and leaves I find in the environment to see how they turn out. I will however use the appropriate objects if I were to take these ideas further.