Chicka Chica Boom Boom book cover redesign

BOOK COVER REDESIGNAMANDA KERN || GRDS 709 TYPOGRAPHY STUDIO I || PROFESSOR TRUDY ABADIE

SAVANNAH COLLEGE OF ART & DESIGN || FEBRUARY 3, 2010

BOOK COVER REDESIGN | TABLE OF CONTENTSPR

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AMANDA KERN || GRDS 709 TYPOGRAPHY STUDIO I || PROFESSOR TRUDY ABADIE || SAVANNAH COLLEGE OF ART & DESIGN || FEBRUARY 3, 2010

DESIGN NARRATIVE ............................................................................... 3

BOOK CHOICE.......................................................................................... 4

INSPIRATION ........................................................................................ 5-6

ROUGH DRAFTS ................................................................................... 7-9

DESIGN PROCESS ............................................................................ 10-13

TYPOGRAPHY CHOICES ........................................................................ 14

TYPOGRAPHY PROCESS .................................................................. 15-16

COVER DESIGN PROCESS ..................................................................... 17

FINAL BOOK COVER DESIGN ........................................................... 18-19

BOOK COVER REDESIGN | DESIGN NARRATIVEPR

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You will utilize the design principles reviewed last week—color, unity, Gestalt, space, dominance, hierarchy, and balance—as well as the knowledge you have acquired about type selection, to create a book-cover design. The design must be primarily typographic in nature.

Part 1 (Unit 2)Redesign a book cover of your choice. Prior to design, write and submit a one-page brief of your book communicating the story, tone, intent, and point of view of the author. Please post this document on the discussion board for this unit. Upon approval, create thumbnails or sketches (small, unrefined drawings) for a minimum of three different and distinct design approaches. Scan and post on the discussion board. Please include any notes necessary to explain the work submitted. Review designs submitted by other students and post constructive critiques on the work of three students. Also, make sure to keep a print-quality file in your system. At the end of the course, you will be required to burn a CD with all your work on it.

Due: Research, written brief, preliminary concept sketches, and comments on others’ work

Part 2 (Unit 3)After reviewing your peers’ and professor’s comments on the discussion board, create tight roughs (refined drawings or sketches that include more detail than the thumbnails) of your three design alternatives. Scan and post PDF files on the discussion board, along with a short caption about the book. Review designs submitted by other students and post constructive critiques on the work of three students. Remember, at this stage, you are still not at final design, so try to be discriminating and helpful to your fellow students.

Due: Tight roughs and comments on others’ work

Part 3 (Unit 4)Review the online comments about your designs. If you have questions about the feedback received, e-mail your professor. Upon final approval, create and produce your final book-cover design.

OBJECTIVEYou will design a full-color, wrap-around book cover of your choice, including the front and back covers, spine, and both flaps. The design solution must be primarily typographic, with the title a minimum of three words. Visuals may be used to enhance the design, but they must be secondary to the typography, which is the primary focus of the assignment.

The choice of book is up to you, but it must be previously published, since you will be required to post both your redesign and the book’s original design. Please scan the original front cover at 72 dpi, approximately 1” x 2”. Keep the file size under 15 KB.

As an example, the design of a book on the American Wild West could feature a hot-metal, serif typeface typical of the era and complement it with a more modern sans serif for the byline. A book on cooking or entertaining might use a typeface with a calligraphed flourish, and a book on urban habitat could incorporate a grunge- or graffiti-like scrawl.

You will need to lay out the template using either InDesign or QuarkXPress. The layout should be accurate and should include crop marks and bleeds. All imagery used should be original work. All five surfaces must be designed. You will submit a JPEG file of each one of the panels, plus one of the whole jacket. The maximum size should be 550 pixels wide for the flat version. The panels should be saved at approximately 100 pixels wide.

BOOK COVER REDESIGN | BOOK CHOICEPR

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For this project I have chosen to redesign the children’s book, “Chicka Chica Boom Boom”.

BOOK CHOICEAmong all the books I’ve read to my children, “Chicka Chicka Boom Boom” is by far one of the most memorable books that they’ve thoroughly enjoyed. The story is very simple in nature and involves a lot of rhyming to help children learn their ABC’s. Throughout the story the ABC’s are in a race to get to the top of the coconut tree where there’s quite a bit of anticipation and excitement as the letters all travel up the tree. They begin wondering if there’ll be “enough room” and before they all make it to the top they all go “chicka chicka boom boom” as they outweigh the tree. As the letters are all banged up, with “skinned knees”, “stubbed toes” and “black eyes”, they help one another up the tree before the sun goes down. As the story ends, the moon comes out. The next morning when the letter “A” wakes up beginning the cycle all over again as the letter “A” dares the other letters, “Dare double dare, you can’t catch me. I’ll beat you to the top of the coconut tree.”

There’s so much to admire about this story that helps teach young children their ABC’s. It’s rhyming and repetition make the story more fun for children. For my children I’ve found that the way the story uses repetition and then ends really makes it one of those stories that can easily be read a hundred times in a day. The story really has a strong message beyond just learning their ABC’s too - it emphasizes if they fail at something to keep trying.

For me the one disappointment in this book has always been the illustration. It uses simple solid shapes throughout. I’ve always found the illustration throughout, including the book cover to be something that could be improved. For me the one thing I’d love to do is apply traditional illustration and hand rendered type to the book cover design to help make it more visually appealing to children.

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When I first thought of redesigning this book I found myself most inspired by the work of children’s book illustrator, Eric Carle. I am hoping to achieve a more hand created look rather than computerized. I think this style would be more appealing to children.

INSPIRATION

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Below are a few book covers I admired while searching for inspiration. All of them had either something unique with typography or off computer creation of the covers.

INSPIRATION

BOOK COVER REDESIGN | ROUGH DRAFTSPR

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The following were rough ideas sketched out prior to beginning this project on the computer.

CONCEPT 1The first concept has a similar composition to the current cover, however the style of the illustration and type would be hand rendered. I was considering either watercolor or a type of paper mache. I’ve also considered exploring the style of Eric Carle where he paints on tissue paper to create his type and illustration.

CONCEPT 2The second concept involves spanning the coconut tree across the front and back cover with letters scattered across the bottom. Again, a hand generated solution would be used.

CONCEPT 3The third concept would involve a more typographic front cover. The cover would also be hand generated but the type on the front cover would almost appear as if the type is falling from the title.

ROUGH DRAFTS


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CONCEPT 4The fourth concept would be a more collaged style cover where the letters would be hand generated and then collaged together. For the front cover it would create the coconut tree. On the back cover it would almost create an ocean of letters that could act almost as a letter hunt for the kids to identify their ABC’s.

CONCEPT 5The fifth concept plays off the use of negative space. This time instead of creating the collage/paper mache this would create the background, but the type would be left in negative space. On the back a few letters would be large, again in hand generated style.

CONCEPT 6For the sixth concept the coconut tree creates the “i” in both “chicka” words. Though I like this approach I’m not so certain kids would read this unless I put the “i” climbing the tree. Again, hand generated illustrations and type.

ROUGH DRAFTS


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CONCEPT 7The seventh concept would focus on using type to appear to “move” more. I considered creating a linoleum print of the type so that the movement lines were clearly naturally made like in printmaking or possibly another watercolor or paper mache style illustration of the type.

CONCEPT 8The eighth concept involves creating three dimensional elements for type and illustrations and then photographing them to use in the book cover design. The front cover focuses solely on the type and the back cover reinforces the concept of the coconut tree.

ROUGH DRAFTS

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Knowing I wanted to create original type with a hand rendered, illustrative feel to it I spent a few days painting huge color fields that would give me flexibility to use them type, illustrative elements or backgrounds. Acrylic paint was applied to large sheets of translucent vellum.

DESIGN PROCESS


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Because painting the textures were created spontaneously, I allowed the kids (and a friends kids) to join in the fun of creating the variations of colors created. Some colors were mixed during the painting process others the paint was applied in more than one coat.

DESIGN PROCESS


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Color fields were painted ranging anything from one to four feet wide to be used within the project.

DESIGN PROCESS


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(continued)DESIGN PROCESS

BOOK COVER REDESIGN | TYPOGRAPHY CHOICESPR

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Typographic choices were explored. The cover/headline font was chosen based on the need for a heavy, chunky, bold font that would enable cutting out letters from the painted paper. I nearly chose ITC Franklin Gothic Extra bold, however, the lowercase “a” was a simpler form for the purposes of a children’s book in the futura typeface.

Univers 47 light condensed is the preference for body copy, as an alternative serif option Adobe Caslon regular may be used if a serif proves to work more effectively.

TYPOGRAPHY CHOICES

In this lively alphabet rhyme, all the leters of the alphabet race each other up the coconut tree. Will there be enough room? Boom!

Now a modern classic, this ryythmic alphabet chant rolls along on waves of fun. Lois Ehlert’s rainbow of bright, bold, cheerful colors makes the merry parade of letters unforgettable.

Cover/headline fontFutura Extra bold

Body copy choice #1 Univers 47 light condensed

Body copy choice #2 Adobe Caslon Regular

In this lively alphabet rhyme, all the leters of the alphabet race each other up the coconut tree. Will there be enough room? Boom!

Now a modern classic, this ryythmic alphabet chant rolls along on waves of fun. Lois Ehlert’s rainbow of bright, bold, cheerful colors makes the merry parade of letters unforgettable.

BOOK COVER REDESIGN | TYPOGRAPHY PROCESSPR

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Originally in my mind the book cover I thought might be best with all strong bold colors, including the background. After cutting out the letters from the painted background I found I wasn’t as fond of this concept. Not only were there issues with some of the colors that were close in value, I found that some colors proved to provide challenges as they were used against the bright yellow/orange color I had originally envisioned using. I then explored with other colors as a background, to include the light blue/white color field. I enjoyed seeing it create a “sky”, however, some of the blues again posed problems in contrast between the letters and painted background. The one thing I liked least about using the textured painted backgrounds is that a glare was created and due to the painting techniques some papers looked a little more wrinkled than I liked. I tried another test of the letters against just a white textured paper and thought it may have some potential if the typographic elements were implemented creatively.

A coconut tree illustration was also created in a very similar manner as the letters. The story includes a coconut tree that the letters “climb” and later fall down so it seems to be one visual that could and should likely be included somewhere on the cover. I then composed the tree in a way where the letters looked as though they had fallen down the tree which seems more interesting than the tree standing on it’s own.

TYPOGRAPHY PROCESS

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I continued to work more with the letterforms in a more creative way for the cover. I found it interesting to see such bold, bright, and textured letters piled up and felt it resembled visually some of what the book touches on in the story. Close up views seemed very intriguing and could potentially be implemented into the cover’s inside flap design.

TYPOGRAPHY PROCESS

BOOK COVER REDESIGN | COVER DESIGN PROCESSPR

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I used the photographs taken of the letters, illustrative elements and paper texture and used it to composite the main cover imagery in photoshop. Due to the lighting and the paper texture all imagery required close adjustments to ensure colors were as close as possible. Additionally masking was necessary to blend images together as seamlessly as possible. For the names of authors and illustrators I elected to mask the names against the original color fields due ensure they were as legible and flexible as possible for any potential revisions that might arise as additional detailed type was added to the book cover design.

COVER DESIGN PROCESS

BOOK COVER REDESIGN | FINAL BOOK COVER DESIGNPR

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The final book cover was designed in Indesign where final type was composed to finish the book cover design.

FINAL BOOK COVER DESIGN


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I’ve included a few photos of the final book cover design mocked up full size.



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I’ve included a few photos of the final book cover design mocked up full size.


Documents

Chicka Chica Boom Boom book cover redesign