Design is in

Cover: Wet Apples, White Blood

Cover: One of the books from Space Opera Series

Cover: UK version of Sea of Poppies

What makes one pick up a book and even think of reading it? Apart from the format, the cover of the book plays an important role in attracting attention. If one were to buy a shirt, one can try it before buying. When we are buying a book, the cover has to speak to the eyes. 

David Drummond's body of work is what I think of, when I am talking of book covers. The cover of the Naomi Guttman's 'Wet Apples, White Blood' book should explain why I am fond of his work. I have set of five criteria to judge any work done by a graphic designer — instant likability, message, relevance, character and potential. This is one book cover that gets a yes for all five. The cover is matt laminated with a spot UV varnish on the descending drop of milk. Fascinating.

If one had to apply the set of five criteria, I think of designer Sanda Zahirovic's Space Opera Series, which is art directed by Luci Stericker. Sanda designed these series of book covers in reaction to the Student D&AD brief, for which she won a pencil. She knew that she could create a relationship between the high tech content of the books and the low tech materials used for them. The end result is both simple and striking.

I am quite kicked about UK version of the Sea of Poppies. You should check out Faceout Books, which is a decent collection of contemporary book designs. The best part of the collection is that designers are speaking about their work and that may give design students insights on book design.

A lot of you have been asking where do we find links to write about. This post was triggered off from a search in google that directed me to How Magazine site. Then in that list, I got all excited seeing this link that records the top ten sites that all designers should visit. In there, I met David and Sanda. And many faces I uncovered.

Have a great week, all of you.
By Sanjay Basavaraju

Fixing Braille printing plates

Languages are one of the oldest forms of abstraction, and ‘design’. Culture, society, and the available tools have designed every language collectively. Languages have developed and changed over hundreds, or thousands of years. One unique language, developed around 200 years ago, for a very specific need, is Braille. 

Braille was developed by Louis Braille, in the 1820s, in Paris. He had turned blind at 3, and developed a unique system while teaching at the blind school in Paris. Braille developed a code using one or more raised dots in a cell three dots high, and two dots wide. He was also an accomplished musician, and developed an application of his system for musical notation. In 1916 schools for the blind in the USA officially adopted Braille. In the 1960s, Braille seemed to be declining in popularity, as many people saw it as ‘old-fashioned’. However, children who had been trained in Braille, had much better chances of getting employment later on. The 1990s saw a revivial of Braille, partly due to computer devices and software, which enabled many blind people to read and write. 

The design of Braille is such that it appears big. Braille shortens many word and letter combinations by a system of rules called ‘grades’. One page of printed material will give 2-3 pages of Braille. Braille uses a lot of white space around letters. For this reason, the size of Braille paper is large, 11 x 11.5 inches, a standard paragraph indent is only two pages, and lines are not left between paragraphs. Braille requires unique rules of typography. 

There are no photocopy machines for Braille, but there are Braille embossers, ruggedly built to punch thousands of dots accurately in sheets of paper. Braille is embossed on both sides of paper simultaneously, aligned so that both sides are readable. 

When printing Braille documents, the challenge lies in representing illustrations, maps and images, which need tactile representation. Sight absorbs images as a whole, but touch acquires information in pieces. Most drawings and graphs have to carefully re-design for fingertips. The main principle is simplicity; all unnecessary details must be eliminated. Consistency is crucial, the appropriate symbols to represent rivers, boundaries, graph curves etc, must follow consistent guidelines. 

In India, the National Association for the Blind produces and prints books in English and the state languages. In India, Braille has been adapted for the numerous local languages. Indian languages are essentially phonetic in nature, which further enables Braille to be used as a script for writing text in different Indian languages. India has made a recommendation to UNESCO to consider a standard universal system for Braille, based on a phonetic representation of sounds using the six-dot system. Read more on standard English Braille. 

Producing Braille materials is essential, as having information when you want, at your choice of speed, and in a format you can write in, makes anyone feel more at home in the world. 

By Armeen Kapadia

Published with Lulu

Publishing a book is no more a legacy, these days. Independent publishing is focusing on fresh content from budding writers. The focus is on low quantity and try to take content directly to the readers. Lulu has gone one step ahead. It has changed the way we publish books.

Lulu is a prime example of the open-source revolution. Its founder and CEO, Bob Young, who also co-founded Red Hat (NYSE: RHT) in 1993, the open-source software company that gives hardware and software vendors a standard platform on which to certify their technology. Bob is a true technology entrepreneur and open-source visionary with four successful multi-million dollar start up companies on his resume.

Lulu believes that every writer should publish their book for free with them holding the complete intellectual property rights. Lulu attracts 2 million site visits every month. What is interesting is the Lulu’s approach.

Excerpts from Lulu.com:
Lulu eliminates traditional barriers to publishing and enables authors to sell their work directly to their particular audience — no jumping through hoops to find a publisher who is likely to reject their work. Using Lulu’s simple publishing tools, they format and upload their digital content. Then they can take advantage of Lulu’s global marketplace, social networking and author services, free customized storefronts and retail listings on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and much more. Lulu’s lucrative 80/20-revenue split empowers authors to profit from their work.

Lulu can be explained in just two simple steps: Publish and Sell. Lulu provides templates for various sizes. It also provides templates for covers. It also offers choice on the kind of bookbinding. The author has the right to set the price of his or her book. The books are even promoted. The books published via Lulu seem authentic and professional because the writer can even register an ISBN number. Lulu is benefited from distribution channels such as Amazon and social networking tools such as Facebook.

Lulu is to books like iTunes is to music. Hopefully more talent will rise out of such a system. It has radically changed the way we publish, sell and buy books. There is a tremendous potential for retail bookshops to do bulk shopping of books via Lulu and sell them locally.

Recently, Lulu launched a poetry site too. If one wants to publish a book and let the work do the talking, Lulu is the right space to do it.

By Sanjay Basavaraju

The newspaper industry has not evolved in terms of design for decades now. Although established newspapers have taken a leap in designing online content, print versions seem dated. A designer from Warsaw, Poland, Jacek Utko, has changed the way we interact with the newspaper. His philosophy of treating the frontpage as a poster, which seems like an ordinary idea, has yielded extraordinary results. Warsaw is considered the mecca of the poster revolution. Poster culture still survives in Poland. Many consider the medium of poster as either dead or declining in Europe.

Utko focused on changing the whole product, rather than just changing the look of the newspaper. He worked on the strategy, content and design. This process is nothing new, but he has explained it in the context of newspaper design, which could be useful to us.

As soon we consider the frontpage as a poster, it provides a space for us to communicate a message effectively. When stacked on stands, it behaves like a poster. As soon as we pick it and start flipping, it becomes a newspaper. Justifying his approach, Utko says, "Front page is a poster, an intimate artistic statement. Personal interpretation of reality; my channel to talk to readers."

He was recently featured in Ted talks. You can watch it here.

Biography
Jacek Utko studied architecture but has inclination towards interior design, set design and  graphic design. He joined Puls Biznesu (run by Bonnier Business Press group) as an Art Director. Currently he is a Design Director of Bonnier Business Press group located in Warsaw, Poland. His covers for Puls Biznesu were named 'Cover of the Year' in Poland three years in a row. Two of the papers he redesigned, Poland’s Puls Biznesu (in 2004) and Estonia’s Aripaev (in 2007), were named “World’s Best Designed Newspaper” by Society for News Design, in the largest international design competition.

By Sanjay Basavaraju