I'm glad I chose to add my character separately to the background of my design, as it makes her stand out so much more but without being really obviously stuck over the top. To avoid that I tried to integrate her with the scenery, like having her hide behind the tree and poke out of the bushes. I think this element helped me visualise her as part of the piece rather than a slapped on add on. While I wanted her to be prominent on every page, I feel that having her in the foreground of every page would have taken away from the gradual story of how nature changes whilst staying the same that I wanted to tell with the background. This piece to me is all about the relationship between youth and nature, even though it can never last and are ultimately opposites, as youth fades and nature perseveres through centuries. Having her hide behind certain things and not always be totally visible helped me blend the two contrasting elements more successfully I feel.
For my cover, which I'll add separately after printing, I decided to name the character and the story "Echo", to mirror how she echoes through the book, and to homage the Blake poem I blogged about that inspired a lot of my development through this project, "The Echoing Green".
Overall I'm very happy with my final design as I feel like it says everything that I set out to express with my story without being too overcrowded or feeling crammed.
I'm so very tired. I've really enjoyed experimenting with this book though and I feel like Ive got some interesting outcomes. In the future I think I have to be more experimental and not be as precious about designs as I can always do more and develop them and make them better. With this piece I was trying to keep all the colours in designated areas, but maybe in future briefs I should try to control that aspect less and allow myself to explore more new ideas and methods.
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