Week 21

This week we started off with a briefing on the project booklet - which is part of our final hand-in. I have always felt a bit apprehensive about creating this booklet because my whole project is making a book, making another additional 100 pages is scary to me. Andrew done a great job by giving in depth detail about what he is looking for from this documentation and the examples that he produced from previous years were extremely helpful. He urged us to create our own miniature project booklet to make us think about what we could potentially include in ours, mine is displayed below.

I then started on my actual project booklet, I have created an InDesign file and added headings to pages based on what I will write about. It is so exciting and nerve wracking that the end is so near. As my project will be a 500+ page book then add another 100 pages from this booklet, I have a lot of work ahead.

As the mark 2 presentations are next week, I began to re-think about the attachable page and the materials that I will use for this. Following on from last week’s prototypes of how the loose CBT pages would be incorporated into the booklet, I decided that I really like the design of it. The origami one was extremely relevant to my design style as well as it looking sleek and it was the easiest to function. I needed the holder to be durable and solid seen as though it will be regularly handled and moved. It would also be beneficial if it was waterproof as it will be de-attached from the hard cover so some protection would be good. Last week I started with paper as this was easy to gauge the right shape and size, I then trailed with thicker paper, then card, but they never had the waterproof aspect, and they could appear dirty with fingerprints. These would also have to be either glued or cello taped together so it doesn’t give it a polished finish. I then moved onto trailing the design with plastics, I dismantled polypropylene (poly pocket) then cut my desired shape then used an iron hoping to melt each element together. For some reason they never bonded together, it was okay though because this material was too flimsy to withhold multiple pieces of paper and be a prominent feature within the book. As I looked for materials around the house, I thought i'd test a polyethylene (carrier bag). I used straighteners this time and it did actually melt the sections together which was a positive. The material was far too thin that it never held its own shape so it won’t be strong enough and therefore wouldn’t be my solution.

Finally, I trailed a plastic wallet. Much to my excitement it managed to bind together using heat and after the process it was sturdy enough to hold its shape on its own. It is also waterproof due to being made from polypropylene and it’s easily accessible, cheap and will come in a range of colours. Therefore, I will use this material for my final hand in, but I will keep testing it out to fit the best process to get a clean-cut finish for the paper holder. I will have to decrease the size of it so that it is flush with the rest of the book. An option is to allow the user to choose the colour of the attachable section.

Below shows how the attachable feature will work.

This week I done a good amount of research into what my finished book would look like inside and outside. I knew that I wanted the book to be compact so that’s why I originally planned for it to be A5, but I researched into pre-existing book sizes like Demy and moleskin books which are a tad more petite than A5 which could have been nice. Out of sheer luck I got the urge to search for Japanese books, to my excitement I managed to find Hanshi-bon and Chuhorn. Chuhorn is slightly smaller than A5 but are traditionally used in Japan for novels, guides to pleasure, travel, cooking and other how to books, therefore, I have decided to go with this size.

I then looked into the layout and design of my book; graphics is all new to me, so it was quite confusing getting my head around all the jargon. I learned some new phrases such as the golden ratio – which I still do not fully understand! I have to be careful that the pages still align with the golden ratio even with the large margin that I will require for the binding. I have shown my working out in my sketchbook which is shown below.

For the design of the book, I looked into the Wabi-sabi style. Wabi-sabi takes inspiration from all things natural and contains a natural palette that celebrates beauty in imperfections. ‘Clean but not sterile. Simple yet smart’. I am creating a large grid to stick to so I can create freedom for all the elements. I think a nice way to characterise the book is to separate the colour scheme to correspond with the 4 seasons. It could possibly look like this:

· Winter - blue

· Spring - green

· Summer – yellow

· Autumn - orange

I would like the colours to be muted/pastel

I made a major breakthrough this week in terms of the length of the book. The USP of this book is about bringing the CBT technique into everyday life, so for that reason I must make this the greatest part of my book. Therefore, I have reduced the number of pages in my book dramatically by not having day view pages for planning but week pages. There will still be space for the user to plan their days but maybe not in as much detail as there would have been if each day had a separate page. Instead of this book being 500+ pages it will decrease to between 250-300 which will be extremely easier to bind.

It would only be right for the included typefaces to also have Japanese inspiration. I researched into fonts and have decided that the majority of content will be wrote in Meiryo regular. I am still yet to decide between what font I will use to create hierarchy on the pages in terms of the titles and subtitles. There are some options that I have captured below. I am drawn to the bottom one as I like the paint brush effect that it creates. All of these typefaces are Chinese inspired.

For mark 2 presentations next week I want to produce a more established prototype of what it will look like printed and binded. I came across Japanese stab stitching, below shows some prototypes that I made of different ways this can look aesthetically. For the finished book I will use material that looks more aesthetically pleasing but for this instance I used wood, string and a needle. To my amazement it is extremely tight and sturdy, the way that it is bound will make the pages very unlikely to fall out or break. I will definitely use this binding technique for the finished book but I am not yet sure which way because I like the look of them all.