First, the cover design
If book binding is like a group of buildings, then the book cover is undoubtedly the appearance of these buildings. Whether it is a Gothic church in the west or a classical palace temple in China, the architectural appearance can reflect the architectural spirit. The cover is also the same, which will reflect the theme spirit of the book and is a key point of book binding design.
The formal elements of the cover also include words and graphics, and the cover design also needs to highlight the main image. But from conception to expression, what we pay attention to is a kind of freehand brushwork beauty. The same is true in the design with characters and graphics as the mainstay.
1. Text
The concise words on the cover mainly include the title of the book (including the title of the series and the subtitle), the name of the author and the name of the publishing house. These words left on the cover play an important role in the design.
In the design process, in order to enrich the picture, you can repeat the title, add pinyin or foreign language titles, or directories and appropriate advertising languages. Sometimes, in order to meet the needs of the picture, the author's name and publisher's name can not be arranged on the cover, so that they appear on the spine and title page, leaving only the essential title on the cover. Descriptive articles (publishing intention, catalogue of series, introduction of author), name of binding designer, ISBN pricing, etc. , according to the design needs, set on the back cover, back cover and inner page. Bright fonts are not determined by the style, style and characteristics of books. The arrangement of fonts is also as described in the advertising design composition. They are designed as points, lines and planes, organically integrated into the picture structure, and participate in various arrangements, combinations and divisions, resulting in interesting and novel forms that make people memorable.
2. Cartography
The graphics on the cover, including photography, illustrations and patterns, are realistic, abstract and freehand. Specific realistic techniques are widely used in the cover design of children's knowledge books, popular science books and some literary and scientific books. Because it is easier for children and readers with low education to understand specific images. The use of specific pictures on the covers of science and technology books and some books on architecture and daily necessities has scientific, accurate and touching explanatory power.
Cover design of some books in science, technology, politics and education. Sometimes it is difficult to refine the expression with concrete images, but it can be expressed in abstract form, so that readers can understand the meaning and get spiritual feelings.
The technique of "freehand brushwork" is widely used in literary cover, which is not just freehand brushwork that refines the original content like a concrete and abstract form. But in the form of iconicity rather than iconicity. Chinese painting has freehand brushwork techniques, focusing on grasping the expression of form and spirit, and gaining emotional appeal and touching association with concise methods. Some people call the change method of natural patterns "freehand brushwork change", and on the basis of simple natural forms, they exert their imagination and pursue the expression of formal beauty. Exaggeration, variation, combination. Using freehand brushwork as the image of the cover will make the performance of the cover more symbolic and artistic. For example, the close-up of the word "Shao" on the cover of Youth Literature and Art, like a fluttering red scarf, gives people an association, which embodies the personality of youth literature and art from conception to form. The deformed cover of children's books can arouse children's interest and find their bosom friends in fairy tales, myths and fables. Those Chinese and foreign ancient and modern patterns with freehand brushwork have also played a great role in embodying national style and characteristics of the times.
3. Overall coverage
In fact, the cover is not just the front. It is true that people are mainly concerned about the front. However, due to the high aesthetic requirements, the reverse side can not be ignored, and the spine of the book also plays an advertising and aesthetic role on the bookshelf. Therefore, the front and back of the cover and the spine should be included in the scope of cover design. The whole cover is a small whole in the whole book binding, and the relationship between the front and back and the spine has a unified conception and performance. The success or failure of this relationship also affects the overall effect of book binding design.
We can sum up several types:
A. the front and back designs are exactly the same. Or the general design is the same, but the text has changed, the title appears in front, followed by pinyin, foreign languages, or the names of very small editors and designers. The color and juice on both sides have changed.
B. Divide a complete design picture into a front cover, a back cover and a spine, and modify the text respectively.
C. The back cover echoes the cover with pictures or small signs and patterns that reduce the cover.
D spine should be the embodiment of cover design, especially in thick books, and should not be satisfied with arranging titles, authors and publishers. Through the same font as the previous topic, the relationship between size and density is arranged in a long and narrow area, and some of them are divided by geometric points, lines, surfaces and figures, which echo back and forth and form rhythm changes with them.
E. The spine can be designed separately on one side, and the cross-plane design can be pressed. In hardcover books, there is often a protective cover, which can not only play a protective role, but also be an important means of publicity and small advertisements. Cover design paper, beautifully printed and rich in expressions. The cover with protective sleeve can achieve the effect of change simply, and at the same time, because the cover uses binding materials such as linen, lacquer cloth and leather and the constraints of printing process, it adopts a simple expression method. The closure of the cover should also be carefully designed to make it an integral part of the cover, which can be used to publish abstracts, authors' introductions, publishing information, series catalogues and so on. Protective covers are divided into full protective covers and semi-protective covers. The height of the semi-protective sleeve only accounts for half of the cover and wraps around the waist of the cover, so it is called a belt, which is used to publish book advertisements and some book-related supplements and also plays a decorative role.
Second, the layout design
The so-called layout design refers to determining the reasonable layout of all elements of the layout within a certain range of news and publication layout, that is, determining the size of the layout center and its spatial position on the layout, the layout form of the text, the font size of the text, the line spacing of the text, the position and layout form of pictures and tables, and the use of layout decoration. , so that the layout of news publications has aesthetic feeling and unique style.
There is a title page in front of the table of contents or preface of a book. The title page includes the development page, blank page, photo page, frontispiece insert or series name, front title page (book amount), copyright page, inscription or thanks, blank page, etc. There are too many title pages to specify the number of pages mechanically, which must be determined according to the characteristics of the book and the needs of binding. At present, books at home and abroad are often concise, and often use the cover page and the title page to directly enter the catalogue or preface, while the arrangement of copyright pages depends on the specific situation.
The cover page is printed with the title of the book, the name of the author, the name of the publishing house and the concise pattern. Because people's reading habits. The direction of the front cover is always the same as that of the cover. When we open the cover, open the ring lining and blank pages; Text appears in the middle or upper right of the right version. In addition, there is another design that takes the left and right sides as the main title page, which is called double title page. The font on the title page should not be too big, mainly in fine arts, which is consistent with the font on the cover. The design of the title page is very concise, leaving a lot of blank space, as if there is a relaxing space before entering the text.
No matter whether the front cover and the back cover are open, there is always a page connecting the front cover and the inner page, which is called a ring lining to keep the front cover and the heart firm. The ring lining design of the hardcover book is also very particular, using abstract texture effects, illustrations, patterns and useful photos, and its style and content are consistent with the book. But the color should change relative to the cover. Generally, elegance is needed, and the graphic contrast is weak. Some can be decorated with patterns in four directions, resulting in apperception effect and visual transition from cover to heart.
On the one hand, the purpose of layout design is to make the form best express the layout content, on the other hand, it is to establish the style of layout. Generally speaking, the layout style of different news publications should be different. However, the overall style of the same news publication should be consistent.
How to achieve the style goal of layout design by means of layout design? It is generally believed that there are the following methods:
1. Reflected from the font and font size. For example, some pages do not use bold characters to maintain elegant style, while others use a lot of new fonts to reflect their novel and lively style;
2. Reflected by the line spacing and width of the text. For example, some layouts increase line spacing to make the layout clear and pleasing to the eye, and some layouts have longer line width to make the layout solemn and elegant;
3. Reflect in the form of pictures and tables. The size, shape, quantity and location arrangement of picture tables can bring different characteristics to the layout;
4. Reflected from the layout and decoration. Layout decoration mainly refers to decorative symbols such as lace, flower thread, theme flower, net bottom and border. How to arrange the layout decoration symbols is also an important means to reflect the layout style;
5. Reflect from the layout space. Some pages are blank to reflect the clear and delicate style; Some pages have less blank space to hold more information.
It should be said that layout design is a highly creative work. Layout designers should at least have the following qualities:
1. You should know all aspects of news publishing and the whole editing and typesetting process;
2. Have a strong business knowledge of news theory and a sensitive "news nose", that is to say, "knowing the goods", knowing which news is the most important, and basically judging the news value and propaganda value of the manuscript;
3. Be familiar with some printing knowledge and master the knowledge of typesetting and plate making. As far as modern newspaper layout designers are concerned, they should master laser phototypesetting technology;
4. Be familiar with the font type, font size and layout decoration symbols in the laser phototypesetting system, and be able to skillfully use them;
5. Know the requirements of various plate-making methods for manuscripts;
6. Have a certain knowledge of art;
7. In addition, we should also study the composition, structural mode, style, reading adaptability and beautification of the layout, so as to make the layout beautiful and conducive to reading.
Third, illustrations.
Illustration is a kind of painting, but different from ordinary independent appreciation painting, it has relative independence and necessary subordination. Illustration should have certain painting conditions and not rely on words. It can also express a theme from its image itself, and at the same time, it must obey the original and become an auxiliary. This is the meaning of the example.
Illustrations can be divided into two categories. One is art illustration. By choosing meaningful characters, scenes and plots in the book and expressing them with painting images, painters can increase readers' interest in reading books, combine readability with visibility, deepen their understanding of the original work, and at the same time gain different degrees of beauty enjoyment. The other is books on science and technology, history and geography. This kind of illustration can help readers to further understand the knowledge content, thus achieving the effect that words are difficult to express. Its image language should be accurate, practical and explanatory. A photo of an apple can help us to see a very objective shape, color, structure and texture. The explanatory diagram of seeds can not only reproduce their shape and structure, but also reflect their germination process in soil.
Literary illustration can be said to be a typical literary illustration, including title, tail, single-page illustration and inter-text illustration. Its manifestations are various: ink painting, line drawing, oil painting, sketch, print (woodcut, lithograph, copperplate, screen painting), gouache, watercolor, cartoon and so on. There are realistic and decorative ones. The first step of illustration creation lies in the understanding of the original. We should not only know the specific content and requirements, but also know the theme spirit of the original work. But also through in-depth reading of the original, it is clear whether the original is China literature or foreign literature. Is it classical literature or children's literature? Is it fiction, prose, poetry, or fairy tales, fables, jokes? Is the original style rough, bold, delicate and rigorous, or warm, lively, simple and deep? The historical era, characters, costume props, daily customs and architectural environment described in the original work. And deepen understanding through visual image data, because literature is the art of language, and art is the art of vision. Without the life experience described in literature, it is difficult to reflect the literary content on the screen. Only by consulting relevant materials, such as paintings, sculptures, architecture, handicrafts and cultural relics with similar nationalities and times, can we link all kinds of feelings, comprehensively study, find out the rules, and determine the tone of the work according to the requirements of the original work, which runs through all the pictures. In this way, the image in the book, the image in the materials and your own imagination can make your mind clear and express yourself profoundly, not conceptually. At the same time, it is also a method of personal accumulation and continuous improvement. With this step, you must refine the original work and find the plot content that can be sung. The original document is very long, and the illustrations are not based on comics. Only a few illustrations are arranged in a book. This requires us to grasp the theme of the plot content of a paragraph of text through an illustration, and show the most typical text content and the plot suitable for painting performance. This kind of illustration does not stop at reading the literary map, but should be recreated to make it have the appeal of artistic personality. At the same time, it should be thorough and meticulous, so that readers can enjoy art from it. I can feel the concrete image of life. Chen Laolian's Peeping Jane is a picture, and she chooses to hide at one end of the picture to read the letter. She was genuinely happy. The matchmaker peeked from the other end of the screen. Her fingers are on her lips, but they are light and agile, vividly showing the image of a smart and lively girl. The picture processing is extremely simple, and the boudoir environment is displayed with wonderful pictures. The flower-and-bird paintings on it, whether flying butterflies or whispering birds, all cleverly carry a good wish for camping. It illustrates this truth very vividly.
It is precisely because an illustration should show a lot of text content that some illustrations adopt the method of integrating different time and place into a painting; Realistic illustrations use montage techniques; Decorative illustrations are not limited by objective conditions such as perspective and proportion, but are more organized in the picture according to ideas. This method has been adopted by China traditional painting and folk painting.
Illustrations are rich in forms and can also be divided into two categories: realism and decoration. Illustrations from different countries have their own styles. Even literary works of the same country and the same category will show different angles, different contents and different picture forms because of their different artistic accomplishment and understanding of the original. As an illustrator, faced with books with different contents and different themes, we should study and think carefully and find a suitable expression, not the same. Huang Yongyu's illustration Ashima not only shows the master's joy and happiness, labor and heroism, difficulties and encounters, but also expresses the rhythm, artistic conception and style of the poem in a meticulous and ingenious way. The composition of the whole set of illustrations is full of rhythm, smooth lines, simple and elegant colors, changeable knife techniques and full of decorative flavor. However, the illustrations he made for Ye Shengtao's Selected Fairy Tales and Feng Xuefeng's Fables adopted different expressive techniques according to the different styles of the original works. In the illustrations of Ye Shengtao's Selected Fairy Tales, due to the painter's understanding of fairy tales and his familiarity with children's appreciation requirements, the exaggeration and imagination of art are fully exerted, and children's interest in novelty, intensity, naivety and personification is satisfied. Each animal image full of personification is clearly presented to young readers.
A book will have more than one illustration, so the relationship between illustrations is also a whole problem. As the title at the beginning of the article, the tail ornament at the end and the illustration in the middle of the text, we should properly handle the relationship with words and space. The whole set of illustrations should have an overall design arrangement when conceived. From the cover, ring lining, title page to the illustrations at the end, as well as decorative patterns, we should run through the theme of the book, achieve harmony and perfection in the "architecture" of book binding, and let readers fully enjoy the spirit during the tour.