Final Design

This is the version without crop marks or bleed, I just wanted to upload the book cover design itself.

Digital Diary

A short and sweet digital diary (for once), i've just captured the main changes to the book design as I went rather then each step. Trying to capture the "magical realism" of the book was a harder task then i thought and i've reflected on this in my sketchbook. I wanted a minimal approach with little to no illustration depending on how the design was going to develop. I've used illustration sparingly in the final design because, as I said, I felt a minimal approach would suit this book more. Once i'd settled on a good typeface that was appropriate for the books tone, it was merely just about setting the book up between illustrator and finalising it in photoshop.

Book/Magazine type

An article on book and magazine type, this is just the editors personal favorite type used on such medium.

A good variety of choices of headlines and text fonts are necessary for book and magazine design. In classical book and magazine publishing, serif fonts have most often been chosen for text, as these have historically been seen as the most legible in longer passages. On the other hand, Modern literature is commonly set with sans serif fonts, because of their associations with 20th Century Modernism.(follow the link for more)

"Book & Magazine Fonts - Linotype Font Inspirations." Download Fonts from Classic to Cool - Linotype.com. Web. 03 May 2011. Available at http://www.linotype.com/2227/bookmagazinefonts.html

Minimalistic Illustration

Minimalistic illustration can be favourable for book covers, as to not overwhelm the space of the cover with too much visual noise. Here are some good examples of minimalistic illustration:

"The Forest Is Full of Wolves by ~Calliope00 on DeviantART." Calliope00 on DeviantART. Accessed on Web. 03 May 2011. Avaiable at http://calliope00.deviantart.com/art/The-forest-is-full-of-wolves-59511426
"Framework by ~lee25 on DeviantART." Lee25 on DeviantART. Accessed on Web. 03 May 2011. Available at http://lee25.deviantart.com/art/Framework-25604151
"Friday the 13th - Jason by *soopernoodles on DeviantART." Soopernoodles on DeviantART. Accessed on Web. 03 May 2011. Available at http://soopernoodles.deviantart.com/art/Friday-the-13th-Jason-180605005
"Kill Bill - Crazy 88 by *soopernoodles on DeviantART." Soopernoodles on DeviantART. Accessed on Web. 03 May 2011. Available at http://soopernoodles.deviantart.com/art/Kill-Bill-Crazy-88-181240493
"The Moon by ~TenOfSwords on DeviantART." TenOfSwords on DeviantART. Accessed on Web. 03 May 2011. Available at  http://tenofswords.deviantart.com/art/The-Moon-34153568
"Star Wars - Stormtrooper by *soopernoodles on DeviantART." Soopernoodles on DeviantART. Accessed on Web. 03 May 2011. Available at http://soopernoodles.deviantart.com/art/Star-Wars-Stormtrooper-180463271

Good typefaces for book cover

Here is a link to a good article about the top ten typefaces used by book designers.
http://fontfeed.com/archives/top-ten-typefaces-used-by-book-design-winners/

Previous Book Covers

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/014103243X/ref=pd_lpo_k2_dp_sr_1?pf_rd_p=103612307&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=0140278761&pf_rd_m=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE&pf_rd_r=0H051X8KQ1HZCAY7BV9Z
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0140157514/ref=pd_lpo_k2_dp_sr_3?pf_rd_p=103612307&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=0140278761&pf_rd_m=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE&pf_rd_r=0H051X8KQ1HZCAY7BV9Z
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Hundred-Years-Solitude-Essential-Penguin/dp/0140278761
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Hundred-Years-Solitude-Picador-Books/dp/0330255592/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1301250328&sr=8-4
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Hundred-Solitude-Penguin-Twentieth-Classics/dp/0141181400/ref=sr_1_9?ie=UTF8&qid=1301250328&sr=8-9

Macondo

 The place of Macondo is fictitious but is based off of García Márquez's childhood town, Aracataca.

Municipio. Accessed on Web. 27 Mar. 2011. Available at http://www.aracataca-magdalena.gov.co/sitio.shtml

Brief Summary of One Hundred Years of Solitude

 One Hundred Years of Solitude is both the history of Macondo, a small town in an unnamed region of South America, and the town's founders, the Buendia family. The book follows seven generations of the Buendias and the rise and fall of Macondo. The family patriarch, Jose Arcadio Buendia, founded the town with his wife, Ursula Iguaran. Because Jose Arcadio Buendia and Ursula Iguaran were cousins, they have a fear of bearing children with pig's tails; this fear will linger over the book.

"One Hundred Years of Solitude Summary | GradeSaver." Study Guides & Essay Editing | GradeSaver. Accessed on Web. 27 Mar. 2011. Available at  http://www.gradesaver.com/one-hundred-years-of-solitude/study-guide/short-summary

Typography Research

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aoirostudio/5275497916
http://www.flickr.com/photos/thetypecloud/5399520166
http://www.andrebeato.com/#1009894/May-the-Force
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jsquared2/5474969080
http://www.flickr.com/photos/thetypecloud/5471743550

Lecture on One Hundred Years of Solitude by Ian Johnston.

Introduction

In this lecture I would like to start with an initial question and then suggest some possible directions one might like to explore in answering it. We can all agree, I think, that this novel is amazingly rich, so I don't propose anything like a last word. However, by examining some patterns in the novel, we can perhaps help to shape some potentially illuminating observations.

So I propose to deal with the novel in the following stages:

First, I want to consider One Hundred Years of Solitude as an epic, in the traditional sense of the word, and from that consideration to frame an interpretative question.

Second, I propose to look at the complex effects this novel creates: a wonderfully comic sense combined with an overall tragic irony underlying the remarkably energetic and entertaining inventiveness in the plot and the characters.

Thirdly, by way of accounting, at least in part, for these complex effects, I wish to look at two particular aspects: the double sense of time in the novel and the style of magical realism.

Finally, putting all these elements together, I shall address the question posed at the start. I would like to suggest that this novel does, in fact, have something very insightful and important to reveal about the social and political realities of the world it depicts and that this theme may be difficult for North Americans fully to recognize.

Full lecture can be found at:
Johnston, Ian. "On Marquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude." Marquez: One Hundred Years of Solitude. Accessed on Web. 6 Mar. 2011. http://records.viu.ca/~johnstoi/introser/marquez.HTM

About "One Hundred Years of Solitude" by Gabriel García Márquez

Synopsis

Famously associated with the term ‘magical realism’, Marquez is probably South America’s most famous literary export. Equally tragic, joyful and comical, One Hundred Years of Solitude inhabits a strange dream-like space where very little makes real sense, but everything is mysteriously and vividly alive nonetheless. Blending fantasy and reality seamlessly, the characters struggle hopelessly against a merciless backdrop of madness, corruption and death…all measured out equally with farce and fatality; as profound a statement on the human condition as possible. In every sense, this is literature on the grandest of scales.
An acknowledged masterpiece, this is the story of seven generations of the Buendía family and of Macondo, the town they have built. Though little more than a settlement surrounded by mountains, Macondo has its wars and disasters, even its wonders and miracles. A microcosm of Columbian life, its secrets lie hidden, encoded in a book and only Aureliano Buendía can fathom its mysteries and reveal its shrouded destiny. Blending political reality with magic realism, fantasy with comic invention, One Hundred Years of Solitude is one of the most daringly original works of the twentieth century

http://www.penguin.co.uk/nf/Book/BookDisplay/0,,9780141184999,00.html?strSrchSql=one+hundred+years+of+solitude%2A/One_Hundred_Years_of_Solitude_Gabriel_Garc%EDa_M%E1rquez#

Past and Current Penguin Book Covers Research

I've research a good volume of vintage and present day penguin book covers to show the wealth of different topics/genres penguin publishes for and has in the past.
 
UK Book Shop and Online Bookstore - Penguin Books. Web. 06 Mar. 2011. Available at http://www.penguin.co.uk/
"Penguin Book Covers." Cover Browser. Web. 06 Mar. 2011. Available at http://www.coverbrowser.com/covers/penguin-books

Penguin Books Research

Penguin was founded in 1935 by Sir Allen Lane. Penguin is a books publisher. The company has a long history.

The first Penguin paperbacks appeared in the summer of 1935 and included works by Ernest Hemingway, André Maurois and Agatha Christie. They were colour coded (orange for fiction, blue for biography, green for crime) and cost just sixpence, the same price as a packet of cigarettes. The way the public thought about books changed forever - the paperback revolution had begun.

 

 

Penguin have a massive range of books that span numerous genres/topics.

• Art, architecture & photography
• Asian interest
• Biography & memoirs
• Black interest
• Business, finance & law
• Children's books
• Coffee table classics
• Computers & internet
• Crime & thrillers
• Fairy Tale, Folklore & Myth
• Fiction (novels & short stories)
• Film & TV
• Food & drink
• Gay & lesbian
• Graphic novels
• Health & fitness
• History
• Home & garden
• Horror
• Humour
• Irish interest
• Jewish interest
• Leisure activities
• Lifestyle & personal development
• Music
• Poetry, Drama & Criticism
• Politics, society & philosophy
• Reference
• Religion
• Science
• Science Fiction & fantasy
• Sport
• Travel
• Young Adult

 Penguin publishes books in a number of different formats including Hardback, Paperback, Adobe ebook, Audio CD, eAudio and ePub eBook.
Penguin group also has a number of brands including Penguin and Penguin Classics, Puffin, Ladybird, BBC Childrens Books, Rough Guides and Penguin Press.

 

 

http://www.penguin.co.uk/
http://www.penguin.co.uk/static/cs/uk/0/aboutus/aboutpenguin_companyhistory.html
http://www.coverbrowser.com/covers/penguin-books

Initial Action Plan

Having found out about the opportunity to do 3 additional projects along with my existing project on the D&AD brief for Diesel, I figured it would be best for me to tackle these projects rather then have one project.

This brief for Penguin is to design a cover for the book One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez. The following is a rough action plan for tackling this brief, as the project goes on, i'm likely to do more then listed here.

Research Penguin
Range of Penguin Books
About the book "One Hundred Years of Solitude"
Research Type ( the brief outlines this books needs strong typography)
Research competing books
Research book covers
Brainstorm first ideas
First concepts for cover
Read the book
2nd stage concepts
Refine Concepts
See how the cover design work both small for places like Amazon

Penguin Design Awars 2011 Brief

One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez

About the book

One of the twentieth century’s enduring works, One Hundred Years of Solitude has sold over 30 million copies worldwide in thirty-seven different languages.
‘Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendía was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice.’
Pipes and kettledrums herald the arrival of gypsies on their annual visit to Macondo, the newly founded village where José Arcadio Buendía and his strong-willed wife, Úrsula, have started their new life. As the mysterious Melquíades excites Aureliano Buendía’s father with new inventions and tales of adventure, neither can know the significance of the indecipherable manuscript that the old gypsy passes into their hands.
Through plagues of insomnia, civil war, hauntings and vendettas, the many tribulations of the Buendía household push memories of the manuscript aside. Few remember its existence and only one will discover the hidden message that it holds …
‘Enormously, kaleidoscopically, mysteriously alive … reality and fantasy are indistinguishable’ Guardian
‘No lover of fiction can fail to respond to the grace of Márquez’s writing’ Sunday Telegraph
‘Dazzling … should be required reading for the entire human race’ New York Times
‘Sweeping chaotic brilliance … one vast and musical saga’ The Times
‘The book that sort of saved my life’ Emma Thompson
‘It’s so much fun to read, unexpected and beautiful’ Darryl Hannah

The brief

Your cover design should reflect the richness of Márquez’s writing to appeal to a contemporary, discerning, literary readership.
Your cover design needs to include all the cover copy as supplied and be designed to the specified design template (B format, 198mm high x 129mm wide, spine 26mm wide).

Tip:

The author name and the title are both immediately recognizable to the target market and as such are crucial elements in the design.
The front cover quote should help position and place the book for the market.

What the judges are looking for:

We are looking for a striking cover design that is well executed, has an imaginative concept and clearly places the book for its market. While all elements of the jacket need to work together as a cohesive whole, remember that the front cover needs to be able to work on its own and be eye-catching within a crowded bookshop setting. It also needs to be able to work on screen for digital retailers such as Amazon.
The winning design will need to:

• have an imaginative concept and original interpretation of the brief
• be competently executed with strong use of typography
• appeal to a contemporary, literary readership
• show a good understanding of the marketplace
• have a point of difference from the many other book covers it is competing against