Evaluation: Puffin Children's Award

Out of the two projects I completed, this was definitely my favourite. I did find it easier to put the book cover together than I did trying to make patterns. My biggest strength in this project was definitely choosing to try and create something using paints, I think paints are one of my stronger media's to use and I can usually work really well with it and get a high quality result. I was very pleased with the painting  produced of the Toad and would happily do it again. I find painting really interesting and I enjoy it more than any other media, though it can be time consuming and if you go wrong it isn't always easy to correct it. My other strength during this project was asking people about my work constantly, making sure that it was eye catching and appealed to a wide audience. I got a lot of good feedback from people and when people said I should try something, I would experiment with it and try it out, even if I personally didn't think it would work. This really helped me to try out more things and get a good perspective of what people would look for if they were going to buy the book. One thing I did try and make sure I got right was the text as well, in a few of the examples I looked at I mentioned how the text didn't work and I didn't want to fall into the same mistakes myself. I tried to keep the text quite simple and legible. I tried the text in a number of positions and a number of different fonts to try and get the right one for my cover, I think for both covers I was able to achieve this.
I think my weakness for this project was my sketches. I think I would have benefited from doing more sketches and maybe trying different positions/angles. I did do a variety of different angles to begin with and just didn't think anything worked as well as the face on approach which is why I stuck to it.
Overall I'm very pleased with my results as I was able to complete two very different covers for the book The Wind in the Willows and I really like both versions. I did ask around again to see what the general opinion was of other people though and the majority of people preferred the painted version as they said it was different to what they've seen before and was very eye catching and detailed, someone even said they hated the story but if they saw my cover they would definitely be interested and have a look into it, which was definitely a great bit of feedback to get.
If I was to do this project again there isn't actually a lot I would personally change. I think the more cartoony one could may  do with a bit more tidying up with the lines, but it does work as it is so would only be a possibility, but I think the other cover works really well as it is, especially if I'm getting such great feedback about it.

Evaluation: Coming Together at Christmas

This project was definitely out of my comfort as I've never tried to design a pattern for wrapping paper before, or a pattern in any sense, so was definitely going to be a challenge for me to get it right. My biggest strength for this project was getting the sketch work done. I haven't always been the best at getting sketchbook work done, however for this project I was able to just keep drawing and drawing, I was able to draw sketch after sketch to try and get the Santa character right. I actually really enjoyed this process and will definitely be taking it forward and using it in future projects. Because I was able to do the sketches and I was enjoying doing them I was really motivated to get this project done. I felt like I kept up to date with my work and there wasn't a time when I wasn't doing anything. After the initial sketches for the project I found the digital work quite easy to begin with, and I found myself trying things I hadn't before which was great! I was creating my own background and experimenting with Photoshop. With this project one of my strength was definitely asking people's opinions about what they thought all the way through the project. If someone didn't like something I tried changing it to see if their suggestion worked better. I found myself really listening to peoples advice, as the outcomes for this project would be brought by them. Doing this was very helpful and will be doing this more in the future as well, as I don't think I ask a wide enough range of people to get an overall opinion on things.
I think my weakness in this project was definitely the fact I'd never produced anything like this before, my character designs were professional and neat but I think I could have done better with the pattern designs. I found myself watching tutorials on how to create patterns to try and make them better but I think if I'd had more time I could have worked on them even more. I'm not unhappy with how they turned out at all, I still think they turned out very well, especially as I haven't done it before, I would just have liked more time to work on them.
Overall, I was happy with my final outcomes and I got good feedback from people. Especially one of my wrapping paper designs, a few people said if it was made or if I printed it would they be able to buy it from me which definitely boosted my confidence. If I was to change anything I would love more time just to work on the project as a whole, to be able to create and complete more characters rather than just have some extras as sketches. I'm not sure that wrapping paper/pattern designing is for me though, maybe card design.

My Final Outcomes for Puffin Children's Award

This was my first final cover that I came up with. When I started this project my first intension was to produce a realistic looking cover, most likely using the media paint. After doing some realistic sketches in pencil, I decided I would experiment with a more cartoon style as well, as this seemed to be a strong point for me in the previous project. I actually really liked the results I got from drawing Mr.Toad in this style and decided to take it forward as well as the idea of the realistic version. I'm very happy with how this outcome looks. I think its eye catching and would appeal to a young audience especially, but isn't too childish not to catch the eye of an older audience too.

This is my second version for The Wind in the Willows cover. I'm very pleased with how this cover turned out, especially as I had a few difficulties getting the background right. The two covers are very different and stand out for different reasons. I haven't left a single bit of white in the background for this  cover, which makes its really interesting and makes you want to look at it. When I asked people for their opinions this cover was definitely the majority of peoples favourite, so if I was to take one forward and submit it, it would most likely be this one.

My Final Outcomes for Coming Together at Christmas

Because I found that a lot of Christmas card designs had a 'Christmasy/Winter' theme to them, I wanted to create my own idea of a peaceful night for this season.

This was one of my first designs for this project. I created the background in Ps using multiple brushes to try and create snowflakes/snow. I think my design is different to the normal looking snowflake which makes it stand out.

As painting is a very traditional method when it comes to Christmas card designs, I decided to have a go at it, I think it turned out pretty well. The reason I didn't give my Santa legs was because I thought the black shoes would stand out too much and draw the eye away from the actual Santa himself. I find modern designs to do a similar thing which characters sometimes, giving them no legs, almost like a little figurine/ornament aspect to it.

As I gave my designs backgrounds they might not have been able to be used as wrapping paper designs like that so I had a go at making my own wrapping paper design pattern. Like at the beginning of my research where I like the simplicity of the snowflakes which a red background I tried doing something similar with my wrapping paper. I think the wrapping paper actually works really well like this, so I tried playing around with the positioning and amount of repeat patterns...

This was my second design for wrapping paper which I also entered into the competition. 

Overall, I was very happy with the results I got from this project and I would definitely like to do something similar again, something in the card/wrapping paper industry. I seemed to work well with this type of work and really enjoyed doing it. I got very positive feedback from people about my work and many said they would purchase it, if it was actually produced.

Looking at the Puffin Awards and Books

These are the previous winners of the Puffin Children's Award:

2012: Grimm Fairytales

1st Place: Tim Parker - Cambridge School of Art at Anglia Ruskin University

 2nd Place: Lorna Scobie - Kingston University

 3rd Place: Alex Walker - Nottingham Trent University

 2011: James and the Giant Peach
1st Place: Niklas Sagebiel - University of Fine Arts, Hamburg

 2nd Place: Liva Cabule - University of Bedfordshire

 3rd Place: Josephine Kibuka - Buckinghamshire New University

 2010: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
1st Place: Jurate Laugalyte - Anglia Ruskin University

 2nd Place: Becca Allen - University of Falmouth

3rd Place: Sarah Dollman - East Surrey College

Something I've noticed with all the previous winners is the majority of them have produced covers that join together to create a whole image spreading across the cover. I'm wondering if this is something they favour?

1st Prize: The winner of the Puffin Children's Prize will be invited to spend four weeks at puffin in the design studio on a work placement, working with Puffin Art Director Anna Billson on live briefs. The winner will also receive a cash prize of £1,000.

2nd Prize: Will receive a £350 cash prize.

3rd Prize: Will receive a £250 cash prize.

In 2010 Puffin were 70 years old, and are always on the lookout for the next big idea. Penguin Books was a big idea from the mind of a man called Allen Lane, who in 1935 invented the quality paperback and changed the world. And from great Penguins, great Puffins grew, changing the face of children's books forever.

Puffin was hatched in 1939 and the first Puffin story book featured a man with broomstick arms called Worzel Gummidge. In 1967 Kaye Webb, Puffin editor, started the Puffin club, promising Allen Lane that it will make children into book readers. 

Puffin have many authors and illustrators:

http://www.puffin.co.uk/static/authorsillustrators/

Research: Puffin Children's Award

The Wind in the Willows is a classic piece of children's literature  by Kenneth Grahame, which was first published in 1908. Alternately slow moving and fast paced, it focuses on four anthropomorphised animal characters in a pastoral version of England. The novel is notable for its mixture of mysticism, adventure, morality and camaraderie and celebrated for its evocation of the nature of the Thames valley.

The main characters in this novel are:
Mole - A mild-mannered, home-loving animal, and the first character introduced. Fed up with spring cleaning in his secluded home, he ventures into the outside world. Originally overawed by the hustle and bustle of the riverbank, he eventually adapts.

Ratty - Ratty (actually a water vole) is cultured, relaxed and friendly, with literary pretentions and a life of leisure. Ratty loves the river and takes Mole under his wing. He is implied to be occasionally mischievous and can be stubborn when it comes to doing things outside of his riverside lifestyle.

Mr. Toad - The wealthy scion of Toad Hall. Good-natured, kind-hearted and not without intelligence, Toad inherited his wealth from his late father. Spoiled, conceited, and impulsive, he is prone to obsessions and crazes (such as punting, houseboats, and horse-drawn caravans), each of which in turn he becomes bored with and drops. His motoring craze eventually sees him imprisioned for theft, dangerous driving and gross impertinence to the rural police. Severla chapters of the book chronicle his daring escape from prison.

Mr. Badger - Gruff and solitary, who "simply hate society", Badger embodies the "wide hermit" figure.  A friend of Toad's late father, he is uncompromising with the disappointing Toad yet remains optimistic his good qualities will prevail. He lives in a vast underground set, part of which incorporates the remains of a buried Roman settlement. A brave and skilled fighter, Badger helped clear the Wild Wooders from Toad Hall with his large cudgel.

After reading the book I definitely wanted to focus on Toad as I personally think he has the most character out of the four, and is the most interesting.

Examples of The Wind in the Willow book covers:

 This version of The Wind in the Willows is the one I seem to see most often in book shops. The design is very modern and very simple. This design has done what I'm hoping to do with my book cover, focus on one character (Mr. Toad). What I lie most about this cover is the use of colour. They have used a very limited colour palette and it works really well. I will keep this limited colour palette idea with me when I create my covers as I think it would work really well for what I want to do.

 This cover is very simple. This is another example of a limited colour palette so the opinion to do this for this book is very popular and seems to work very well. This cover is very repetitive, I'm not sure this is what I'd want on my cover as I've already explored pattern making in group of work and not sure its what I'd like to try and do for this project. This front cover could actually be used as a wrapping paper design because of the pattern/repeat used on it. If I'm completely honest, the colours used and the style of line work they've chosen doesn't really appeal to me personally.

 Looking through all the different covers for The Wind in the Willows, this is definitely one of my favourites. Its eye catching and detailed and really puts you where they are. (You feel like your there with them) I like how the whole cover (front and back) fit together and create one big picture. I'm thinking of using this approach in my work, I think its really effective and makes you want to open it and look at it as a whole. Also, I like the title in capitals and will keep this in mind when producing my cover.

This is a more detailed book cover compared to the first two examples, and in terms of realistic colour is closer than the last example. Ernest H. Shepard has definitely tried to make the characters seem more 'human' in this cover. He has used very realistic colours for the characters but has kept them slightly cartoony at the same time, which would help to appeal to a younger audience. I think the image is really effective on this cover, however I don't like the colour yellow/orange used at the top of the cover. I don't think it fits in very well, it does help to make the cover stand out and get noticed, but it isn't very appealing. Personally I don't think the red writing works on it either, like the previous cover I like the use of capitals for the title though.

The style of this cover is definitely more old fashioned to the other examples I've looked at. I like the strip down the bind, its very decorative and catches your eye. However, I do think this takes the attraction away from the actual cover because its more detailed and draws your eye in. I don't think this is very good and have to keep this in mind when creating cover, so I don't have something in the background taking the attraction away from the artwork on the front cover. The style used to create the image on the front is actually very interesting though, its rough but been softly painted. This is another technique I would like to keep in mind when developing my work as I've seen this style of working on a few examples of The Wind in the Willows.

I don't actually like this cover at all, you can barely read the title on the book because the colours clash so much and the blue is so bright the writing pretty much fades into it. I do like the detail put into the drawing, but as a whole I wouldn't take a second look at this book. I need to make sure I stay away from clashing colours like this and make sure the title is completely legible.

I looked at this cover because I liked the use of soft tones and washy backgrounds. I really want to use paints for my cover and I've been looking at a few different covers that have used paints to see what kind of techniques they usually go for. A lot of them seem to be very soft, light tones, almost like a simple wash over. This version is actually quite cartoony, if I'm going to use paints I'm hoping to produce a more realistic detailed piece that really makes you look at it and see al the different colours incorporated in it.

This is probably my second favourite cover that I've come across. The colours used are very calming and make the image very beautiful. There are a lot of different colours/tones in this image which makes you look really closely at it, so you notice all the little bits of detail added. The colours used are actually quite dark and then they've added the circle of light to make the characters stand out. I like the idea of using darker tons as I want to focus on Mr. Toad and he is quite a dark character in the sense of getting into trouble and ended up in jail. I think this would work really well for my cover.

This cover caught my eye because it focuses on Mr. Toad and the trouble he causes, it shows you the main things to do with him in the story, him and his motor vehicles. I like the idea of using the character  as well as an object that makes you know exactly who the character is. I like the way its been painted as well, I think some of the tones used are very effective and help bring the image to life. The only thing I'm unsure of is the title, the two 'The' just don't look like they sit well where they are, so I need to make sure I look at the position of the words in my title, because even little things like that can make all the difference.

This is another example of a painted front cover, again this one is very washy and soft.With this one though they have actually used a limited colour palette and haven't really put any detail into the image, its very simple but I think its actually very effective. It caught my eye, theres actually something very beautiful about the style they've used. I'm not 100% sure that the text works though, some of the words get lost in the bright yellow part and make it hard to look at/read, could be a simple change of size that needs to be done though for this example.

This is the final cover that caught my eye. I like the use of white space on this example, I think it works really well, you focus completely on the image on the front and it makes it really stand out. I love the amount of detail put into the image, however I think the font completely ruins the whole cover, with the amount of detail put into the image they should of used a more simplistic front as to not take any attention away from the image.

This isn't actually a book cover but the space used and the way they only had the Toad character in the centre really appealed to me and made me think about doing something like this for my cover because it seems quite effective, you know exactly who the character is.

I started to look at drawings other people had done of Mr.Toad after this as that is who I want to focus my work on.

I found that a lot of examples of The Wind in the Willows used this kind of style to produce their images. Very rough around the edges and then simple washes over the top to give them a bit of colour. Because this is such a popular way of working, I want to have a go and see if I can make it work in my style.

 

I've included this image because again this image has been pained and I like that they done a detailed yet light background and then used a black line round Mr.Toad to make him stand out to the rest of the image, this is really effective, because even though the whole image is detailed and interesting to look at you focus on Mr.Toad first which is important I think.

This image caught my eye because of how messy it is. The use of print/text underneath the image is really interesting. Using pages of the text from the book underneath the image would actually be very different to anything I've come across for The Wind in the Willows books, if I have the time I will hopefully be able to try this and see if it works. I think if your able to just about read the text it could really make the image the story.

 This is another example like the first one, where they've used a very rough edge to the image then put a wash over the top. The colours used on this example are very simple and aren't too bright. Apart from the green all the colours are actually very similar and almost just blend together, the green is the only part that makes this image stand out to me.

This is Disney's version of Mr.Toad, you can tell by the style of it that they created it as all their work is recognisable. They have made Toad very appealing for children, very cartoony and 'friendly' looking. I'm not sure they colours they've chosen are right as he looks more human coloured than Toad coloured but they are known for fantasy stories and make belief so making Toad more 'human' works for them.

This is one of my favourite images I came across simply because a lot of detail has been put into Toad's head but the rest of the image is quite simple. This really stands out for me and catches your eye. Even though there is so much detail in the image its still very cartoony and child friendly. This type of style could appeal to a whole range of ages.

I also watched the film that was produced in 2006. I found watching this very helpful to be able to get a real feel for the characters especially Mr.Toad (played by Matt Lucas)

I found it very helpful to see what a human version of the character would look like as they are meant to have human qualities. 

Each character acted their roles really well as the animal they were meant to be, it really brought the story to life and gave a very fantasy like feeling to the story, a feeling that animals could almost be human and act human.

I was able to get a real feel of Mr.Toad's personality and how reckless he is.

To begin with I wanted to have a go at creating a more cartoony image for toad. I did lots of trial and error before coming to this final image for Toad.

I'm really happy with how he turned out, I was trying to incorporated the style of having the rough sketchy edges then colouring over the top. I personally think it worked really well for this particular drawing.

When I added the image onto the template, I decided I wanted to keep the white space around the image and not have a background or anything taking the attention away from the image, like examples I came across, but because the back looked so plain without an image I decided I needed to add something. Because Toad is know for his motor vehicles, I wanted to try and create a simple version of the vehicle he drove.
This is the image I came up with, I wanted to keep it simple and wanted to use the sketchy edge style again to match in with the image on the front, originally I tried it without colour which just didn't work, so when I coloured it in I tried to use a similar colour palette to what I used on Mr.Toad.

I'm happy with how the car turned out. It's still got a very simplistic style to it and just adds a bit of colour to the back cover. I actually really like the sketchy edge style, it works really well for the characters etc for this book.

The other technique I tried was painting Mr.Toad. I think the detail in this image works really well and personally I think its very eye catching and makes you want to pick up the book to take a closer look at the image as a whole.

I'm really pleased with how this turned out, its quite realistic and quite dark as well which is what I wanted to try and achieve if I painted something. 

Looking at the Tigerprint Company...

Tigerprint was formed in 1996 in Brighouse, West Yorkshire, designing cutting edge card and wrap designs to supply to M&S. They've come a long way since then, with over 200 employees and offices in Bradford, London and Hong Kong.

Their continued focus on innovation and creativity means that they've become the sole supplied of over 5000 greetings products to M&S, making them the fourth biggest retailer of greetings cards in the UK.

Over the past 10 years, Tigerprint has been working with a wide number of art and design colleges & universities across the UK. They run projects with the colleges which usually last between four and six weeks.

Products that Tigerprint produce are:

- Cards

- Wrap

- Bags

- Stationery

- Calendars

- Christmas

- Wedding

- Gifting