Origins Dust Jacket

Go here to see the jacket in real life: [link]

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Right after having been assigned a project I wasn't thrilled about, we were given a project that I totally love!
I've been a huge fan of book jackets ever since I designed my first one Freshman year and this semester, I got
to make two of them! One needed to be autobiographical in nature and the second a fictional narrative of our
own creation. They could either be illustrated or photomanipulated, so long as we used our own photographs.

This is the fictional dust jacket, which centers around a science fiction story I came up with on the fly. While the
title is from one of my own stories, the plot is entirely different. I had a very specific idea for the cover artwork,
one that didn't mesh well with my original novel, so I just made up another one for the sake of doing the cover.
I know that's technically not how you're supposed to design, but I was running low on time and I already had
this cyborg-ish sketch of a woman's face from my Illustration class, so I took a shortcut and killed two birds with
one stone. In the end, I think it was a rather smart decision because the overall design turned out really well.

Initially, I wanted her face to be rendered in high realism using gradient mesh and other Illustrator effects, but
being that it was midterms and I had a lot of other stuff to deal with, I had to move quickly. I went with a flat-color
vector and decided to rely on value and color to make an impact. The essence and energy of the narrative can
be seen in these bold colors as well as the streamlined, sans-serif type (which I have fallen madly in love with).
I do think the way the cover art wraps around the spine and onto the back is really effective and eye-catching.

This was one of those projects that I half-assed but somehow it all came together better than I expected. When
I had my senior review, the judges thought it was pretty dynamic. Just having half of the face on the cover really
intrigued them. I got a comment from one of my peers that the placement of the publisher's logo makes it look
like she has a goatee, but hey, you know, it's whatever. When it's folded around the book, it doesn't really look
that much like one. I think my favorite part is her eyes… maybe because I spent a long time on her lashes, lol.

I think this looks better printed and applied to the book than it does flat like this, so I'll upload those pictures for
you eventually. In the meantime, tell me what you think. I'm still unsure about the colors, but I like the layout.

<sub>Designed in Illustrator + InDesign CS5. Completed October 13, 2012.

Typeface(s): Akzidenz Grotesk</sub>