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Art 341 Project 1
Book Cover Design
Challenge
Create a concept book cover design for a fictitious book series about two people who are a "famous couple" (pair, rivals, arch nemesis, etc.). It's a new book to propose as a story for a Penguin Random House book series.
Choice: Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow
Since childhood, I have always been a fan of Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow, two rivals from the GI JOE/Hasbro Universe who are ninjas from the fictitious Arashikage Clan. The history between the two makes them mortal enemies for much of the series, but they were once brothers in America's "lost war" and later reunite as GI JOE's ninja's when Snake Eyes eventually convinces Storm Shadow to leave Cobra.
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Exploration
Design System: For this project, corporate identity had to be preserved in terms of imposed limitations which only allowed one additional color/hue the brand's signature orange hue, brand name, and signature penguin logo, registration Black and White were the only other (non)colors allowed to work with.
The format of the cover required inclusion of the brand logo all sides (front, spine, back) and the company name and book series on the front cover.
I looked to incorporate the look and feel of tension between the two subjects who are both like a Yin and Yang set of rivals who wear Black and White. Their character style elements were originally adapted to the graphic elements including their symbol for: Arashikage (Fire and Water).
Many online examples were explored, but my incorporation of the pair's identity came through mostly as graphic hand-illustrations.
10 Adjectives and Backstory
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Sketches
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Type+Color palette
Title and paragraphing: New York (discontinued by Apple); Nearest: Operatta 52
Color palette: preserved the corporate Penguin brand Orange, Black and White
Cover Explorations
For this stage, I decided to explore simple cover designs
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Type+Image Cover Designs
For this stage, I decided to explore more hand-drawn cover designs.
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Final solution
A hand-drawn illustration was fixed in ProCreate and Adobe Illustrator to design the cover that was assembled in InDesign. A tangle of snakes, it's metaphorical for the relationship of the two rivals and the fictitious enemy organization known in the G.I. JOE universe as "COBRA," the origins behind what that has defined Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow's rivalry.
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