typesetting fun

Today we put into practice the weeks of Indesign knowledge we've accumulated over the course. We were set a task to typeset Jane Eyre. 

I used paragraph styles for the chapter headings, main body, first paragraph and for the poem at the end. I adopted a custom baseline grid, adapted the margins, found out how to use drop caps, mastered master pages (finally!) edited images in the file, and I added an extra fancy detail on the bottom of the master page to reflect the Victorian-era text. 

I edited the text quite extensively to exclude double spaces, incorrectly used dashes, double lines, unnecessary capital letters, orphans, widows and quotation marks. 

I think the effect works very well. I set the leading at a very specific 18 pixels, which creates a nice space between the lines to adds readability. I will use all of these techniques in my final typesetting assignments.

Picks of the Month: book design geekery

Four Corners Books

Four Corners Books is a really interesting publishing company with a really unique and strong aesthetic. The titles are designed individually with reference to their content - which range from classical literature to non-fiction. Each title contrasts so effectively against the Scandinavian grey/white of the website background, which separates the company from most online booksellers.

The company is a really good example of how book design can carry through and influence the company aesthetic. The pricing is a little more expensive - at twenty pounds for a hardback - but this is understandable due to the collectable nature of the novels. Four Corners seems to occupy a space in-between coffee table books and classic fiction that not a lot of publishers have dared to explore.

Below is an example of Gustave Flaubert's 1856 Madame Bovary, adapted and designed through a simplistic, mixed-media aesthetic.

Smithsonian artists' books

The USA's Smithsonian museum have an excellent collection of artists' books. These range from traditional books with excellent illustration and design to actual works of out that do not function through readable text, but just use the physical form of a book to tell a story or to convey a message. I have pictured a few of interest below:

Eye Magazine

'Books without words' is a theme I'm really into today. Eye Magazine has a great selection of wordless books, ranging in theme but mainly centered around art and visual culture.

 

Outdoor Gallery by Yoav Litvin focusses on graffiti of note found in New York City, it features Banksy and Normal Rockwell and a few other unexpected characters. 

London Letters by Roger Perry features large, black and white images of politically motivating 1970's graffiti. Juxtoposed against one another, the layout is poignant and emotive in a way that stark images  alone can be.

designing a cover

 

I designed a cover in today's session, from this original image:

 

I added a black back cover from the cover grids set up in week 3, and I used Photoshop to clone stamp some of the starry imagery around where I thought the blurb should be. I tried to turn the different images on angles so it wouldn't be as obvious what I had done, and I think this has been successful.

 

I used the font that I found in the last exercise, and I think that works in practice. I also think the spacing of the author, title and quote works visually.

 

The colouration is particularly effective on this cover, as all of the colours used are picked with a dropper from the original image. I feel that this adds some sense of continuity across the cover.

If I were to change the cover, I would manipulate the title so that it was more inventive. I would possibly experiment with a pink or teal drop shadow, or change the leading. This would make the title stand out more, and also open up opportunities to add different finishes.

cover design and font choice

Today I'm looking different cover genres and searching for an appropriate font to match.


1. 'A View of the Cascade'

From a distance, this cover looks like it could be from a fantasy novel (to me, anyway). I think it's because of the muted, pink and green colour palette that somehow reminded me of the pretty glowy elves from Lord of the Rings. Anyhoo, on closer inspection it appears that the illustration is actually a really beautiful and traditional nature painting, with a few people in early 20th century dress. Because of all of these indicators, I decided on this font 'Fogtwo no5'. I think it's pretty classic and definitely signifies a vintage period, but I also think that it isn't too predictable and 'broadway'. 

 

2. ' Space Cats'

This a pretty cute illustration of a cat, in space (two of my favourite things). I really like this idea, and I chose a font that wasn't too traditionally 'childrens' because I think this image could possibly have potential with an older market too. 'Another' is a typewriter font with a rounded, approachable feel. 

 

3. 'Morning Dawn'

This design is a nice, fresh graphic design that doesn't give away much. Because of the palette and because of the style, I would think that this book is aimed at women. I decided that it didn't look much like a romance novel, so I settled on a memoir-type idea, and used a handwritten font called 'Hickory Jack'.

 

4. 'Demon Flight'.

This book with a demon on the front first indicated to me that I needed to take a wander down the 'gothic' section of dafont.com. However, after saving a few very garish and obvious fonts to my desktop, I decided on 'Optimus Princeps'. It's not quite as restrictive, and I feel that the cover of the book is deliberately enigmatic enough to draw a wide range of reader, and it should be complimented by a font that respects that. 

 

5. 'The Greatest Feeling'

This cover deserved a typical retro font, because of the mid century fashion illustation on the cover. I really like the graphic colour scheme, and I think the font could be easily edged up by colouring it acid yellow and outlining it in black.

 

6. 'Dancing: An Illustrated History'

This was my least favourite of all of the covers because it doesn't really say much except 'dance'. The fonts related to dance that I could find were all quite comical, so I settled for an aptly titled, 'timeless' serif font. 

 

7. 'POP!'

I really like this cover. I originally thought that this would be a 60s-inspired art book about pop art, but on second thought, it would make a really interesting contemporary literary fiction cover. I settled with the font 'Nova' in the end, because I thought that it encompassed the best of both worlds. This cover was definitely the hardest to look for, because I couldn't really pin it down

Now I'm going to make a full front and back cover from one of the illustrations above, I'll probably upload a separate post going through that though - look out for that!