Book cover inspired by Philippe Apeloig

Phillippe Apeloig

We have been looking at the work of French designer, Phillippe Apeloig.
His strength lies with typography and manipulating typography to create interesting pieces of graphic design. Here are some of his works. His work also features a strong use of grid systems and he is heavily influenced by modernism.

I was asked to create a book cover for 'The Girl in the spider's web' in the style of Phillippe Apeloig, which would also communicate the idea of data and the internet, which is what the book is about.

Here is my design. I like the technique of overlapping and warping typography in Photoshop, however I am not very keen on my colour scheme as I feel that it is a bit bland.

Tone of Voice- Waterstone's Christmas adverts

Waterstone's Christmas Adverts

Tone of voice

In one of our lessons we looked at the concept of 'tone of voice', how images have a tone, which needs to be matched for their use.  For example there are many different images depicting 'Christmas' but their tone many vary. One may have a religious tone, another may have a friendly tone, another may have a childish tone. When designing we need to create the right tone of voice through our use of imagery. 

In our lesson, we were put into groups are asked to select a number of images, some colours and some typefaces that we would use to create a series of Christmas posters for Waterstones.

Our group decided to choose a number of wintery images and backgrounds. Our chosen colours were gold and light blue. We chose three fonts 'hello', 'champagne and limousines' and 'Znikomit'.

I then set about creating some posters and a formal invitation for the Waterstone Christmas party, using only the images that our group selected. These were the designs I created.

I wanted to  create a house style for all the posters. I went for a simplistic approach using the most striking images to pass across a message. The idea behind this campaign is the that of the idea that Waterstone's has a book for everyone at Christmas. This is portrayed by the baubal with the person's name on it and the tree branches, which could represent a family tree. The heart also expresses the idea of giving a gift they will love. I chose to use the words 'Get Christmas Sorted' portraying the idea that getting Christmas presents at Waterstone's is quick and stress-free.
I added a black decorated border to give the posters another dimension and to create a sense of continuity between the posters. The black decorative border also ties in with the colour of the black logo below. 

The next task was to create a formal invitation using the images that we had previously selected as a group.  These were my initial attempts which I was not entirely happy with. I felt that they were too dull and the colours not striking enough.

I then went back to the drawing board and came up with this design which I much preferred. 

I felt that the background image was much more striking and also I felt that the style fitted better with the house style of the posters. I like this final design because it is very simple but the background image is striking and bold. The heavy use of gold is also the right tone for a formal and expensive Christmas party.

Chidren's Books

 Trainspotting Poster Inspiration

In our lesson we looked at the work of the design house, Stylorouge, and in particular their iconic trainspotting poster. At the time the film poster was ground-breaking because it was totally different from how designers usually created film posters. The poster did not focus on any particular character and it did not give much idea away as to the subject of the film. Since then, the design style has been used over and over again. 

Our task was to create a series of 4 posters for 4 books not showing the main character in the conventional way. I decided I would focus on 4 iconic children book characters but not use the whole character as you would usually. The characters in my posters are so well known that even if it is only half of their head being shown, you would instantly recognise them. I drew the illustrations in illustrator (based on pictures of the characters) to give them a common look and feel. I went for bright bold colours suitable to a children's book poster. I also added a character profile on each as a finishing touch. This is also in the style of the trainspotting poster.

I am really happy with my finished posters and may adapt this idea to use for my final Waterstone's Christmas campaign, perhaps giving them a Christmas-themed patterned background.

Book shop bag design

Waterstone's Promotional Material

We were asked to design some promotional materials for Waterstones bookshop. I decided to create a bag and envelope design focusing on the area of children's books. I thought that this concept would work well as a colouring competition promotion at waterstones, whereby children could submit their bag design. This would help the store to get more traffic in and out.

This is the design I came up with using my own childlike illustrations scanned onto the computer.

Minimalism

Minimalism 

We looked at minimalism in our lesson today. Minimalism is a style of design where images are simplified as much as possible and used to communicate the key message.

I particularly liked these examples if Modern Minimalist Fairy Tale posters I found by Christian Jackson of Square Inch Design.  The designer focuses on the most memorable aspects of the fairy tales and makes these into very simplistic images. I also really like the textured backgrounds which give the designs an added depth and dimension.

My Minimalist Poster Designs

 I decided to focus on the classic story of Cinderella and created these minimalist poster designs.

I like my final design best which depicts one of the ugly step sisters trying to fit into Cinderella's shoe. The colour scheme and the typography work well.

Environmental Type -The Gruffalo

Type in the Environment

One technique that is often used by designers successfully is to install type in an environment. The environment then also becomes part of the design and gives more meaning to the type. 
Charlotte Middleton is one such designer who has used this technique in her work. See below.

Another example of environmental type is this piece by Amy Fields called Praey.

Both are really effective as the environment that the type is placed into gives the words meaning and context.

I decided to make my own environmental type for the Gruffalo book.
One of the common phrases in the popular children's book is 'There's no such thing as a... gruffalo'.
The story is set in the woodlands, so I decided to head off to my local forest to photograph my typography. I printed my words in a playful childish font and cut them out from card. I decided to use plain white card as I felt this would stand out well against the dark woodland colours.  
I also took a few props with me too, like the 'Gruffalo' book itself and a soft toy gruffalo which I thought might come in handy.

These were some of my more successful shots of my environmental typography.

 CONCEPT 1

Although this design is quite striking, I feel that it is a bit too obvious and
doesn't leave much to the imagination.

CONCEPT 2

This image is made up of two photographs I took, one of the typography on the tree and the other of the gruffalo. I blended the two images in photoshot to create this. I like the angle of the typography but I don't feel that the positioning of the gruffalo really works.

 CONCEPT 3

This design has the typography subtly in the background out of focus with the gruffalo in sharp focus in the foreground.  The composition is good but I think the focus would be better on the typography.

CONCEPT 4

I then came up with this design which I felt worked really well. I particularly like the lighting in this shot and the gruffalo toy peeping out behind the tree.

This is another variation of the design. The lighting is less striking in the second shot but I like the subtlety of the gruffalo. Your eyes are drawn to the text and then you later notice the gruffalo peeping out in the background. I like the way that the forest disappears into the background creating a sense of curiosity and mystery. I like the use of the soft toy as it sets the right light-hearted tone for a children's book advert.

Book layouts

Book Layouts

I began to think about the layout of my final book. Here are a few possible page layout designs.

 Layout One
This design uses sans serif font and has plenty of space for large images and text. It makes good use of the page as there is very little white space. On the down side it may be a bit too cluttered as a design.

Layout Two

This design uses a serif typeface throughout and has a little more space and less text. I don't feel that the design is as balanced though as some of the images are a bit large.

Layout Three

I personally feel that my third design is the most striking. It uses bold block colour. I would change the choice of block colour to fit with the particular project. For example this one uses red to tie in with the colour of the tea pot. I think the second page looks a bit cluttered and I am not keen on the thick border around the image on the third page. I will work on adapting these designs further.

Change for Life Mini Project

Change for Life Posters

Change for Life is a government initiative to encourage people to live a healthier lifestyle.

The posters have a distinctive design style.  

For this mini project I was given the tast of recreating two of the change for life posters using
Calligrams and Pictograms. I decided I would create my own version of the sugar swaps poster using pictograms. 

My idea was to use different foods that are similar shapes and join them together, so on one side would be the sugary foods and on the other would be the healthy alternatives. I was inspired by the baking poster below. I really liked the colour scheme.

 This was my final Change for Life poster using simple pictogram style images.
I used the pen too to create my illustrations in Illustrator.

I chose to put the logo in the middle as it seemed to balance well.
I chose a chunky bold font to present the information clearly. 

Overall I am very pleased with how the poster turned out, especially the use of colour.

For my other Change for Life poster I wanted to use the technique of callagrams to communicate the information. I found this image below from the campaign depicting the recommended calorie intake for an adult.  There is not currently a poster with displays this information so I decided to create one.

This is the poster I created. I drew the letters free hand with the pencil tool in Illustrator.
As a finishing touch I decided to use red, orange and green for the plates depicting traffic lights, portraying the the idea of using calories to control our food intake, in the same way traffic lights would control the traffic. I don't feel that the poster is as successful as my other one but it was good to experiment with a different technique for presenting information in an interesting way.

Pictograms and Calligrams

Pictograms and Calligrams

 

Pictograms are simplified illustrations that communicate a concept using a simple symbol.

They are becoming increasingly popular in graphic design.  I created these pictograms of 'curling' as there are not currently many existing pictograms for this sport.

 

 

 

A calligram is a visual image created using typography. This is an example of a tea pot calligram that I created using the pencil drawing too in Illustrator. I completed the design by drawing in the handle, lid and spout and filled in using a spotty pattern to create an interesting design. The result was quite striking.