rfth

1. Production Reflection
Benjamin Wincup

2. Process
So, to start my project I began with making a
book cover. It felt a bit boring on it’s own so I
decided to make three more of a similar style.
This first one I made was rather easy. I made the
image 6 inches wide by 9 inches tall. The
background image is from a website for 4x4 trips
in Africa. I added a hue/saturation mask and
colourised it. The settings were Hue: 15,
Saturation: 29 and Lightness: -49. I copied a rusty
sword that I got from Google images onto a new
layer, added an arrange and white outer glow
and centred it. I wrote the title, subtitle and
author’s name in a font I had downloaded from
the internet. After that, I was done with the
image. I later added a publisher logo to stick to
the conventions of a book cover. I made the
publisher logo by taking a mythical animal and
making a silhouette of it by using a clipping
mask. I then added a red dot behind it. I chose a
jackalope because publisher logos are often
animals e.g. Puffin. I made a book cover because
my main product is supposed to be a book/audio
book. I think that this cover and the others came
out pretty well as they look like real book covers.
I did most of this because I thought it looked good and would appeal to my audience. The publisher logo that I
added was done so because it sticks to the conventions of a book cover. The location of my title, author and main
picture was all based on my research which showed that specific layout.

3. Process
My next step of production was to make a
hardback sleeve based on the original book
cover I made. I did this straight after the idea
just came into my head from seeing a
hardback sleeve on Google Images. I made
the image 1920 x 864 pixels. I first figured out
the dimensions of a hardback cover by
measuring my original cover, adding a spine
and halving the length of the cover to make
the inside tabs. I made a rectangle of a dark
brown/orange. I chose this colour because it
is already on the book cover and it
compliments the lighter colour I had chosen
for the tabs. In this rectangle, I put an “About
the Author” section which stick to the
conventions of a book cover. I added a picture
of ‘Jregory Krisk’ (Jeff Goldblum) just above
the section.
I decided to make a hardback sleeve after finding an image on Google images. The flow came once I made the
measurements. I did it all because once again, I thought it might look appealing to my audience and it made sense
as books come out in both hardback and paper.

4. Process
After I had started my hardback
sleeve, I decided that I would have an
“Also Available” section, so I had to
make some more book covers. I
thought that a series of books would
look good and I set off on making a
shield of ice. The first thing I did was
make the book 6 x 9 inches again and
then I found a shield from Google
Images. I selected the wooden parts,
duplicated them onto a new layer and
then created a clipping mask of ice on
it. I did this so that it looked like the
shield was made of ice and metal. I
chose this type of shield as it looks
like a viking’s shield which links back
to my book’s main character.

5. Process
What I discovered
whilst making my third
book was that I could
copy layers into a
different project. This
really helped when
making the book titles
as I could just copy the
author and the title
onto another project.

6. Process
I struggled thinking of a weapon to use on this
book as I couldn’t find a spear that I liked. All
of my books are linked with elements so
when I came to the last book, I had to link it
to the air. I was originally going to use a bow,
but again I couldn’t find one I liked. I finally
came to the decision of a rusty harpoon head
and say it was some kind of claw spear. The
next struggle was thinking of a name. I went
through various ideas, but I finally settled on
The Cumulus Claw after consulting my friends
who are also part of my target audience. I
used the same processes on this book as I did
with the others. I took an image, cut out the
weapon in it, added a glow and then put it
over the background. The font I have used is
called Vinland and I downloaded it from
dafont.com.

7. Process
At this point in production, I was mostly done with
my book stuff, so I decided to add a publisher logo.
The inspiration was from Puffin books, which has a
puffin as it’s logo/mascot. I decided to go with a
jackalope, a mythical rabbit with antlers, and so I
took an image from google, created a clipping mask
of black and put it on the rabbit layer. I downloaded
another font, which I have forgotten the name of,
and a red circle in the background using the elliptical
marquee tool. After that, I decided to make a
clothing logo with the same mascot. The first idea
was to have the jackalope and the red circle with the
word in the middle, but that didn’t look quite right
to me so I decided to do some experimenting. I don’t
remember how I got there, but I had the picture in
black on the background and then the picture again,
in white using a clipping mask, with text in black over
the white layer. Each letter is in a different layer and I
made it fit into the shape by using the free transform
tool. I’m pretty happy with how this turned out as I
can see myself wearing something like that.

8. Process
After making my logo, I realised that I was
making an audiobook which needed a cover.
What I did was make a square image of 709 x
709 pixels. I took my book cover, cropped it
into a square and resized it so it fit. I then
looked at some audiobook covers and realised
that a few of them have a strip across the top
with the publisher and usually “Unabridged”.
What I did was I made a red strip and put my
jackalope logo on, downloaded the font again
and wrote “Jackalope Audio” and
“Unabridged” in black and then underlined it.
This was probably the easiest step of my
production as I had all the resources already.
My main reason for doing this was that my
actual audio was supposed to be an
audiobook. I’m very happy with how it turned
out. My main inspiration for the making
process was the cover for Jurassic Park by
Michael Crichton and read by Scott Brick

9. Process
Once again, I have used the
background image for my book on
another project as I like the
consistency of it all. I took my
hardback cover, copied the front and
the spine, and put it in a clipping mask
on a 3D book I downloaded from
Google Images I also free transformed
the front cover so it looked 3d itself. I
copied the book and pasted it onto
the hued background. After that, I
added an orange outer glow effect so
it was like the sword on the cover.
Swiftly after, the title and four reviews
came. The reviews were hard to think
of because I had to make them up,
but I had some fun with making the
names.

10. Process
I began making my audio by writing a script on
Microsoft Word. This was easy as I enjoy creative
writing. The next step was to record it. I used a
TASCAM Dr-05 to do so. The recording was done in
my own bedroom to assure quiet when doing so. I
recorded 4 takes of the reading and 2 takes of the
opening. Opening Adobe Audition, I selected multi-
track and put the take that I liked onto the top
space. I cut it up so that I could move each section
around for pacing, although I didn’t need to in the
end. I had downloaded a bunch of royalty free stings
to use at the start and end. I cut one in at the start
and lowered the volume by selecting the yellow bar
and dragging it down. I also downloaded some
ambient wind and monster sounds which I put in at
the same time as the talking. At the end, I put in
another sting and lowered the volume a bit more. I
clicked on the volume bar to create a point that I can
drag around for a fade in and out effect. I’m not too
sure what the point is called. I originally had the final
sting after the speaking ended, but I decided to have
it during so that It faded in. I did this because I felt
like my product should be a more technical piece.

11. Process
The final step of my production
was to put the audiobook cover
and the audio together. To do this,
I used Adobe Premier Pro. I
dragged the cover into the V1 slot
and it wouldn’t fit in the box so I
ended up using the safe margins
to centre my picture and crop it. I
dragged out the video aspect so it
was the same length as my audio.
For my audio, all I had to do was
drag it into the A1 slot. I did all of
this because I felt it would be
easier to export as an mp4 and
that it would look better. I was
happy with how it came out so I
exported it as an mp4 and
finished my project.