GDES1003: Creative Digital Imaging
Main Assessed Project: The Book Cover
GDES1003: Creative Digital Imaging Main Assessed Project – The Book Cover Andy Screen 2012
Main Assessed Project Book Covers Background The paperback book democratised reading in the 20th Century and printing directly onto the covers became a way of selling a book to the mass market. The cover design evolved as a crucial element in the marketing process and artists and designers have been striving to catch the eye and convey the idea behind the book in a single page ever since. How has book cover design evolved and what makes an effective, eye catching cover design?
GDES1003: Creative Digital Imaging Main Assessed Project – The Book Cover Andy Screen 2012
Main Assessed Project Book Covers Background Until the 1930s, British book covers consisted of text and a small splash of colour somewhere, maybe as an underline or a border, or a plain background. Pictures were thought to be common and too 'American' Even the cheap end of the market, such as early novel paperbacks, were really sober – title, publisher, author, and a border if the editor considered the book to be ‘flashy’. After the first world war dust jackets appeared and were regarded as disposable items to protect the hardback underneath. Keeping the jacket on a book would have been like storing clothes in a carrier bag from the shop where they had been bought.
GDES1003: Creative Digital Imaging Main Assessed Project – The Book Cover Andy Screen 2012
Cassell's The Book of the Horse by S. Sidney 1890
Main Assessed Project 1920s Then in the 1920s, the decade of mass consumption and communication, and a vibrant US economy, bright, new, packaged and branded products emerged and books became branded too. With dyes no longer requisitioned for the war, US publishers used colour with abandon which, in turn, attracted a different more promiscuous readership.
GDES1003: Creative Digital Imaging Main Assessed Project – The Book Cover Andy Screen 2012
Main Assessed Project British Depression Back in Britain, during the Depression, intellectual snobbery almost got in the way of good business sense. The publishing economy was in a bad way, and The Bodley Head company rejected an idea put forward by one of its employees, Allen Lane. His idea was to produce a series of cheap, massproduced and instantly recognisable paperback titles. It wasn’t the investment risk that bothered them, but that they would loose their upper-crust (but very small) audience because of the perceived “cheapening effect”.
GDES1003: Creative Digital Imaging Main Assessed Project – The Book Cover Andy Screen 2012
Main Assessed Project Penguin However, when Allen Lane did eventually launch his idea – Penguin Books in 1935, it created an audience from the increasingly literate mass market. The general public could buy 10 titles for sixpence, which was five times cheaper than the average hardback sold through Woolworths. Penguin produced an intellectually respectable product to which readers were loyal. The design was absolutely crucial.
GDES1003: Creative Digital Imaging Main Assessed Project – The Book Cover Andy Screen 2012
Main Assessed Project Case Study – Nineteen Eighty-Four George Orwell's classic novel was first published in 1949 and emerged as a paperback in 1954. It's changing cover design reflects each decades approach to selling the book to new readers: from it's classic 50s Penguin cover to the latest design from Jon Gray, they are signs of our times.
Nineteen Eighty Four – British First Edition Cover designed by Michael Kennard – published 8 June 1949
GDES1003: Creative Digital Imaging Main Assessed Project – The Book Cover Andy Screen 2012
Penguin Edition (UK), 1950s
GDES1003: Creative Digital Imaging Main Assessed Project – The Book Cover Andy Screen 2012
Signet Edition (US), 1954
Georges Braque, The Portuguese 1911
Penguin Edition (UK), 1989
GDES1003: Creative Digital Imaging Main Assessed Project – The Book Cover Andy Screen 2012
Penguin Edition (UK), 1984
Tamara de Lempicka, Tamara in the Green Bugatti 1925
Thomas Hart Benton, Palisades 1919-1924
Penguin Edition (UK), 1980s
GDES1003: Creative Digital Imaging Main Assessed Project – The Book Cover Andy Screen 2012
Signet Classics, 1990s
GDES1003: Creative Digital Imaging Main Assessed Project – The Book Cover Andy Screen 2012
Penguin Edition (UK), 2008, design by Shepard Fairey
Penguin Edition (UK), 2009, design by Jon Gray GDES1003: Creative Digital Imaging Main Assessed Project – The Book Cover Andy Screen 2012
Main Assessed Project Case Study – A Clockwork Orange The Book Cover as Art David Pelham's iconic 'cog eye' design for Anthony Burgess's 'A Clockwork Orange' has permeated society since the first paperback of 1972.
GDES1003: Creative Digital Imaging Main Assessed Project – The Book Cover Andy Screen 2012
Main Assessed Project Cover Design – the Future Bringing the story of the book up to the 21st century, the arrival of electronic readers has sent traditional publishing into a tailspin. The paperback and its cover design has been replaced by the concept of mass storage and electronic pages. As this new technology gains new fans the paper book comes under renewed scrutiny. Whether society accommodates both ways of disseminating knowledge in the future depends on our continued devotion to good writing, editing and design.
GDES1003: Creative Digital Imaging Main Assessed Project – The Book Cover Andy Screen 2012
Main Assessed Project
The Brief: Book Cover Design It is with this historical beginning in mind that you will be designing a book cover for a paperback or hardback of your choice. Part 1 Choose a book. It may be fictional or text, biographical, autobiographical, serious or fun, but must be real. Think about the words of the title – make sure that your choice has potential to suggest strong, interesting and rich imagery. Research your chosen title and carry out a deconstruction of its design. Read the book, or at least a good proportion of it – it’s vital that you know what the book is about. Read about the author and the conditions of the book’s creation. Also, find examples of similar works, or other inspirational designers, typographers or image-makers. Try to make sure that you choose a book that you will enjoy researching. GDES1003: Creative Digital Imaging Main Assessed Project – The Book Cover Andy Screen 2012
Main Assessed Project
The Brief: Book Cover Design You will now be in a position to begin brainstorming and most importantly, producing thumbnail visuals. It’s essential that you work with your learning team at this early stage and take on board any suggestions/ideas/ constructive criticism, even if you reject these later AND JOURNAL IT. Narrow down your designs and produce a full-size final visual BEFORE going to the mac. Make sure you design the back, front, spine and gate fold wrap around if you are producing a hard back cover.
GDES1003: Creative Digital Imaging Main Assessed Project – The Book Cover Andy Screen 2012
Main Assessed Project
The Brief: Book Cover Design Part 2 The second part of the brief gives you the freedom to be even more creative and develop an area of your interest. Choose one of the following: 1.
Design a promotional product to work alongside your book cover. For example, some point of sale, a freebie, a poster…. Your work should be printed out at 300dpi CMYK, full size or a to scale print/model.
2.
Design a home page for a website or a piece of digital media to support your book cover. You could include some navigation, but this does not have to work. This should be screen based at 72dpi RGB.
3.
A story board and 3 stills (minimum) for an animation or video to promote your book design. You can take this as far as you like depending on your technical skills, but this is not compulsory. This should be screen based at 72dpi RGB. Your supporting items from Part 2 should have a strong visual relationship to the original design and should look like they belong together and promote the book. You should not simply scale down the original and put it on a postcard - this is your chance to be really creative and original.
GDES1003: Creative Digital Imaging Main Assessed Project – The Book Cover Andy Screen 2012
Main Assessed Project
Deadlines 13th/14th/15th March
Cover chosen and researched Initial thumbnails of book cover complete
20th/21st/22nd March
Final visual mock up of book cover Initial ideas for supporting products
27th/28th/29th March
Preliminary mac work
17th/18th/19th April
Finalising designs
24th/25th/26th April
Peer Assessment - Completed practical and draft report
1st/2nd/3rd May
Non-mandatory workshops
8th/9th/10th May
Project submission.
GDES1003: Creative Digital Imaging Main Assessed Project – The Book Cover Andy Screen 2012
