Boy 21 Book Cover Evaluation

By Gabriela Sokol

METHOD 1

The first version of the book cover is based on the photographs I have taken. I took portrait photographs of a model and photos of road lights changing the settings in the camera to make them blurry. I have used Adobe Photoshop to change too look of my images and using different settings change the look of the overall work. I started from cutting out the background of the portrait photograph and then adding a dark background layer to make the lights stand out more also to make it look darker and more mysterious. Using different settings and changing the hue of my photographs and rearranging the images I created the images shown in the next slides. I tried different layouts to produce different textures and to have more versions of the book cover to chose from. I have changed the contrast and brightness. Next I added text to the simplest version as I liked that one the most. I have decided to used Faltura Alien font because I think its mysterious look matches the theme of the overall image. I typed the text in white color so it stands out on the dark background and tried different layouts.

METHOD 2

I have decided to make the second version of the book cover which I chose to use as my final piece using illustration. I started off with taking reference photographs of the item I was going to draw which was a fluorescent star and I used them to create my illustrations as well as the research I did online. To create the illustration I used Adobe Illustrator. I started from drawing a single star using the star tool. Using the outer glow effect, changing the settings and stacking them up on each other I gave it a glowing look. I copied the illustration to make more of the stars and used them for creating the text. Firstly I just arranged them in the shape of letters however I found it hard to read so I decided to link the stars and make the title look like a constellation. I used the path tool to connect the stars and changed its color to white to make the lines visible on the dark background. I made the title smaller and placed it in the center of the page adding the author’s name underneath. I tried a few different font styles and I have decided to use “Moon Flower” because of it is a sanserif, simple looking font that looks similar to the lines linking the stars. To add more action to the background a started adding simple illustrations. Firstly I drew uneven stars using the pen tool, next I added a planet and a rocket. I tried different colors of the background as well. In the end I have decided too see how it would look like in a ‘flat art’ style. I used the previously made images and colored these in using the live paint bucket, however I found it looking to childish and not matching the theme of the book so I have decided to use the simpler version that only contained text and put the illustrations I have made on the back cover. I think keeping the book cover simple makes it more interesting also it links to the characters in the book that are not really open and at the start we do not know much about them. I have decided to use the florescent stars as the main image because of one of the happenings in the book that involved the main character sticking them on the ceiling. I thought that using the ceiling with glowing stars as the book cover could be a nice link to the events in the book.

The primary research photographs

The secondary research images