57 UNIVERSITY DRIVE Specification Booklet
Contents
Introduction Page Layout Margins and Columns Page Layout Grids Layout Styles Colours and Pattern Typography Expressive Typography Examples Chronology Markers Cover Paper Stock Printing and Finishing Errors and Oversights
Introduction
This book is a chronilogicall review of Aung San Suu Kyi’s life from her birth in 1945 right up until the recent free elections in Burma in November 2015. Along with this is the political, social and economic events that have shaped Burma over this same period and how the two wind together to produce a varied, troubled and rich story of oppression and human will. I have researched Burma and Aung San Suu Kyi in a lot of detail over this period. I have been quite astonished at the human rights offences, blatant oppression, xenophobia and corruption which has been rife in the countrys government regime. This has been very prevelant since the military coup in 1962 which saw 50 years of untold damage to the country on the International stage due to its closed culture. Aung San, who was Aung San Suu Kyis father, was assassinated when she was only two years old. He was, at that time, the Prime Minister in waiting and was killed along with six of his shadow cabinet due to their democratic views and ideals. Thougout the book there are dark pages and bright pages, this is to indicate the dark times or the more positive times through that period in time. I wanted to convey a lot of darkness in the earlier sections of the book which eventually are taken over by a brighter and more positive mood later in the book. The years are indicated by a ruler style marker at the bottom right of each page along with a brief statement of the major event for which that page is dedicated. This I believe adds to the feeling of the years moving forward and allows the reader to easily identify the period in which that spread is pertaining to. The expressive text on each spread will be associated to one of the two markers. The expressive text was to be less obvious and each one has been given a hidden meaning which becomes apparent when the main text has been read. Again, I feel this adds to the readers experience as the expressive text only hints at what is in store in the main body.
On the right hand side of the book runs Burmese script which is the Prayer of the Three Jewels, a Burmese Buddhist prayer for peace which is said every day by most Buddhists. This prayer was to add an indescernible hope for peace towards the end of the book, which I believe adds to the overall tone of the book. The prayer is set at 25% opacity so it does not overpower the main body text. Along with this texture has been added by means of an ancient Burmese etching. This etching has been placed at an opacity of 15% and gives the overall book an older feeling and a connection with the ancient Burmese history. The pink colour was chosen for page colour and for the expressive text due to the clothes that Aung San Suu Kyi has worn in specific times during her life. In 1995 when she was released after her first house arrest and in 2012 when she made her Nobel laureate speech she wore a lilac / pink longyi, which is a traditional Burmese sarong. This colour also stands out strong against the darker pages and so is a symbol of her fight against the darkness of the regime. The type choice for the expressive text is Impact. This was chosen as it is a solid san serif font that conveys a solid message without decoration or extravagence. The main body type is Helvetica light which is the opposite to impact. It is light and elegant and it sits very well opposite the larger bolder expressive text quite well. it has an elegant female voice that suits the matter perfectly. The story is one that needs to be told and understood. Burma and Suu Kyi have been through tough times but the light is finally shining on this small part of Asia.
Page Layout: Margins and Columns
Page Size:
A5 148X210mm
Margin:
Top 12mm
Bottom 12mm
Inside 12mm
Outside 12mm Column:
5 column
Column width:
21.6mm
Gutter width:
4mm
Page orientation:
Portrait
The pages were laid out in this manner due to the expressive texts elements that were crossing the spreads. The final bound book was to lay flat and so the margins on both the internal and external sides were set equally. This page set up allows for a fluid layout but still has a structure to the text placement.
Page Layout: Grids
Page Size:
A5 148 X 210mm
Column Grid:
11
Column Gutter:
4mm
Baseline Grid:
12mm
Again this layout added a lot of fluidity to the layout. The centre sitting grids along with the five columns gave a good symmetrical layout to work with.
Layout Styles
Spread Style 1 - Pages 8-9 This spread shows the use of the expressive Typography right across the two pages. In this example the main body text has been split into two equal widths of paragraphs of 3 columns with a seperation of a 4mm gutter. The message is loud and strong from the offset to portray the seriousness of the situation. The chronological date markers are set across each spread in exactly the same position at all times. This gives a certain continuity between spreads which discounts the need for page numbers. The news headlines will sit in the space around the expressive text left aligned with the body copy of either page where possible.
Spread Style 2 - Pages 10-11 This spread shows a three quarter wide expressive type style. This allows a single width body column to the first page of the spread. This then offsets and balances the weight of the expressive type on the right hand side of the spread. The chronological date markers are set across each spread in exactly the same position at all times. The news headlines will sit in the space around the expressive text left aligned with the body copy of the left page single column paragraph. This is reversed in some cases throughout the book.
Spread Style 3 - Pages 18-19 This spread shows the use of the expressive Typography in a more reserved manner which allows the 4 paragraphs more space to breath on the page. This sets the mood as a little more relaxed. Again the chronological date markers are fixed The news headlines, again, will sit in the space around the expressive text left aligned with the body copy of either page where possible.
Colours and Pattern The two main colours are black and pink as set out below which are overlaid in low opacity pattern or used at full strength.
Black C: M: Y: K:
0% 0% 0% 100%
Pink C: M: Y: K:
22% 100% 15% 0%
Burmese carving pattern used to overlay and underlay on certain elements in the book.
Burmese pattern overlayed on black at 15% opacity to add texture and a feeling of age to the spreads.
Burmese pattern overlayed by pink at 50% opacity to centre spread and end papers. This opacity was set to allow for the white type to be easily legible against the texture.
Burmese pattern overlayed on pink at 20% opacity to title page spread. The opacity is lower to give a more vibrant colour to provide a higher impact for the title spread.
Typography
ABCDEFGHIJKLM NOPQRSTUVWXYZ abcdefghijklm nopqrstuvwxyz 12345678910 Name:
Impact (Regular)
Size:
11, 100, 200 and 300pt with discretionary scaling
Designer:
Geoffrey Lee, 1965
Mood / use: Powerful, strong and sometimes loud voicing to convey a very obvious message to the reader when first opening the spread. A quite robust and very solid font. Also used in highlight at 11pt for the Newspaper Headline elements which are set to replicate the type from a newspaper.
ABCDEFGHIJKLM NOPQRSTUVWXYZ abcdefghijklm nopqrstuvwxyz 12345678910 Name:
Helvetica (Light)
Size:
9pt (plus 1 instance of 400pt)
Designer:
Erich Schultz-Anker, Arthur Ritzel 1961
Mood / use: An elegant but confident voicing to convey a feeling of comfort and strength. A much more feminine font than impact which is by design rather than accident. The two styles play off each other on the pages in quite a juxstaposed manner which adds interest to the spreads.
ABCDEFGHIJKLM NOPQRSTUVWXYZ abcdefghijklm nopqrstuvwxyz 12345678910 Name:
Helvetica light oblique
Size:
9 and 18pt
Designer:
Erich Schultz-Anker, Arthur Ritzel 1961
Mood / use: Again, a strong but elegant voicing. Used for the chronological year markers.
ဧဣထေရ္ ဖ္ယ္သိစလ္လ္ယ္, vဧရ္ဗလ္လ္ယ္ အန္ဒ္ မေန္တလ္လ္ယ္ မယ္ ဗေ ဧffအစေဒ္, အန္ဒ္ ဣန္ ဩရ္ဒေရ္ ထတ္ ဤ မယ္ အစ္qဥဣ
Name:
Burmese type style
Size:
12pt Vertical (descending)
Mood / use: Burmese language type used in the Three Jewels Prayer which is set vertically on the right page of every spread. Set at 25% opacity so as not to overpower the main body text. Adds a buddhist spiritual element to the book. Is also the script behind the engraving used for the texture overlays.
Expressive Typography Examples
Context:
This particular spread deals with the Burma army takeover in 1958 to set up an interim government. The large type with the overlaid machine gun silhouette immediately allows the reader to get a feel for what is happening on that spread before they read it.
Design:
The colour is specifically designed in this pink to keep our attention on Suu Kyi’s story as well as Burma’s. The story is entwined and so is the overall design.
Context:
This particular spread deals with the Human rights breaches that have occurred in Burma. Again a large font size gives the reader an immediate idea as to what is happening.
Design:
The colour is specifically designed in pink and white to highlight the white flag of the people of Burma against their abusers. The word ‘rights’ is given a 25% opacity to show that the area is a weak aspect of the country.
The only real prison is fear and the only real freedom is freedom
Aung San Suu Kyi
Context:
The 8888 uprising was one of the gamechangers in the regime in Burma. It brought the attention to the world on the brutal way it dealt with the demonstrations.
Design:
This particular spread deals with the 8888 civil uprising on the 8th of the 8th 1988. The spread is designed to convey the 8888 ‘rising up’ across the spread. Again, giving the reader a preview of what is to come in the body text.
Context:
The NLD convoy attack of 2003 almost cost Suu Kyi her life. 4 of her bodyguards died in the so-called NLD provoked attack. It is a good example of the intimidation being perpetrated at the time by the regime.
Design:
The spread has a full width expressive text element set out in tight lettering. The word convoy is interspersed with attack to again, allow the reader to figure out the underlying theme of the spread.
2012
Regime softens
Chronology Markers
Use:
Font:
The markers are used on every page to indicate the chronological movement of the book. Each marker has been issued with a brief note as to the elements included in the body text on that particular page. Just to read every one of the markers throughout the book would give an outline as to the progression and the contents of the pages. Helvetica light oblique
Cover
Title:
57 University Avenue. The title is the address of Aung San Suu Kyi’s family home in Rangoon. This is where she spent 3 terms of house arrest which lasted a total of 15 years. The title is split into 3 hyphenated sections to depict this disjointed element of her life.
Treatment:
Blind embossed in 48 point Franklin (Impact not available in Duffys binders) Placed from the top left corner to match the title page.
Cover:
Hard cover with dark grey cloth to match the ‘dark’ pages of the book.
Paper Stock Printing and Finishing Paper:
All body copy pages are printed on 170 gsm satin paper, double sided. This particular paper was chosen to give a vibrance in particular to the pink colour which is at it’s core a voice of Aung San Suu Kyi. The project was printed in 3 sections of 12 and one of 8 to make up the total of forty four pages included in the book. The end papers are also printed in 170 gsm satin to ensure continuity throughout.
Printing:
Hacketts Digital Baggott Street Dublin 2
Binding:
Duffys Bookbinding Seville Terrace Dublin 1
Errors or Oversights
1:
The opacity of the burmese etching overlaid on the black sheets of the main spreads was perhaps slightly too high at 15 %. It may have been better for legibility of the white print to set the opacity at 5 to 10%
2:
The front page spread colour, perhaps could have matched the colour of the centre page spread and the end papers.