Extended Practice: COP BOOK

This year we were instructed to design and produce a COP book which consolidates our inspiration over the past 3 years. This was a pretty hard task as to what to include as we could be here all day. I wanted to produce a publication which shows a breadth of my interests in graphic design. Some of it which has informed my practice over the past3 years and other things that I just like. They may not have had a direct impact on my work however they do interest and inform my bigger picture of graphic design.

What I Did

To start with I went through my entire blog from the duration of the course and started to make a COP book folder for my indesign file. I figured using in design would be the fastest and most effective way of producing my book. I sifted rthrough all of my reserach and inspiration and started categorizing my inspiration and research. I wanted to create a research publication which was split up into sections dedicating a double page spread to each designer/studio/piece of work.I kept everything neat and organized so when it came to putting in the images it would be made easy.

I decided I wanted the content of my book to be a square format. I planned to use an Acco Fastener to bind the book so would need to leave a pretty big margin to compensate. I went about drawing up a grid to work with so that the content was neat and tidy.

Once I had the layout set up I went about drawing differeent image boxes to fit in the grid. I wanted them all to work as a series but differ across the pages. I used a similar layout throughout and then went about inserting the images into the right boxes.

When it came to inserting the images I used a double page spread per designer/studio. Depending on the image I slightly changed the boxes to accommodate but always worked to the grid.

Once I had inserted all the images for the book I started to write the content. For each designer/studio I displayed contact information for future reference to their website and email address. I wrote a short sentence about who they are and why I like the work and how it has inspired me, or what I have learned from it.

For each of the images I referenced what it is giving it the title. The book was split up into different sections, poster design, editorial, packaging, environmental, printing & smart inks and typography

Once I had inserted all the content, I added a short introduction to complete the publication. The next challenge was printing and binding the book.

Final Publication / Inspired

The publication was printed on cartridge paper giving the book a nice srurdy structure. The printing took a couple of attempt and I had to experiment with the printer settings in order to apply more heat as at first the ink wasn't bonding with the paper. Once I had printed the book out I trimmed it down to size. I used various different coloured stock to seperate out the chapterts of the book. The final stages were the tricky part. I split the book into too sections and made sure everything lined up nice an neatly. I then clipped the book sections securely and hole punched them in order to make room for the fastener. This was the finishing touch for the book. I am really happy with the outcome and also the content. It is a brief but well informed publication of my inspiration over the past 3 years. Creating the book was good editrial experience. I played about with different layouts in order to get something which is different throughout but also works well together. I also found the difficult part was choosing what content to include as I have had so much inspiration over the past 3 years. In the end I had to narrow the book down a fair bit and just concentrate on some of the main aspects. I initially had a fair few extra chapters planned, but due to my time scale I had to cut a few sections out.

Photos