Evaluation of FMP

I decided to base my Final Major Project on the Grimm's Fairy Tales. Then Penguin/Puffin design awards 2012 competition was my starting point for this project, as the puffin competition was to create a book cover for Grimm's Fairy Tales, by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm. After researching and thinking about my project a little more, I decided to do a series of book covers, the other covers would be for other stories by the Grimm brothers, after researching I decided to do create covers for 2 of the better known stories, Rapunzel and Cinderella.

I tried to split my time between the 3 covers equally. I started off with the Rapunzel cover, creating images of a fairy tale nature. Rapunzel being a fairy tale that would attract more girls than boys, I tried to use the more feminine colours. Though after researching other covers for Rapunzel I saw that most of them were very similar so I wanted to do something different, something more eye-catching, I then looked at the story from a darker point of view, which is where the skeletons came from. I always tend to struggle with typography, so with this first book cover I tried my best with typography, trying to it with the image instead of having it look like I just randomly placed the type anywhere. I thought what I had done worked quite well and I was proud.

I also started to do some screen printing, started to experiment with other things instead of just sitting at a computer and doing everything digitally, I also started to do some paper cutting to create shapes for certain elements. These worked well and I was pleased to have done something a little different than usual and as I work with texture some of the screen prints came out lovely. I also started to work with other materials such as fabric, which I then made into some pillows. I never usually do things like this with my work, but I think the context of what I was doing is perfect for things like this.

For the next book cover, I focused on the main Grimm's Fairy Tales one, again I took a darker approach to it and I didn't want to use pick one story and illustrate it, I wanted to include things from a few different stories. The main focus for this cover were some of the evil characters, such as the Wolf (Little Red Riding Hood), Evil Witch/Old Lady (Hansel and Gretel), and the Evil Queen (Snow White). I think I work well with creating characters with are animals, but I have always struggled with human faces and features. But as I wanted all 3 characters to be a similar shape, this helped me create fun and simple characters.

Both of these images took me about 10 weeks to complete. Having around 4/5 Weeks left after I did these and created 2 pillows. I started my Cinderella cover, which I was very proud of as I completed this in just over 1 week. Using simple ideas and strong typography as I have done for the other 2. All 3 of my covers work well together, using the same view points and all having nice strong colour pallets and typography. I feel they work really well as a set of covers, as you can tell they are part of a 'series' and are done by the same illustrator.

Overall I have created 3 book covers, including fronts, backs and spines. Some pillows and other things such as notebook covers and book marks. I am overall very pleased with my outcomes. I have done more than I usually would for a project, instead of just doing the main things I have set for myself, I have pushed them aside and done a few more things and experimented a lot more.

If I had even more time for my FMP, I would have liked to have experimented with different ways of working even more and try new things and possibly do even more book covers that would sit nicely with the others I had produced.