Having the final critiques was really beneficial as it highlighted all of the aspects of the book which I hadn't realised could be improved upon due to looking at it for too long, and not having an objective point of view.
It was expressed that the leaf pattern on the front cover is a bit too much, especially as it is also used within the inside cover and the introduction page, and perhaps try embossing or debossing a single leaf larger on the front cover, to make it appear more desirable, as this quality is expressed in the brief. It was also commented that the digital leaf pattern looks too manufactured and structured being a repeat pattern and standard laser printed. This contrasts against the natural theme that is being expressed in the book.
To make the front cover look more desirable, it was suggested to spot varnish, foil or emboss/deboss the logo on the front, either on the belly band or the cover itself. Spot varnish or emboss/debossing could take a while to do, as we only have two days left to finalise the brief, however foiling could work nicely and is relatively easy to achieve, and a matte or gloss foil could create quite a high quality and sleek finish.
An environmentally sustainable idea was to use a typeface which has been specifically designed to use 70% less toner when printing, so as to highlight more the theme of nature and sustainability. This is perhaps something to be looked into, however it will solely depend on the typeface itself and what it looks like, whether it will fit in with the rest of the book.
My tutor also gave a reason as to why the photographs looked slightly different printed as they do on screen, which is because the stock that was used, sugar paper, has a high absorbency, which could result in the colours being darker than original. The use of sugar paper also resulted in the photographs cracking a bit as well where the folds are, which makes the quality appear less desirable and high end. It was suggested to try and print on different kinds of stock to see what the effect is, and how the colours print as well.
It was also raised to watch out for oversplay, where the inside pages splay out more than the outer ones, just due to the thickness of the stock and the binding method used, as if the excess was to be cut off, around 6mm, then a considerable amount would be cut off, resulting in uneven spacing as you get tot he centre of the book, and the edge of the page being very close to the text as well in the centre. This could be resolved by producing two mini books and binding them together, or to change the binding where folding isn't an issue, just as coptic binding, which could be interesting, Japanese binding or perfect binding as well. This is something to consider when thinking of the overall aesthetic of the book.
A lot of people also commented that the size needed to be slightly bigger, as being so small it looks like something you'd pick up for free from National Trust, that would be throwaway. It was also commented that being so small it was also kind of fiddly to open each page as well. They did however comment that the idea of it being tall and this was effective, and to emphasise this a bit more. To relate the size to nature more, my tutor suggested to look at the golden ratio, as this is often found in nature, and perhaps find sizings from that.
A positive that came out of the feedback was that the from inside cover was really effective, with the simplicity of the logo on the right and the pattern on the left, it looked very desirable, and perhaps this is something to consider with the front cover.
I have gotten a lot of feedback, mainly constructive criticism, which has given me a lot to think about when progressing with the design and production of the book. One main thing I will experiment with is the front cover, as I agree I could make it look a lot more desirable, and experimenting with foiling could be interesting and create more unique effects, and also it's massively time consuming either as there isn't a lot of time left in this brief to start screen printing spot varnishes. I will also change the front cover as well by trying out no pattern on the front, but using an embossed G F Smith green stock, or a darker green non embossed G F Smith stock, to see if this gives it the added quality it needs. I will look into the specific typeface that uses 70% less toner, as this would add extra context to the reasoning behind my typeface choices, however if it doesn't fit in with the aesthetic of the book it won't be used. I will also experiment printing example content pages on different kinds of stock, as I have collected several different ones from G F Smith, to see what the different qualities of print are. However some of these stocks are slightly thicker than others, and considerably thicker than the sugar paper originally used, so this will impact upon what binding method I eventually decide, as the oversplay would be too much to fix. Finally, I will experiment with different sizes, making it bigger but still having the tall and thin idea, but ensuring a spread can still fit on an A4 piece of paper to save as much money as possible with printing, wasting as little paper as well to reduce waste.
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