Narrative Illustration/ Development. Digital clean up

Although all my drawings are complete they are still not ready to be used in a final book. This is where digital clean up comes into play, allowing me to prepare my images for printing. This began by scanning all the finals  using a good quality scanner. All the illustrations are scanned at 300dpi as this is the requirements from the Project Brief. 

The Illustrations will be completed in Photoshop. Firstly I create a new document for each of my finals and open them for cleaning work. I have chosen to use Illustration seven to use as an example as it needs a few tweaks. After removing any unwanted areas from scanning I was ready to begin.

The first step is something I will use for all my final designs, this proses cleans the white background. When scanning, white areas on an image tends to get coloured or stained. Cleaning is especially good for Vignette style illustrations or purely black and white drawings. To do this I go to the “select” menu on the top tool bar in Photoshop. On the drop list there is a selection called “colour range…” and when selected will open an edit window. When this window is open the mouse cursor will function as the eye dropper tool, allowing you to pick a colour. The colour that is chosen with the eye dropper will be selected across the whole canvas. The fuzziness slider gives a bit of leeway to the selection. I used this tool to remove all the white from the image. Using the “erase” tool I remove any blemishes which were not removed by using “colour range”. 

After cleaning the background I wanted to move the peach closer into the image. To do this I select it using the “lasso tool”. The peach is simply selected and then moved closer into the design, then de-selected by pressing “control D”. 

Another useful thing I can do in Photoshop is to adjust the colours of each piece. To do this I go in to “Image” on the top tool bar and then “Levels…”. The level sliders allow me to change the colour strength of the image. I find this really helps with watercolour paintings as it gives them a bit of extra colour and helps the painting tie together. 

Once I am happy with the image I simply crop it and then save it as a JPEG file in CMYK. This image is a Vignette style Illustration so I just leave plenty of room around the edge of the image. This will leave space for a bleed line, that will come into place when I fit the images into the book layout. This was done for all the final pieces, below is the final result for illustration seven.

For the front cover I followed a similar process of cleaning, but with a few extra edits. After scanning in the cover drawings I then make a Photoshop document to fit the size of the cover with measurements 13cm by 20cm with a 1cm spine. Firstly I place the front cover into its appropriate space. I use the ruler tool in Photoshop to make sure that the banner is straight. I clean the cover drawing in the same way I cleaned up the Illustrations. When I’m sure it is lined up correctly I select round the banner and copy paste it. The new copy of the banner is placed on the back cover and lined up using the ruler lines.

To make the spine I take the small illustration of the flying Peach and measure it into place. I then clean it using “colour range”. This is followed up with the Title and “By Roald Dahl”. I place the text so it is read downwards as this is the most common choice for books.

For the back cover I simply placed the Seagull section above the banner and resized them slightly. After adjusting the colours and cleaning all the segments the cover was finally complete.

For a final touch I used the text box tool to add the blurb to my cover. I placed this in the spaces I had left when drawing out my design. The font doesn’t fit perfectly well with the design but this was just a test to see if it would fit in the spaces I had left. I found that the text fit fine in the gaps I left. I only needed to make the cover so I’m not too concerned about this.

Narrative Illustration/ Development. Making the cover

I began to produce the Cover Illustration in much the same way as my other Illustrations. As I explained in my research, the cover is meant to attract a reader. I wanted my cover to be colourful and still stand out on a book shelf. Firstly I measured my copy of the novel using a ruler. The measurements of the copy are 20cm by 13cm and the width of the spine is 1cm thick. 

Using these measurements I then drew up a template to use in my early designs. I wanted the cover to definitely show the peach but I was unsure how best to include this in the design. I had an idea to place small symbols in a circular order round the peach, representing parts of the story. This was used in my first mock up for the cover. I also included a decorative banner design across the top of the page to separate the title from the Peach image, I hoped this would help give extra definition to the design. For the spine I placed the title and a small scribble of the flying peach to add extra detail. The words read downwards as I found this to be the most common choice on book spines. The back of the book design continued with the banner pattern. On the top I thought it would be interesting to place some seagulls tied to a text box. I did not have much opportunity to feature the Gulls in the book so I wanted to include them on the cover.

First drawing idea for the Peach

First cover concept

Although I was happy with this design,  I felt it needed to be tweaked in a few places. The Symbol choice could be better and the Banner at the top could be more detailed, I also wanted to try a version with the Insects around the Peach instead of Symbols. 

Version two took those concerns into account. I made a few tweaks to the banner design and tried to place the Bugs around the peach. The Bug designs were kept as Silhouettes as they are quite small and stand out more as a block colour. I thought I could keep them as silhouettes and just colour them differently but I liked the block black as it stands out much more. I also made the peach a bit smaller so it did not clutter the full page.  I would like to keep the Seagulls on the back page as I feel they fit with the overall design. I’m fairly happy with design two but I feel it needs some colour details adding to it.

Second cover concept

For colour I wanted to stick with the pallet I had used for all the interior Illustrations. I used a photocopy of my mock up to experiment with. I knew what colour the Peach would be but it was choosing complementing colours for the rest of the design. I still wanted it to look colourful above all else. 

Colour test 1

Colour test 2

Colour test 3

The Typography I used was simply hand drawn with the intention of it matching the pen work. Looking back I really should have put more thought in to this aspect of the cover but I was happy with it at the time. I only tried a few different looks but they were all fairly similar. I chose design three because I felt it was the most playful but they all look similar. I still find that it works with the look and feel of the book but it might be hard for some people to read, because of the chaotic look and the thin line.

When I was creating the final I wasn’t fully sticking to the plan I had drawn out. This was because I would be digitally editing the image in Photoshop after completing the hand drawn segments. The pen work was drawn using a light box as with my other illustrations. Afterword’s I coloured it using watercolour. I chose colour test two because I felt those colours went best together and the blue fits with the Ocean travel in the story.

At this point all the segments for the cover were complete but were in no state to be used. I would have to use Photoshop to clean these images further and construct the cover so it could be reasonably used as a book cover. One of these edits would be the spine of the book as Idrew it on a different piece of paper.

The cover before digital clean up.