(B9) Home: Front Cover & Test Prints

 Names for the book:

• Placeways
• A Theory of Human Environment
• A Sense of Place 
• Sense of Place

The book feels like looking into my perspective of Sheffield, being able to understand my sense of the city. When talking to peers I became clear that everyone has their own sense of place and this is the key thing I want to communicate through my publication.
- Had the thought at the start of the project about the book being a collection of different perspectives with a range of photographs. 
- Still think this could be interesting to experiment with post submission, developing publications that explore individual sense of space form my peers. 
I want to showcase this on the cover that it is my perspective. I've realsied that a place exists in many different forms through many different people. I will have a sense of Sheffield that is different to everyone else that lives there so Sheffield to me is different than Sheffield to the person interacting with the book, but I want to provide a glimpse into how I sense the place through my book. 

Front cover ideas:

- Use a photo from the publication

- Request a final photo of cityscape from felix

- Use existing photo of cityscape from personal log

- Incorporate the locations into the cover

Testing location idea:

Like the simplicity of it, not sure it matches with the inside pages though. Could draw the points my hand instead 'x's to mark the spots? 

- Could have these layers over an image or be accompanied by an image.

Could use more personal imagery, showing my sense of place. Finding a photo that showcases what Sheffield is to me as a place since the book is exploring the topic from my perspective. 

- Try this with hand-drawn locations. 

For the back page think it would be good to have text that talks about the final outcome, what the book is displaying, in an objective way for the reader.

Test print:

Test print was a success the method of taping tipins to the page with washi tape worked and didn't rip anything. 

A few notes:

- Need images to be moved away from centre spine a little

- Same with tip-ins, particularly essay intro (did this yesterday when printed paper, left 8mm extra on the bind side). 

- Last two images show with an image tip in. Adding these to the book helps make the text tip ins feel less abnormal and break up the pacing, increase interactivity. Need to work out what images as where. 

Final Book Layout (Digital):

Cover on book:

Bulkynewsprint as the cover doesn't feel formal enough, it's too delicate and flimsy for a cover, it needs to be something more sturdy.

Antique white was a good cover option or cartridge paper could work too. 

The design needs more consideration, it's quite a different tone to the inside with the image spanning over the spine of the book. 

The hand-drawn markings work really well, these should be included. 

Esther MacManus Book Covers:

Feel personal due to the paper and ink choices, the hand-made print textured tone to them provides a sense of comfort and warms.

- Could think about this with type on cover, make it a little distressed, feel more like a stamp? 

Playful tone of page colour is really nice, sets up the feeling for the rest of the publication.

- Is this something I need to think about with my book? Paper colour and ink, could experiment. 

Working on Cover

- This one feels stronger, having the image not bleed over to the back works with the tone of the publication. Overlaid dots mirror the tipins inside the book. 

- Text is too large on these examples.

- Having the image on the back makes it feel like a memorie or in memory of something, not sure if this is appropriate. 

- This one is more on the right track. 

- Looks good without the image but not sure if I want to include the photo, I feel it sets a tone for the publication. 

- Tried with a less personal photograph but it feels cold and distant. 

The cover should resemble my sense of Sheffield or allude to it at least. 

- One of these, can play with paper stock, introduce a colour for the cover? 

Feedback from peer crit about cover design
- Simple is better, provides less of an obvious tone so the audience can interpret text
- The location dots are a great image to have, fit with the more abstract themes and focus on materiality. 

- Like the image but it makes it look a bit like a scrapbook, doesn't match the imagery inside
- Cover with stairs as image is much too cold, very different from the others, not in a good way
- Could make text a bit smaller, have less of an aggressive tone. 

Will go with these covers:

Need to test on paper stock.
Then decide final.

Copy for blurb:

Key quote from text that sums up the project: 'No city is what it used to be. The same place does not remain the same. Yet, despite great changes, some places continue to make sense.'

A sense of place is our personal recognition of space, we view spaces from an individual perspective.

Paper stock tests:

- Tested on several paperstocks, they all have different qualities to them that make them an attractive option for a cover. 

- The colour of the blue has a great tone to it that matches the rest of the publication, as does the pale yellow. 

- Experimented with red text on the blue cover and it didn't work very well, it looked like blood and wasn't very indirring. The black and white colours are more enticing as there is higher contrast.  

Test prints with cyclus and olin:

Cyclus is used here for the pages that contain my handwritten stories. This was really great for the pages where it didn't impact an image but for the pages with imagery it meant they appeared a lot darker and not as appealing to look at. 

If I were to have more time on the project I would rearrange the page structure to be able to incorporate this paper as it adds another layer of texture to the publication. However, as I'm incorporating image tip in as well, and I am not able to reprint the pages I think the book will still be effective without this feature. 

End Pages:

Looking at the end pages of paper backed books that I own, without them on the test print they it looked and felt unfinished. Some pages have the title and information about the content - here would be a place to put credits to the photographer and the designer. 

What colour?

- Yellow end page, was too thin so could see the text through. Adding another color was too much for the publication as the first spread shows pink paper also. 

- Using bulky newsprint, adds a nice tactility to the book and is a neutral tone so doesn't overpower. 

^ Simple text to be printed on the end pages, title and credits in italics to match the cover design.

All pages are printed and cut down, using masking tape to fix tip-ins in place, need to bind and then photograph.