Let's Play With Type #1: Made and Found Objects
Sharp Objects Book Cover
For this book cover, I wanted to do something that was challenging, yet fun. The book that I decided to go with was Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn, which I had recently picked up on. It's been a while since I have read something that really intrigued me, and this book consisted of a lot of twists and surprises that kept me on the edge of my seat. The plot of the story is about a reporter, Camille Preaker, who returns to her hometown to cover the murders of preteen girls. In order to unravel the mystery behind the murders, she must face the psychological puzzle of her past as well.
Research
Shown above are the three book covers that have been made for the book. The one that I decided to get is the one on the left. The first two covers that are shown above involve a blade, which could represent two meanings to the book. The first one is the title. A blade is literally a sharp object. The second one is more symbolic. It represents more of the story. Since the story showcases psychological issues, thoughts that involve hurting oneself would be in it.
Hands On
As the story revolves around the story of a murder, I thought it would be fun to try making words that look as though it's written with blood. I tried writing it differently, and found that writing letters in different ways could change how the story is being represented.
I then started to sketch out different designs for the cover. I knew that I wanted to try making the word "sharp" with sticks in a nature background since one of the girls that were murdered was found in a forest. I wanted to take pictures of each individual letter and print them out like an investigation.
Although I created various sketches of my initial ideas, through playing around with the objects that I bought, I ultimately decided on something a little bit different. I decided to keep the idea of the word "sharp" created with sticks and photographed them.
I loved the idea of having the word "object" look like it was written with blood, but I wanted to go deeper in meaning and created the letters with broken glass pieces instead. There are two meanings behind broken glass pieces. Not only are broken glass pieces literally sharp objects, but they could represent the reflection of one's self as well. A mirror is often symbolized as a portal to one's soul. I wanted the broken glass pieces to symbolize and reflect Camille's psychological issues throughout the book.
As for the background, I chose a hardwood floor background. Another symbolic object that was shown in the book was a dollhouse.
When I was photographing the objects, I tested out various camera angles and found that the 0.5 lens on my phone camera created a nice effect with the broken glass pieces. The effect that the camera and light had allowed me to settle on the overall color scheme.
Final Product
Through a lot of trial and error, I was able to come up with a design that I was satisfied with. I was able to use the skills I learned on Illustrator to complete the project and learned something new through Photoshop to edit my photo. The photos of the letters for "sharp" came out to be a bit small, so I had to enlarge it through editing. I had some issues that came up while creating this project, by testing out tools and playing around with it, I was able to get come up with a cover design that I liked.
