(B6) A Book A Day: Day 1

Topics Trending: 9:30 am

1. Monday motivation
2. NAW 2021 (National Apprenticeship Week 2021)
3. Monday thoughts
4. Snow
5. Monday morning
6. Tom Brady
7. Wallis
8. Edward Agar
9. Chiefs (superbowl)
   
   

Monday as theme mindmap:

The idea about monday's being weighted with expectation of productivity, optimism, all these "fresh start" ideas. But all I'm feeling is low, no motivation and a general 'I want to get back into bedness'.

- Presenting this up and down, light and dark theme that surrounds a monday within the publication could be an interesting way to go about it.

So what for content? 

- Photograph my space, using light to create a tone?

- Notes, to do lists, thing of this that resemble productivity.
- Text, could be how I'm feeling, could look at blog posts about monday mornings and use these?
- Are there any poems about monday's?

My housemate spoke about a poetry subscription service she was thinking of signing up to. 
- Could look into this?

Research: 

Tide Press

Emily Ryalls - Einzelblatt 2

Something different starts to happen

A work–in–progress single sheet, broadsheet newsprint publication with a written piece based on the experience of making photographs. 
This is the second of the Einzelblatt series where each edition features the work-in-progress of a different photographic artist using a single sheet of newspaper. The concept is to incorporate a design process to make a visual comment on the process of editing and sequencing work. Connections between photographs are established to develop nascent narratives. 

- The experimentation and playful nature of this publication is what's so enticing.

- The presentation isn't traditional to you typical "book" as it's one sheet of paper folded up. 

- Reminds me a little of the posterzine format.

- I find the format to create an explorative interaction between the user and the object, it is something you investigate to be able to understand fully. 

Kristine Kawakubo

Surface, Concept:

Fuka established herself as a photographer at a time when men dominated the field in Czechoslovakia. Now that she has been restored to Czech photographic history—émigrés were struck from the record in the Communist years—she is celebrated as a pioneer.

- Find the format to be exciting and interesting, makes you want to get involved with it, pick it up, explore.
- The layout is interesting, there is a structure but it's more sporadic than a traditional publication.
- Like the different sizes of paper, the black piece in the back stands out!

Photography (All photographs):

I'm not a photographer but I was wanting to represent the things I found to encapsulate the feeling on a Monday morning for me, sense of having to be productive but not wanting to be. Expectations to keep going but feeling a general low mood. 

Use:

- Feel as though the bed images showcase that waking up moment well.

- The lighting has a up and low tone to it, it's not just happy or sad but it as a dampness to it. 

- Where the day starts and ends (want to focus on the morning part as this was one of the trending topics). 

- Again the lighting here really showcases the feeling of opening the curtains in the morning. Painfully bright, realise there's whole world outside and my room suddenly feels small and dark. 

- Saw this on my morning walk, somethin about it was interesting, there tends to be a lot of random appliances and furniture around where I live.

- Again another random item on the street, but find the writing on it to be rather humorous.

- Always makes me giggle when I walk past it. 

- The street, like the brick wall at the end, seems to represent my feeling this morning pretty well.

- Light and airy but with a roughness to it. 

- The 3 above I was wanting to document some textures from my walk, feel as though these could be used to add some grit or tone to the book.

- Back inside, the dark gloomy feeling very representative of a monday. 

- Thinking about "fresh start" my housemate cleaned the kitchen/dining room yesterday and it looks fab!

- Documenting this as she did it so we could have a nice start to the week, feels very fitting. 

- However we still have a lot of pots and pans from the week before.. seems to be two sides.

- Thinking about the lighting and how it shines into my room throughout the day. 

- These last two photos were take around 12:30 so more like midday. The earlier the more grey it was outside.

How could these photos be use?

- Edit?

- Rip up?

- Print and Scan?

Design:

Text, shall there be any?

What is the purpose?
- Want to highlight the light and dark sides of a monday. Capture my monday mood. Want the publication to feel personal, as though people can relate to it as a somber monday feeling is something many people can relate to. 

Light and dark, different paper stock, texture to present feeling.

Looking for text for content, could do own writing but what would this be?
Looking for poems to use and found a website that publishes a poem each day, today's poem:

The cold grows colder, even as the days

grow longer, February's mercury vapor light

buffing but not defrosting the bone-white

ground, crusty and treacherous underfoot.

This is the time of year that's apt to put

a hammerlock on a healthy appetite,

old anxieties back into the night,

insomnia and nightmares into play;

when things in need of doing go undone

and things that can't be undone come to call,

muttering recriminations at the door,

and buried ambitions rise up through the floor

and pin your wiggling shoulders to the wall;

and hope's a reptile waiting for the sun.

Could use this?

Text from tweets using the hashtags mentioned earlier:

You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours!

Motivating you to help start your day right!

This is how I feel about Monday

It's a two tea bags per cup, kind of morning.

No matter what the week may bring, always be ready for a wild ride.

Surviving the day!

Maybe a double shot to kick off Monday?

Be kind to yourself

Twitter Text:

Poem Text: 

Poem text with images:

Experiments on the scanner:

- Playing with the different text, some is poem others are tweets.

- Tweets have a humorous element to them, tried to match them up to an image that told a story or had a narrative.

- For the poem this was split into sections with the images place around the back. 

- The texture and tone from the scans are really nice, they create a closeness between the audience and the content, really works in communicating a relatable experience.

With Poem:

https://issuu.com/ec267099/docs/test_1

With Tweets:

Test 2

Test 3

Test 4

- Using digital image, doesn't have the same feeling as the scans, they're not as interesting or textured, they seem flat.

- Doesn't make you feel close to the work, presents a distance. 

Finding the layout of a A5 book to be odd, it seems to formal for something that is mean to make you feel involved and encouraged to look through. The traditional book format feels boring. 

Experimenting with flat layout using scan text with added twitter usernames. 

Then printed:

Then with the images place from digital file:

- Playing with the idea of having a rigid structure but this is then messed up by the folding process.

- Wanting to represent how a monday is meant to be organised and formatted but most often they're not. 

When printed:

- I think the idea is good but doesn't have the same tone as the scanned images. 

- Feels too polished and with this arrangement more elements are crisp and clean (how a monday "should" be) but the only thing that feels more "messy" is the folding.

Previous idea was best, test it on different paper stock:

A - Too dark, the colours on the images don't work very well.

B - Better than A but the green tone within the paper because rather overpowering when the images are there.

C - The best, has a natural tone to it and at a slightly heavier weight than printer paper it's has a soft texture to it.

D - Regular printer paper, too white, too thin.

Other experiments:
- Thinking about the chaos from the week before being wiped clean, could use work/notes from the week before as the paper and overprint test this

Found this to be an exciting exercise, the results were interesting and I quite liked the idea but it didn't really communicate much as there was very little context.
- Good to push self and try something different.
I like the sense of chaos though within the book, could use layouts from fold out zine to push this further?

Explorative nature of research examples is more exciting, the single paper fold out feels a little light, the layouts are interesting but the fold out could be improved and refined.

Sophie mentioned she'd like to see the photos larger 
- I agree, could experiment with fold outs for particular pages (think along the lines of 'A Book on Books' format:

- Think about this when applying to final zine.
- Layout from this^ with more detailed photos (suggestion by sophie)
- Imagery like fold out sheet layout, develop a closeness. 

Reorganising the book using the same composition as on the fold out page but with more overlaps across spreads, one bleeding over to the next page if it gets cut off by an edge, using the fold out page as a way of displaying images that would benefit from being on a larger scale. They have more clarity and show a slight shift in perspective to then be brought back down again with the original format. 

Final publication:

Reflection:

Worked too slowly on it
-  need to make choices and go with them tomorrow. 

Tomorrow should experiment with type more as today the focus was more on imagery.
- Really like the images though, feel as though they capture that monday morning feeling.
- When combined with the tweets it adds a little bit of humor that fits well with the binding of the book (or lack of)

Would want to expand on the techniques I use tomorrow, working and experimenting more with the scanner but also with other physical techniques.
- Don't worry too much about the outcome, it's okay if it doesn't go too well.

Could do a time limit? Give self 2 hours to have it finished.
- This way won't waste time on blogging process throughout, do at the end.