OUGD405: Research, Collect, Communicate: Product

After I created my recipes and research illustrations, I started to make my own. I used a graphic tablet to create these and here are the sketches I did first:

Then I edited them and added colour to them on Illustrator. I changed the opacity to 80% on all of the illustrations, so that when different parts of the food overlapped, the shade turned darker in that area. As I did them all on a graphics tablet, they all have imperfect lines and nothing is completely straight. I used the Smooth Tool on certain things to make lines less jagged. I wanted them to look inaccurate and be quite rough though, as during the war everything was homemade, and people made the best out of what they had - make do and mend - and I wanted the illustrations to reflect the handmade, imperfect lifestyle.

As I was making the illustrations, I was adding them to a page layout, just so that I could see what it would look like in context. 

When I started to think about page layout however, I went onto InDesign and made some guides on the A Master slide so that I could stick to the same layout throughout. I decided to make the grid like this because I had different amounts of information and illustrations on each page, and it needed to be consistent and look the same throughout.

Then I started to add all the information on:

Some of the recipes had fewer ingredients than others, so pages like the Rice Pudding and Fish Pudding look quite sparse in comparison to the Beef Pot-Roast and Rabbit Stew, but I still think it looks consistent because I haven't had to lower the point size of any text to make it fit the page, or enlarged any to eliminate white space, and the text starts at the same place on every page.

I drew how I wanted the front cover to look like first, and I wanted to create something which was simple and still handmade, to go with the rest of the theme. I traced it onto Illustrator using the graphics tablet, and made it into a Live Paint object so I could easily colour it in. 

I then chose red and blue to colour it in with because they are the colours of the British flag, and I thought they would show the patriotism the country had during the War. For the text, I found it hard to warp the type on Illustrator because it didn't flow with the banner, and it looked too polished with the hand drawn illustration. So I printed of 'BRITISH WARTIME RECIPES' in Adobe Garamond Pro and traced it on the graphics tablet. I then edited the characters slightly, and placed them onto the banner. I think this looks a lot better because it fits in with the uneven lines of the banner and illustrations throughout the book.  

Following some feedback about my recipe book, Alex said that he liked everything apart from the font which was featured on the contents page. I have to agree with this, and I think that the Tommasso font makes the text look too overcrowded. So I changed the font to Adobe Garamond Pro, but in bold.

Now I am ready to print.