Paige Burger
Dummy Book Response
Working on this dummy book has been a great experience. I feel that it gave the visual physicality I was yearning for, enabling me to understand my intentions and see my ideas. Handing over this book to another person was a little nerve racking. There were so many things I wanted to say to preface what she was about to see; and that was the first thing I gained from this experience. I don’t want to feel like that about my final project; I want to make sure that make work speaks miles for itself and that all of the things I want to say are exposed through the text and imagery inside. While making this book I experimented quite a lot and with everything, except for font. There is a grand array of tone, color, spacing, layout and content but text was the one thing I swept under the rug. In both feedback reports text is mentioned as an aspect that needs to be revisited. The text on the cover is tacky and makes the book look like a middle school science textbook. However, using my own handwriting on the flyleaf was liked, except it needs to be a bit more legible. As for the rest of the fonts, “none of them really do the pictures just.” Borders came up several times during the dummy review and on my written reports. There was no intention of the border being present, especially not on the cover. I think that added to the visual impairments of the cover. When I went to the store to make my prints, they came out with the border, being that it was only the dummy book I decided to leave it be. Now I am beginning to feel like that I should have had it reprinted because I still feel the need to look the pictures without any borders; I have a hard time imagining something like that. On the other hand there was one picture that was given a border, due to the printing selection, and I actually ended up liking the edge it gave the photo. I don’t think I will be using a standard white border but it definitely opened me up to some more visual opportunities. I received positive feedback in regards to how “engaging” the book is. My title choice was well liked; it makes you “really interested in seeing what an elegant explosion is.” I was very excited about the title and how it has directed the energy of my book, in some senses I feel like that title gave me a definite direction. I like how it captures interest. I felt that the layouts were the most successful part of my dummy book. I was able to try many things and visually understand the content of the book and the context of which it would be viewed based on its design. I feel like I gave my self many options and am very comfortable with the layouts that include text, in terms of design at least. I feel like I would like to make another dummy book once I am more secure in what will be the final layout. For now, I want to continue to add space for text on a few more spreads, maybe 7 spreads total with text. I need to work on the poetry and lyrical additions to the book; the actual words will need to be laid out as well. I would like to practice doing things handwritten and then see what scanning them in looks like. I am not limiting myself to digital means, I am comfortable with writing in the book once it
has been published but I would like to see my options. I will continue taking photos that match sequence ideas like, the food coloring and underwater shots.