Portfolio

Book Cover Design

Project Title

Losing the Plot

Brief Overview or Introduction

Summary: Non-fiction book cover design for Wits Press.  

Project goals: 

• Concept presentation
• Draft design
• Final design
• Print-ready files

Client: Wits Press 

Brief: The Client asked for “a graphic, contemporary treatment. Playing with interesting fonts in an arrangement that suggests the ‘plot’ of the novel form is coming undone”.

Role

Responsibilities: Riaan’s role as book cover designer was to follow the brief and conceptualise cover designs for Losing the Plot.

Process & Development:

Research: The initial phase as usual involves studying the brief, the book genre, the target market, the author’s books visual style, the publisher’s style as well as the content.

Conceptualisation: The original concepts all centred around the notion of writing and writers losing the plot; that is, not writing about current events in South Africa as required according to the author, but rather fictional books.

Iterations: The first iterations featured a sumber of designs that makes use of a spontaneous and varibale grid to denote disorder. This iteration made use of two main strings of typewriter text coming together after an ‘apartheid’, bound together by the heading and subheading.

Final Solution/Design: The Client requested that the subheadings and author names be differentiated from the heading, by changing its colours and the colour of the visual devices holding the subheadings. 

Tools & Technologies Used: An array of tools from physical to digital, including paper notebooks, pencils, Illustrator and Photoshop.

Results & Impact: 

Testimonials or Client Feedback: The Client was satisfied with the work and featured the book cover on their website: Wits Press.

Challenges & Learnings: Balancing time spent on the project within the budget was challenging. 

Call to Action:
Request a book cover design: info@riaanwilmans.co.za