Book Design: Escapade

Design Research

Coffee Table Book Design:

Generally a coffee table book serves the purpose of entertaining guests and is often placed on a coffee table in a common area or somewhere where there would be guests (hence the term coffee table book).

Since the main purpose is to entertain guest, it's main content is specialized on displaying more pictures rather than words thus making it a very light reading material which is easy to the eye. Because its specialty is on displaying pictures, it is of essential importance that the pictures are interesting, attractive, unique and are of high quality as these would be the main selling and attracting point of the book.

In addition to that, it should also not look crammed despite having to put a lot of pictures. The number of text block is also very much limited in coffee table book; there are also a lot of white space as well which assist in making the reader to have the feel of a light reading material.

The current theme of this assignment is on beaches of Malaysia thus the overall outlook of the book should be able to give off the beach-vacation feel as well as to have a Malaysian elements to it.

Some inspirations that I got to design the coffee table book:

Cover Page

Foreword & Introduction page:

Content Pages:

I found this particular design very interesting and decided to incorporate in my design as well

Conceptualization

Crafting

Cover Page:

Main Issue Faced: Selecting appropriate font type

- Wanted to portray a beach-like Caribbean feel
- Another issue - looks to plain

- Added a tagline to fill up the empty space
- Error: Lack the Malaysian feel culture

- Used a font for tagline that had a traditional Malay feel to it (Caliph)
- Error: Title font does not compliment tagline font

Experimented with differ other fonts that have similar traditional Malay feel to it.
Error: Ended up having a very Middle East feel.

Chose a font type that is in between modern and traditional yet have a traditional Malay feel to it.
- Success: Title font & Tagline font compliment each other

Foreword Page:

Not much issue faced.

Introduction Page:

Main Issue: Making it look attractive yet readable

- Inspired to put text on top of an image
Issue: Problem finding a picture that would make text readable

- Decided to change layout and put image only at the side

- Foreword & Intro page looks nice together; not crammed.

Content Page 1 & 2

Looks too plain.

- Added more pics & changed border style

Content Page 3 & 4

Experimented mainly with how wide the borders should be or perhaps no border at all.

Final Artwork

References:
Bailey, G.M. (2012). Perhentian Island. Retrieved from http://www.aworldofinspiration.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Perhentian-047.jpg

Deposit Photos. (n.d.). Malaysia Map. Retrieved from http://static4.depositphotos.com/1000331/298/v/950/depositphotos_2984819-Malaysia-map.jpg

Zuhairah. (2012). Perhentian Islands. Retrieved from http://zuhairah-worldtraveldestinations.blogspot.com/search/label/Malaysia

Steppes Travel. (n.d.). Pom Pom Island Resort. Retrieved from http://www.steppestravel.co.uk/destinations/far+east/borneo/regions/sabah/accommodation/pom+pom+island+resort/

Lowyat.net. (2012). Dato' Seri Dr. Ng Yen Yen. Retrieved from https://fbcdn-sphotos-d-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-prn1/546064_10151235064848185_795830775_n.jpg

Layout Sparks. (n.d.). Sunset coconut tree. Retrieved from http://images2.layoutsparks.com/1/116411/lovers-beach-coconut-trees.jpg

Tours of Borneo. (n.d.). Mantanani Island. Retrieved from http://www.toursofborneo.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/6938182936_3998223d8a_b.jpg