Studio Brief 01 - Analysis of - Every Book Starts with an Idea

Every Book Starts with an idea: Notes for Designers 

Important Points:

• Some books can be over-designed and some under-designed. Try and keep a good balance of design and content not letting one over power the other keeping balance.

• Design and content need to go hand in hand.

• Being close to the content can make it difficult to think of the form - good to gather different perspectives

• Have confidence in your own ideas as it will inform your work and make it more interesting. 

• Mistakes are a part of making something good, or sometimes just luck but through trial and error there will be less mistakes in the future improving your practise and giving you more control.

• Books start with a question. The clearer the question the better the result. Finding out the question involves a lot of thought and time for the idea to take shape.

• As designers we are responsible for the content just as much as anyone else.

• Important questions to keep in mind are: What needs to be done? 

• What are the main issues? What does not work? What is missing? How to create the right conditions for a workable situation?

• There will always be messy parts that need resolving and design choices that you need to fight for

• Don't just sit down and wait until it all comes to you because it wont by itself

• To know how to resolve things you need to be open, to reinvent, to rethink what a book can be, rethink the form, rethink the information, always look at the alternative and if things can be improved and everything will be benefited as a result.

• All books start from their content. The content is a source of inspiration. Understanding the book is essential.

• Be aware of your decisions and what they mean for the book you're designing. The way something is designed can make it or break it.

• The content is the engine - that leads to ideas -  personal ideas - crazy ideas. 

• Be clear about who you are, don't try to emulate someone else.

• All books tell a story about why or how they were designed, sometimes there are unexpected problems, theres always going to be drama and mess somehow, it cant be perfect, but what matters in the end if the book works or not.

• If you're able to link the content to your concept and the concept to your form you have succeeded. 
• To find form you'll be restricted by different things such as the stock, the binding, the printing technique etc

• Express your ideas through type, layout and the way the information is structured by juggling these elements you'll find new combinations. 

• There is a real challenge is using your imagination, talent and skill to move successfully through the complexity of designing books you need to dream about the books you would like to design and this is what drives you and what keeps you going, and wanting to work on the next book. 

Individual question to consider:

• What is your book answering? 

Is there beauty in the everyday/mundane?

"All books start from their content..."

My content focuses on an urban environment. I took lots of photos of my surroundings in Leeds. When i initially started I was just focusing on the city and anything interesting that caught my eye. But as I reviewed my images and analyzed the purpose of what they were trying to convey, I realized that there was three common themes throughout my images, which were:

• Shape
• Direction (purpose)
• Art

I started off wanting to have a lot of variety within the context of the images. However I think staying to my chosen question and keeping clarity in the content. 

With the question "Is there beauty in the mundane/everyday?" I've taken a variety of images I've tried to portray the message that within an urban environment there are often parts of the city that we don't really notice whether thats because of its scale or positioning or it just being a part of socially structured that we don't notice the content like we usually would with other visual things.

To do (And some additional thoughts)

Now that I have established a question I'd like to gain some different opinions on the content thats been created and what I can do with it regarding format and how I'd further like to inform my idea. 

Since the nature of the content is to put it in a better light, possibly looking into different layouts to present this could be beneficial.