After conducting all my research for my Penguin 'A Clockwork Orange' brief, and after making my mood boards, I decided to get started with planning and designing my front, back and side covers. I really liked the designs I saw for actual clockwork and wanted that to be the main style/theme of the covers. I also tried to play around with keeping the cover simplistic, because the storyline is so chaotic. The front cover will have a slice of an orange in and amongst a set of spinning mechanics, with the hands of a clock on the orange. I decided to take the title literally, because I felt like the hat and eye has been played out too much and the existing covers do not have anything what I want to create.
I scanned my design into Photoshop and added a small bit of colour just to see if I could work with my designs and I thought that keeping the palette orange and white would be perfect. It emulates a futuristic feel where everything is clean and tidy. I also wanted to make my orange extremely detailed and juicy, as I want that to be the focus of attention. I feel like my front cover will have a restricted feel to it because evrything is so constructed and neat and tidy. I like this idea because the books explores the use of free will, so it is quite ironic.
Once I was happy with my designs, I got started on the template already provided by penguin. I started with my little blocks that have prison like borders around them, again because part of the book is focussed in prison. I wanted to have contrasting colours partially because I love when book covers go against the generic book templates, and partially because it resembles the before prison and after prison point of views, as if the colours are twisted inside to out. I then added some inner shadows to add a lot of depth to the blocks. This way they look 3D, as if the rest of the drawings could actually be inside.
Once I was happy with that, I went on to draw my orange. I wanted my orange to be a deeper, almost burnt orange in comparison to the orange of the background, because I wanted it to stand out. I did a lot of blending and also added some 'veins' to the orange to make them appear more real. After that I added the hands of the clocks which would represent the theme of time passing.
I put than on top of my existing background and thought it looked fine, however the oranges were still to similar. I didn't want to redo it, so instead I added a white border around the orange which makes it stand out, and then added a drop shadow, but changed the colour so that it looked more natural and aesthetically pleasing.
Next was time for my actual 'clockwork'. I spent a lot of time considering these because of the variety that I had ended up researching. On one hand I wanted to go extremely intricate, but on the other I thought it would make my cover too 'loud' as it already is very vivid and bold. Therefore I opted for outlines of clockwork as well as filling some in. I stuck to white because I was really enjoying how the colours were contrasting against each other.
I then added all my text. This brief really asked to look at typography, and I feel like I chose the right one for this whole cover on the title. It reminds me of something Jonathan Barnbrook would have made, and it is extremely stylised. I went for a mix of electronic (like on a digital clock) and futuristic. I didn't want to pick something thick and bold because like I said previously, that has been done several times and I wanted to think outside the box. I added more red drop shadow to the 'Orange' to emphasise it and make it compliment the rest of the cover.
Lastly, it was time to do the back cover. There isn't as much pressure to do the back cover because it isn't the first thing that a book reader would judge, but it is the first time you see what the book is about and get an idea of the story outline. I kept with the font that I had used for the author's name, and just changed the colours so that they would be readable, but also complimentary. Since people read from top to bottom, I put the quotes at the top of the page and then the blurb at the bottom.
I then made some grids and used them as overlays, just for a but more detail. I had not planned this but I think it pulls the whole look together. Overall I am pleased with the outcome. On one hand it looks nothing like the previous covers I have researched (apart from the colour scheme) and on the other it meets the criteria of fitting together, and would be eye catching in a crowded setting.
I loved making this book cover and I loved seeing it come to life, so I am excited to get on with the other 2!
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