OUGD504 STUDIO BRIEF 3 - MOCK UP PHOTOGRAPHS

This is a mock up of the type in context book, to see what it actually looks like when printed out, instead of just on a computer screen. Producing a mock up will also help to see any problems with the document itself, placing of images for example. It will also give a clear guide as to what works and what doesn't within the book, which can be improved upon following the final critiques.

Front cover. Simple leaf pattern to reflect the nature within and surrounding Bewdley. This pattern also appears as quite a contemporary design as well. A simple half sleeve has been used to create the white strip across the middle, as printing onto green stock means a white band would be impossible, as you cannot print white. The logo is simple in the centre, to create a sleek, well balanced image.

A green stock was used for the main front cover, to ensure a constant colour was achieved, as printing a block colour onto white stock could result in patchiness. The band stock was Plike by G F Smith, which has a very smooth texture to it, but it is not silky. Having one high quality, more expensive stock in this book adds a touch of high standard to it, rather than looking rough and ready. It gives it an added something extra, and also creates different textures just on the front cover, making it nicer to touch, more tactile.

The half sleeve extends across half the width of the inside cover page, far enough to hold the band in place, but not too obtrusive into the inside cover page. The logo is centrally aligned, however slightly further towards the top of the page, to create emphasis on it, so it's more like a title than a logo almost. When producing the book, The pattern on the inside cover was accidentally places exactly centrally, and with a 3mm bleed around the whole photograph, the bleed on the right hand side crept over the centre and onto the white stock, where it is not supposed to be. This does create an interesting edge to the page, however this will be fixed for the final print.

This is the introduction double page spread, with the leaf pattern spread full bleed. The introduction caption is in a long, thin white box, to reflect the shape of tree trunks. This is quite a simple page despite the leaf pattern, as there isn't a lot of content. The pattern does appear a bit busy however, especially as it is used on both the cover and the inside cover. Perhaps a outline pattern would work better and look slightly understated, or perhaps the pattern should only be present on one page instead of both.

Contents page. Photographs of the Bewdley scenery have been used as boxes for each chapter within the book, to add imagery and colour to this page, making it more interesting that the content is. The number 7 is quite close to the centre of the spread, perhaps the sizings can be altered so that this is not the case, as it does get slightly lost. Also, with the chapter titles being 12.7mm from the edge of the page, the 33 page number also had to be as well, instead of a few mm from the edge like the other page numbers, which makes it look slightly odd, however if it was a few mm from the edge this would go against the 12.7mm margin around the both pages. 

Example layout of the page content. A brown and green duotone was applied to the photographs to try and create a consistent appearance in the photographs, and brown and green to reflect nature and the traditional colour of trees. This however has printed off slightly differently to how it appeared on screen, perhaps due to using off white sugar paper for the stock, which may not absorb the colours as well as more high quality, smoother stocks. Experimentation is needed to make the photographs print more green, perhaps altering the duotone colours to achieve this.

Example chapter title page. A full colour full bleed double spread has been used, similar to the chapter title pages in the Cabin Porn book that was researched, to put full emphasis on the scenery photographs, and to add spots of colour to the book. The text has been produced in white on screen, but the colour of the stock when printed, to create a softer appearance and to be seen the most clearly against the photograph.

In this example of the chapter title page, the text had to be produced in black, due to the colour of the photograph and where the text needed to be placed in order to follow a structure. This doesn't create too much of a problem, however it would of been ideal to have all the text in the same colour, but due to the nature of photographs this isn't always possible.

Back inside cover. The leaf pattern extends across this double spread again, the same as for the front except for the logo page. Again the half sleeve flap can be seen folding over, keeping it in place, however on the back is the authors name, as this is where it is often placed on the majority of books. This keeps is still easy to get to, however is tucked out of the way so as not to spoil the aesthetics.

Back cover. A short description of the content of the book is included on the half sleeve, to give readers a bit of knowledge of the book before even opening it. 

Which you cannot see when the book is closed, when opened out fully, the pattern doesn't extend seamlessly from the front to the back cover, but is the same pattern split in two, so it doesn't match up in the middle. This can easily be rectified by printing the pattern for the cover page from a separate document, so that the pattern can be printed seamlessly.

A problem that was faced was the addition of body copy text, as the whole theme of the book is nature and trees, so the text was intended to be in long thin blocks, however this poses the problem when you have a short word and then a very long word, and not wanting to leave the short word on it's own on a line as this doesn't look aesthetically pleasing at all. This then leaves the options being to hyphenate the long word, extending it over two lines, or to make the text boxes slightly wider, to accommodate the longer word, however this could lead the text extending too close to the edge of the page, and risk either being cut off in the binding process or being too close to the centre of the spread. 

It has been very beneficial and productive to produce a mock up book, as it has shown exactly what works and what needs improving, which you cannot always tell from looking at the design on screen. Some things that will be improved upon are the duotone colour of the photographs, the size of the text boxes for the body copy, the pattern for the front cover, to make it appear seamless, and also the pattern on the introduction page, perhaps experimenting to make it look less busy.
This mock up will be taken to the final critiques first though to gain the opinion of fellow peers to see if there is anything else that can be improved upon or changed, or things that could be left the same as well which hadn't occurred before.