Why did you pick the product you did?I thought that making a book cover would give me more artistic liberty compared to labels for bottles. I'm not interested in making logos, so I didn't want to make something that was more for marketing than art. How did you design your piece? Tell me your process.I originally came up with the idea of having a person look like they're "unwinding." I started by dividing the cover into sections. From there, I designed the cover, then the flaps, then the spine, and finally the back cover. I had to work a lot with different layers, as I didn't want to redraw every single part. That's part of the reason why I did the back cover last, (that way, I could copy the art on the cover and adjust it to look the way I wanted it to). What is most successful about your design?I think the front cover's design is the most successful part. Front covers are really important when it comes to books, so you need to put the most interesting thing on them. That's what I tried to do by having the actual person on the front. By using parts of the design on the back cover too, it makes the whole thing feel cohesive. If you could change anything about the piece, what would you do and why?I think I would have added a little more to the inside flaps of the book. I really liked how the covers came out, but I wasn't as happy with the flaps. I would try to make them look a little more realistic. I would also have added a bar code to the back cover. I forgot that books have them, so I didn't include it.
The Design ProcessI started out by looking at the different competitions that the fair had to offer. The Kid's Cookie Decorating Contest was one that immediately sparked my imagination. I knew that I had to include a cookie, and that I wanted the little kids to appear as chefs. So I sketched it out on paper, and chose blue as the main color besides those necessary for the cookie. I also wanted there to be diversity in the children, so I made them different. DifficultiesThe only difficulties I had were trying to figure out the tablet and figuring out how having multiple layers affect drawings. Switching between the layers was very hard to get used to.
Who lives in the house you created? Is there a particular reason you picked the parts you did?Although I didn't create a house, I think that because it is a mosque, anyone who practices Islam would spend time in it. I picked the columns because they reminded me of many stick-shaped foods (I chose cinnamon sticks for this one), and I chose to change the lamps hanging from the ceiling because they looked like upside-down cookies. What alterations did you have to make to make it look realistic?I had to use the burn tool a lot so that there would be shadows on the appropriate side of the cinnamon stick columns. I also had to clone stamp the ground so that I could change the window reflections so that they lined up with the newly changed columns. I had to warp the cinnamon sticks so that they would line up with the original column placement, and I had to do the same for the cookie lamps. If you could change anything about the piece, what would you do? I would change the cinnamon sticks. Looking back on it, there are probably many other foods that would have a better texture to add to the columns. I was just looking for something that matched it shape wise, but if I had chosen another food, I could have made the picture look more realistic and interesting.
What problems did you overcome during this project and how?I think the biggest problem that I overcame was the horse butt. That sounds odd, but I had to transplant the horse's butt along with the tail for the proportions to look correct. I had to use the clone stamp a lot on the butt and hind legs so that the wolf's fur looked the same throughout the whole thing. Through a lot of clone stamping, I was able to basically change the wolf's proportions. If you could change anything about the piece what would you do?I think that I would choose a different horse image to take the characteristics from. The tail was extremely hard to Photoshop so that it looked natural. If I had chosen another horse image, the tail might have turned out a little better. I also would have tried to work more on the hooves. I'm not really sure what I could've done, but after staring at them for days, they just seem really unnatural to me. Explain your animal? What is their name/species? How did you come up with this idea?My animal is a mixture of a maned wolf and a horse. I think I would call the new species Chrysocyon caballus. This specific creature's name is Beth. I came up with this idea mostly due to the name of the wolf. Manes are typically on horses, so I immediately thought to mix it with a horse. I figured it already had a "mane" so I wanted to add a tail and hooves, plus the harness for bonus points.
What problems did you overcome and how?A problem that I faced involved layers and the burn tool. I was able to overcome it for the most part, but some of the shadows are a little off. For some reason I had too many copies of layers, so when it came time to burn in the shadow, I was confused on why it wouldn't work. Once I figured out that I had to toggle between the two, I was able to have a better grasp of layers and the burn tool. Overall, considering I have never touched Photoshop before in my life, I think it came out alright! If you could change anything about this piece, what would you do?I would take pictures inside. It was a cloudy day and the lighting was different in a lot of pictures, so they were unusable. Also, I should've taken the pictures on an actual tripod, as well as from another angle, so the clones don't look two-dimensional. If I had taken different pictures, I wouldn't have needed to use the burn tool, which I think is the worst part of the picture.
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