OUGD404 | WHAT IS A BOOK? | FINISHED SPREADS

 

 Stuck to a simple front cover as the content of the book is quite full on and busy. The 'V' stands for vegetarian or vegan and represents living a cruelty-free lifestyle. I decided to use the yellow/green colour to represent nature, growth and being conscious of the environment. 

I decided to use 3 different fonts for their different purposes in this book. I will be using Letter Gothic STD, Futura and Helvetica Thin.

The contents page immediately includes an image of a cow looking quite forlorn. I made sure that there was eye contact to allow the audience to feel engaged with the animal. I thought adding a quote on this page would also be effective with the overall tone. I did some research and found this quote by Albert Einstein who is literally known for being intelligent and making sense. I chose this because I was under the impression that the target audience would trust someone so iconic. I made the background of the quote white and covered the left eye of the cow so that there is just one eye showing for dramatic effect.

As for the contents page, I chose to have the list of pages dropping down from the 'o' in contents. I decided to do this because the letter O is circular, rounded and symbolises the Earth we live on. Having the information dropping down from this particular letter made sense to me the most and looked appealing. 

 Introduction page containing a small explanation for the aims of the book. I did not want to come across as mild, rather, I wanted my book to be preachy and blunt and to the point. I centered the text and put it into a black box, diverting all the attention to it. I chose to use a full bleed image so it consumed the whole of the background, it's quite plain as it is just hay, relating obviously to animals and farms.

On the page across from this I decided that I needed a short, snappy phrase to start the content. 'Open your eyes' went well with the content of the introductory text. I chose to have each word on it's own line in a large size. The reason I chose to leave a section of the page white was to incorporate negative space, almost representing silence, as animals cannot speak or defend themselves.

The next spread is simply type. I wanted to introduce the pages about meat. Here I have used the directive, "meet your meat", which is effective because it successfully utilises assonance. I chose to spread this out on the full spread in Futura, so it is bold and communicates a strong message. I chose to use caps as I wanted to convey volume, as this book is quite 'preachy'. The red symbolizes blood and looks quite sinister with the black semi-colon, as black could even represent death.

First page about beef/cows. There was a lot of information so I have used 4 columns on one page. Large title matching the contents page title. Semi colon is mainly for decoration and to incorporate colour, not for grammatical purposes. High impact large black & white image to enhance the dramatic effect of the information on the opposite page.

 Page starts with a quite graphic image for impact. Consistent title with the previous page. This time since there is less information I used two central columns and positioned the large page number to the side.

Used 3 columns on this page as it also fit with the page number. I wanted each page to look a little different but still look consistent, so I haven't been especially strict with a grid system, however I have used the same size columns for each page. Large image on the second page taking up around three quarters of the page, but left some space for the title as it got too easily blended into the image of the fish. If I could do this page again I would make the text in the box a lot easier to read...

This section had the largest amount of information so I used 4 columns which also corresponds with the page number. Kept with the same layout of image as the previous page and made the image more interesting with colour. The red reflects the way that chicken's heads are severed during the process. 

As there wasn't that much information left, I wanted to use a huge image taking up most of the spread. The black and white effect and messing with the exposure and contrast makes the conditions that the birds live in look very grim. Subtle colour added onto the side of the page in red to resemble blood. Again, the text on the image should have been easier to read.

I had used a lot of imagery throughout the book so on this spread I decided to allow for a little breathing space. Since the section about organic isn't about a specific type of meat I just used one block of text.

Two columns as there is not as much information as other pages. Large image bleeding onto the page in the same way as other pages. Kept a white background to contrast with the image.

Image takes up all the room on this page. I added a half tone effect that looks like a tv, representing the idea that these animals are only there for the entertainment of the human, and are solely there to be observed.

 Used a different grid to the other columns and used 3 wider, more square shaped ones. Made the page quite dark as the information is saddening. The contrast of the silhouettes of the people works well with the dark background.

 This page was designed to look different than the others, inducing a happier tone with the use of the lime/yellow. I used an image of a cow looking much happier and 'free' than the one on the contents page, kind of a comparison. I think the text on that page would be better with a white background but I chose to overlap it. The quote on the right is also similar to the text on the introduction page however I used Future to make it more distinctive. It stands out with the black background.

 

I used this picture of a baby lamb because a lot of people always say "oh I couldn't eat a lamb!" yet they'll eat other animals without a second thought. The audience will probably attach a more compassionate bond with a baby animal and so I thought it would be effective to use at the end of the book. 

 EXAMPES OF GRIDS IN USE