FMP (BA): Book Cover - Design Process

The Final Sketch

With all of my elements ready - the layout sketch and type - I could now work on my final sketch. I'm hoping that by planning ahead that this process would be a lot easier, and I jotted down the measurements of my type on a spare piece of paper to help me out a little in terms of composition.

Getting the dimensions right was a priority because I want to make sure that everything is aligned, and this proved a lot trickier than I thought it would for the curved lines. I managed to tackle this problem by laying everything out as straight lines. Each line had to be the same width as the type I had prepared before so I used the line in the middle that I had drawn previously as the centre point for my lines. I then drew around the edge of the plate, making sure that it matched up to those straight lines. I had to do this several times but I got there in the end. 

Once all of the guidelines were drawn I put in some more guidelines for each individual letter which also took a while to do. Fortunately my dimensions were correct so I didn't have to change anything at all. 

Then I started to draw out my characters and went from top to bottom so that I didn't smudge anything.
I used a 08 micron for the top line, 03 for "of" and "FTWeekend", and both 02 and 03 for "Quotes as well as the book illustration. The other illustrations were done in 01 and 02. All in all, I used a lot of micron pens!

FMP (BA): Drafting out the Type

I have an idea of what kind of type style to go for; it has to be professional, easy-to-read, and good to work in a relatively small space. I want it to also appear quite friendly with a hint of decoration.

I had originally done this type process in two stages; one before I had come up with my "final" idea, and one before.

The "Before" Stage

For the before stage I just wrote out the whole line out a few times in different styles; one was done in serif that was inspired by my "Nevermore" piece, a script typeface, and a mixture of the script and serif. Even though I liked the script idea I am worried that it appears too feminine, and the first serif looked too strict. The third idea softened the serif style slightly but I still wasn't too sure about it because of it's slight angle as it might not work for the book layout.

I decided to carry on doing a few more styles to see which one has the right voice for my design.

Annotations

1. Too feminine and girly - better for girly books or children's books - although I do like the uppercase letters

FMP (BA): Book Cover - Initial Sketches & Development

I carried out my sketches over a few days because I really struggled to come up with fresh ideas. It proved to be much harder to create sketches for the book cover than quotes because there was a lack of "voice" or storyline to follow. I know that I need to produce something professional like the Penguin Classic book designs but because they are quite clean and professional I found it quite restricting.

I started with a small doodle (that actually turned out pretty nice) and from then onwards I started to sketch several compositions from what I've learnt from Penguin Classics. I wanted to mix in some "novelty" elements and loved the way Jim Tierney presented his titles and noticed that there was an element of Art Deco in his borders. Whenever I think of Art Nouveau and Art Deco I think of decadence and the beginnings of a new society, which would be great for this book cover because I want to prove that there has been a slow growth of illustration/typography in book covers.

I started to attempt to break out of the structured mould I found myself in and my eyes kept flicking back to my first doodle so I decided to take it a step further and to do more sketches on it. I wasn't too sure if I needed to present my name on the front cover... From my research I have learnt that most books just feature the "author" on an inside page. I took my name out completely and just scribbled in an area where I would write "Oxford Literary Festival" or "FTWeekend". 

On the next page I developed the type doodle even further by thinking of a centred composition and mixing it with another typeface style before coming up with an idea where the type takes up the whole page (something that I was inspired to do after seeing how well this script lettering book looked). I then took it to the next step and tried to neaten the angle and kerning up but I found myself struggling because I felt as if I was restricted to a small area, and my words flowed a lot more when I did it freehand. 

FMP (BA): The Raven

The Final Outcome

The Process

Drawing the Type

I wanted to be as accurate on the type as possible so I measured the width of the whole quote that I had done yesterday and halved it. This would then be the centre point of each section, for example, "Quoth the Raven" measured to 16.2cm so I halved it to get 8.1cm. I measured the centre of the paper I was working on and drew a faint line, as this line would serve as the centre point of all of the quotes. I then measured the points I had earlier according to this line so that all of the quote will sit central on the page. This is quite confusing to explain so hopefully the image below will help out a little bit. 

Now I can work on the type and I focused on the first section first (Quoth the Raven) because this one will be sitting on a straight line. I took reference from my sketches in terms of kerning and character width, and once the guidelines were done I was able to draw each letter.

To retain accuracy I made sure that the thickness of the letters were the same and used a ruler to make sure the lines were straight. This will help me out a lot later on when it comes to inking. 

FMP (BA): Initial & Developing Sketches

I drew some initial type sketches, taking inspiration from Blackletter type and calligraphy. I'm not too sure how exactly to go about this so I thought that the best way to start was by just writing in my usual handwriting and then adding to it.

I first concentrated on the word "Nevermore" because I might not be able to add in the whole quote, and that's one of the most important word throughout the poem. I was leaning more on calligraphy and tried to make the N as elegant as possible but I got a bit worried that it looked too feminine.
To make it less feminine I tried doing the same kind of lettering as I did for one of my sketches for Moby Dick, but I'm not too sure about this so I went back to trying to make the capital letters really elaborate and entwine so that they form one "illustration". I quite liked how my first version was really sketchy so quickly made a note of it for later before carrying on going down the calligraphy route.

I added in some elements of Blackletter in one of my ideas where everything was in uppercase but I think it's too "strong" for my illustration as I want it to be quite delicate. I then concentrated solely on N because if I find a good style for that I could slowly apply it to the other letters. I quite liked the way Sean de Burca did his swashes on some of his letters and tried it out on some of mine.

FMP (BA): The Raven - Line Work

I wanted to try out some shading in biro just to lift the illustration off the page a little bit and make it look more 'finished', so I photocopied my biro lines that I had done in the previous post just in case I decide not to do any shading. 

It didn't take me as long as expected because I wanted it to retain that sketchy appearance, and I found myself doing scribbles most of the time (especially for the raven's body). 

My main worry with this now that it is all shaded in is that although the raven really stands out, the feathers now just make the whole illustration look too neat and subtracts the chaotic appearance that I was trying to go for. It is a lovely effect, but I still prefer my very first version where I roughly sketched it out in pencil. 

My next thought was to then try and combine the two versions (this and the "sketchy" version) by incorporating some more feathers in the background to fill in the gaps, but this time I won't be shading them. I did this by scanning the document in and reducing the size in Photoshop before printing it out and working with biro.  

Comparing this version to the one at the top, it has more of a chaotic appearance and is a mixture of the sketched-version and biro version. This mixture then creates a nice balance because it looks finished rather than a scribble in a notepad. However, I still feel it's a little bit too neat so I might add even more scribbles (feathers), but I'll work on this after I've figured out what to do with the type.

To make things a little easier I placed both version (the sketch-line version and biro version) next to each other:

I'm still a bit torn between the two because although I love how chaotic the original is, I feel that the raven looks a lot better shaded in and the feathers are more obviously raven feathers. There isn't really a messier way to shade them in so I'm a bit stuck.

My next step is to therefore concentrate on my typography and work on compositions, and probably just take a breather from this a little bit so that I could look at it with fresh eyes.

Learning Outcomes:

[5] Developed skills of independent study, resource utilisation, problem-solving and decision-taking.

FMP (BA): Initial Sketches - The Raven

During my mind-map stage I jotted down some initial ideas for this piece, and the one that really caught my eye was where the raven would be shielding Lenore from view. This would create an immediate connection with the narrator as he mourns her death and the fact that they raven replied, "Nevermore" when he asks if he would see her in heaven. It's strange how I haven't really seen many designs that incorporate Lenore, as they mainly focus on the raven itself. In my opinion, Lenore is almost as important as the raven.

I roughly drew a sketch of Lenore's face and had the idea where she would be facing away from the viewer, partly shielded by raven feathers in order to emphasise intrigue. It would also reflect the fading memories of the narrator and that he would never see Lenore again, so in time would forget what she looked like. I wasn't too sure how I would include the raven so I quickly sketched out some poses that I gathered on my Pinterest board.

I then moved onto drawing her hair and how the raven would sit around her, which proved to be more difficult than I had initially anticipated. I was getting worried that my piece would look too similar to John Howe's sketch "Angel Eyes" so decided to start afresh and first focus on the raven's feathers. However, I felt that just drawing the feathers would take out the most important part (Lenore) so I tried to incorporate her into the sketches without it looking too similar to what I had previously.

FMP (BA): Moby Dick Sketches & Experimentation

Initial Sketches

I was so inspired by the typeface styles I showed in my last post that I had done some sketches based off this. I first tried to imitate it but then I wanted to add my own kind of style to it so that I had my "voice". I wasn't too sure how decorative I wanted to go so for now I just drew whatever I wanted as it could always be adapted later. I started small because I just wanted to get the general idea of the typeface I was going to do and didn't want to concentrate on layout just yet.

Developing Sketches - Lettering 

I then picked a few to adapt over the next couple of pages, even if I was only changing a few things. I noticed that during my last 'project' where I was hand-lettering the Lord of the Rings quote that my lettering was better if I focused on just one word to figure out how wide each letter should be. After each type was drawn I used tracing paper to copy it and then add a new feature to it.
I wanted to emphasise the "sailor" theme that I was going for so I added a few swirls and flourishes to the type design inspired by Victorian typography, but I felt that it was much too obvious (as I tried to imitate waves) and much preferred the ones where there was a diamond-shape in the middle. I didn't want to overpower the type and although I do want to try out flourishes I didn't want to add them just yet.

FMP (BA): New Quotes

When I was doing my sketches for the Oscar Wilde quote I decided to hop back onto the Oxford Literary festival website to see what other topics they cover so that I could decide on my next quote. That was when I had the feeling that maybe the designs I had done so far weren't suitable for this project...

This is because some of the quotes aren't that well-known and I feel that maybe I should look at quotes from 'classical' books that literary-enthusiasts would know of. 

I mentioned these thoughts to a family friend and she confirmed that I should stay away from books such as Harry Potter and instead look at Charles Dickens' Oliver, Pride and Prejudice, and other similar books.

I have calculated that I have four weeks left including this one to produce my quotes before I have to move onto thinking about the book covers and printing techniques, so that means I have time for four more quotes. Due to this small timeframe I think that I shall leave my Oscar Wilde quote for now and concentrate on finding at least two or three new quotes that fit with this classical theme, and then go back to it. I have already produced an ideal layout for the Oscar Wilde quote but I would just need to figure out what typefaces to use... Here is my sketch so far:

Because of this realisation and wanting the quotes to fit my target audience I have compiled a new list of possible quotes. I don't think I shall replace any of the quotes I have but just build the book up with classical ones so that I could mix up the pages between classical and non-classical. This means that I would still be aiming at the target audience.

New list:

“Looking at these stars suddenly dwarfed my own troubles and all the gravities of terrestrial life.” - HG Wells, The Time Machine
"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife." — Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
"Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins." —Vladimir Nabokov, Lolita
"Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." — Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina
"I am an invisible man." —Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man
"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way." - Charles Dickens, The Tale of Two Cities
"It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen." George Orwell, 1984
"If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth." - J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye
"In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I’ve been turning over in my mind ever since. Whenever you feel like criticising any one, he told me, just remember that all the people in this world haven’t had the advantages that you’ve had.” - F.Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
"The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there."- L. P. Hartley, The Go-Between
“Call me Ishmael.” - Herman Melville, Moby-Dick
“The sun shone, having no alternative, on the nothing new.” - Samuel Beckett, Murphy
"All children, except one, grow up." - J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan
"Mother died today. Or maybe, yesterday; I can't be sure." - Albert Camus, L'Etranger (The Stranger)
"There was no possibility of taking a walk that day." - Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre
"Quoth the Raven: Nevermore." - Edgar Allan Poe, The Raven


References: https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/3234863-the-time-machine; http://americanbookreview.org/100bestlines.asp; http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/culturepicturegalleries/9817505/30-great-opening-lines-in-literature.html?frame=2458291; http://www.theguardian.com/culture/gallery/2012/apr/29/ten-best-first-lines-fiction;

FMP (BA): Initial Ideas & Experimentation with Celtic Writing

I decided to follow James Victore's advice on how to find my voice [link here] so instead of spending a day searching for inspirational posters and designs, I focused mainly on gathering inspiration from the Lord of the Rings books and films.

Sketching Ideas 

While I was watching the Fellowship of the Ring I sketched a few rough ideas based on my inspiration, because I prefferred to have something down (no matter how sketchy) so that I didn't forget about it later. I started to draw the Tree of Gondor when I came up with the idea of merging the it with Narsil (Elendir's sword) to portray Aragorn as both are very closely linked to him. I wrote some small notes on how I would briefly look into Chalk Lettering but when I watched the film more I realised that that type style might not be suitable for this 'project'.

I started to think about celtic writing, but I was soon distracted by my other idea that I just left it for a bit and sketched out my tree and sword. I couldn't really decide where I was going to place the type but for now I thought I'd have it overlap the sword & tree and delete the areas they'll overlap so that it's left with a blank space for the text. I thus moved on to focus mainly on the type.

APP Words: Author's Signature

[8]

One of the things I mentioned on my previous post was that I needed to add a little signature of the author's name, so I spent a while just sketching out different signature styles before finally deciding that I'll place this on the bottom of the ampersand. I had this idea in mind for a while but actually seeing it confirmed this placement choice.

APP Words: Further Development

With my rough composition now done I can focus on sketching what would be the final design. This means that once I have done this sketch I could then annotate areas of improvement before moving on to drawing everything up on either Illustrator or Photoshop, or by my Inkling.

I'm still undecided on whether or not to just draw the "Never give in and never give up" design on it's own with the Twinings label hanging what would be the edge of the travel mug. Simplicity is always best, but I'm not too sure if it'll be eye-catching enough for my target market. To try and help me out I shall draw this design up on Illustrator/Photoshop/via Inkling anyway with the tea leaves pattern in the background, and place it alongside my other design. For now it's a bit too early to decide on anything just yet.

APP Words: Banner Idea Development

[8]

After picking some chosen designs I decided to take my banner idea a step further to try out some different styles for the banner and for the type. This is because I had gathered some feedback from my classmates and from my sister - who would fall in my target market - and they said they really liked my calligraphic writing, so I wanted to incorporate that into my banner design. 

The first thing I did was try out drawing the banner differently, and I took inspiration from both infographic posters and chalk lettering banners for this. As you can see, I spent a lot of time thinking whether or not to try a straight banner rather than a swirling one as it'll be easier to draw up on the computer. 

I then focused on placing the type within the banners and have the ampersand in the middle to connect the two sentences together. This was when I realised that maybe the straight box wasn't good for this layout because the ampersand was very smooth and curvy, so the straight box heavily contrasted. I also wanted the banner to reflect the fluidity of tea, and so went with the curvy one in the end. [8]

APP Words: Inspiration at Work

[4]

I noticed that my sketches were becoming a bit redundant and that I was running out of ideas, so while it was really quiet at work I took the chance to do some new sketches, drawing inspiration from the patterns of some of the clothes there. Even though these patterns are completely unrelated to this project and doesn't feature any typography it didn't really matter because I find that it's nice to gather inspiration from almost anything, and it was a breather from what I had been looking at the past couple of weeks. 

Inspiration (please excuse the quality of the photos!)

All patterns etc belong to Long Tall Sally

Nevertheless I did repeat one or two previous sketches, but I took them further by drawing them in different styles. For example I developed the ideas of sketching some buntings to dangle from the rim of the travel mug, as I drew each letter of the quote with different patterns. 

APP Words: Developing Sketches - Chosen Ideas

I'm at that point where I could start highlighting aspects that I find could be developed further and incorporated into the final design, so I went through the whole of my sketch pad and put little gold stars next to each sketch that I liked. 

I would like this idea to be the centrepiece of my design, and I could imagine it being right at the "front" of the travel mug. I want to experiment with more type styles though as I feel I haven't really explored into different typefaces and how they are usually displayed on banners. 

APP Words: Developing Sketches 2

I really liked the look of the banner, and after having a look at some of the motivational quotes I had collected previously I just roughly sketched out the words and ampersand that I wanted to draw on it. I left this for a while and continued to experiment with different hand-lettering styles, playing around with a set of micron pens I had purchased.

APP Words: Developing Sketches

To make things easier and keep to the flow of this blog I shall be doing separate posts every time I do my sketches so that I can see my progress and how that relates to my research. It'll also help me to pin point the areas I need to brush up on so I could get it done as quickly as possible to ensure I have more time to develop my final sketch. [8]

I spent the whole day yesterday at uni drawing lots of doodles and sketches and flicking through my typography album on Pinterest for inspiration, and I annotated my sketches where I was inspired by someone's work. This was quite a relaxing way of sketching for me because I didn't have to go off and analyse an inspirational piece and then sketch, but just sketch, write down the source of inspiration so I can go back to it after I was done. This meant that I could just focus solely on my ideas and get me 'in the mood' for doodling.

I've taken some of my previous doodles to develop here, especially those that I think I might carry across to my final sketch although I'm not too certain just yet what I'll include.

Conclusion:

I really like this method of sketching ideas because I was able to continuously generate them without getting bogged down by the thought of not analysing inspirational works just yet, because I could always do that at a later stage as I had written their names in the annotations. 

I think I might continue to do this in later sketches and then create a big post at the end of all of the images I drew references from, making note of them in my sketchpad or create a mood board on Pinterest. As you can tell in my sketches above I've made some progress in hand-lettering, especially when it comes to how each letter sits and is arranged. I've definitely leaned more on sans-serif styles and 'chunky' writing. 

My next step is to look back at my motivational quotes to help me come up with some quotes of my own (if I do choose to go with my own quote). If not I shall just pick a handful of the most inspirational ones that fit within my design.  

[n] Learning Outcome

APP Words: Doodles 2

I was inspired to do some more doodles after I flicked through my Pinterest board and stumble upon the work by. I wanted to develop some of my previous doodles, especially where I had done the words "good morning beautiful," "anything can happen" and "you can do it" because I think that those are really motivational and full of positive thoughts. 

Works in Progress

After some thought I realised that maybe "good morning beautiful" might not be adequate for a unisex design, because it might appear to be too feminine. I then moved onto writing out the words "good morning sweet" as I want it to tie in with sugar cubes, but even then... Well, not everyone drinks tea in the mornings, and I want my design to be used throughout the day.

Anything Can Happen

This led me on to the development of "anything can happen", and I've taken pictures to show my process. I was inspired by a video on YouTube and Sean Wes' work where they had written out a phrase then worked from the middle outwards. I first drew out my banner, wrote my quote, figured out where the middle of each word was, and then moved on from there. 

APP Words: Hand Lettering Experimentation 2

[9] 

During one of my lectures I sketched out some quick letterforms and tried out Blackletter with a variety of pens; I used the biro pen, the pilot pen and brush pen that my lecturer provided. It was nice to play around with different nib sizes to achieve different outcomes and even though it was relatively tricky to get to grips with it was a really fun exercise.

Two of my classmates decided to join me and we produced an A3 sheet of random letters and words with these pens and brushes. We tried Blackletter, Script and Sans Serif to see which styles worked best with these pens. I wasn’t very experienced with Blackletter so my tries weren’t perfect but there’s a first time for everything!

I moved onto doing the two-pencil trick where I cello taped two pencils together and wrote normally, then shaded in the letters with biro pen. This created a really interesting effect and I would like to use this in my initial designs. This is because it has that really ‘fun’ as well as a slightly calligraphic appearance because of the contrasting thick and thin strokes. 

APP Home (AOI): Final Sketch

After doing all of my compositions I settled on the idea of the road going around the border of the image, with the Big Ben, Westminster Bridge and the London Eye in the corners and running alongside it.
I start by drawing lots of little lines leading off the dot in the centre, just so that I could lie out my perspective. Then I drew my buildings according to these lines and drew an outline of my characters.

Conclusion:
Now that this is done and all of the character's are in place I can take it to the final drawing, which I hope to do in more detail so that I could scan it in and work on painting it digitally. This is because I want to create an amalgamation of both digital and traditional media.