Illustration in response to the written word
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Project 02
Brief - You will be provided with a short story and are asked to produce two illustrations to accompany it and a further front cover and spine design for the book 'Collected Ghost Stories of M R James'. The cover will be printed with two spot colours on a cloth binding (you may specify the colours). The cover will be 165mm wide X 231mm high. The spine will be 30mm wide X 231mm high.
One illustration is a full-page, full bleed image which should be presented as follows: CMYK - image size 160mm wide X 226mm high at a resolution of 300 dpi. Note: this dimension includes a 3mm bleed around all four sides.
The second image is a black and white chapter heading that is aligned to the body of the justified text. As such it must occupy an area of 105mm wide X 50mm high. Note: there is no requirement that it has to have a crisp, rectangular edge so you may treat it as a vignette (see image below for an example). The final artwork should be presented as a 300 dpi, grayscale image.
In this brief you will focus on creating a literal illustration - a visual representation of the author's words you have been given. This is what we would call 'literal' illustration. You are still expected to bring your unique creativity and personality to the table but unlike the previous (conceptual) task, you will not be using visual metaphors or symbols.
Outcome - Two illustrations, front cover and spine as specified above.
All back up work (research, ideas generation & refinement, and process exploration/WIP shots)
Deadline: 9.30AM, Thursday 3 March
One illustration is a full-page, full bleed image which should be presented as follows: CMYK - image size 160mm wide X 226mm high at a resolution of 300 dpi. Note: this dimension includes a 3mm bleed around all four sides.
The second image is a black and white chapter heading that is aligned to the body of the justified text. As such it must occupy an area of 105mm wide X 50mm high. Note: there is no requirement that it has to have a crisp, rectangular edge so you may treat it as a vignette (see image below for an example). The final artwork should be presented as a 300 dpi, grayscale image.
In this brief you will focus on creating a literal illustration - a visual representation of the author's words you have been given. This is what we would call 'literal' illustration. You are still expected to bring your unique creativity and personality to the table but unlike the previous (conceptual) task, you will not be using visual metaphors or symbols.
Outcome - Two illustrations, front cover and spine as specified above.
All back up work (research, ideas generation & refinement, and process exploration/WIP shots)
Deadline: 9.30AM, Thursday 3 March
First off, I began by reading and analysing my short story, which was "The Uncommon Prayer-Book". I took note of locations, time periods, reoccurring imagery and important details so I would know what would create effective and powerful imagery in the illustrations.
Afterwards, I sketched out some incredibly rough ideas for each task required of me - the chapter header, the full page illustration, and the book cover.
Full Page Illustration
Full Page Illustration
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I thought it was important to try and get a design down for the ghost that is described at the end of the story, so I began drawing out some concepts and drawing fabric studies. The ghost is describes as being akin to a "roll of shabby white flannel" with "a kind of face in the upper end of it", and "had a bit of band tied around underneath" - so I thought it important to make sure that these were consistent across the designs. |
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Then I began to sketch out ideas for the full page illustration. I wanted to keep this in black and white, probably drawn in ink, either with dip pens or fine liners to keep the tone of the scary story.
Eventually, I decided that I either wanted to draw the scene at the end of the story when the book thief is killed by the ghost coming out of the safe, or the scene in the middle where the groundskeepers daughter talks about feeling watched while she cleans the church.
Eventually, I decided to choose to illustrate the scene where the woman is being watched, as it doesn't give too much away about the story while still portraying the fearful tone that M.R James was intending with the story.
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Chapter Header
For the chapter header, I first began by sketching out some rough thumbnails of initial ideas I had for the concept.
At first, I was unsure about what scene I should take inspiration from to begin drawing the thumbnails, so I drew a range of concepts. I liked the idea of having the Prayer Books being the header, so I played around with some ideas of them sitting on a plinth with candles around them. I also drew out some concepts of the ghost for the heading too, but this idea was quickly scrapped because it would have acted as a visual spoiler for the rest of the story.
After some more thought and deliberation, I decided to have the header act as a starting point visually as it also signifies the start of the narrative. With that in mind I drew out some ideas incorporating the train that the main character starts his journey out in. This created a strong visual which i could play around with, so I developed this idea further.
At first, I was unsure about what scene I should take inspiration from to begin drawing the thumbnails, so I drew a range of concepts. I liked the idea of having the Prayer Books being the header, so I played around with some ideas of them sitting on a plinth with candles around them. I also drew out some concepts of the ghost for the heading too, but this idea was quickly scrapped because it would have acted as a visual spoiler for the rest of the story.
After some more thought and deliberation, I decided to have the header act as a starting point visually as it also signifies the start of the narrative. With that in mind I drew out some ideas incorporating the train that the main character starts his journey out in. This created a strong visual which i could play around with, so I developed this idea further.
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Here I decided on what the header would look like after some more developed thumbnails.
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I decided that I was going to produce the final illustration using a dip pen and ink, so I began studying how popular ink artists created effects and lines. Here I emulated the style of Arthur Rackham 
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It was only then that I put ink to paper and began on the illustration as a whole. Considering I don't use dip pens a lot in my work, I rather liked the outcome here.
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Book Cover
I began sketching ideas for the front cover of the collected works after some research. I looked at both the Waterstones clothbound Classics, and at the Folio Society covers to examine how other book covers had been illustrated. I saw that the clothbound classics preferred a repeating design, which is played with, while the Folio Society liked a single decisive image on the cover.
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