Illustrating An Idea Meets the iPad

This is the final documentation of the iPad mock up - ebook of our Illustrating an Idea.  I tried to lay out the pages as you'd come across them if you were actually on the iPad.

Search for book titles on Amazon.

Click on "The Pit and the Pendulum" cover to purchase.

Click on "Silence: a Fable" cover to purchase.

Click on "The Tell-Tale Heart" cover to purchase.

All purchases are located on "my bookshelf".

Click on a cover to open the book.

The book opens to the chapter index and first chapter.

Continue to the next page and see the other two chapters.

*exit out to the bookshelf and click on the "Silence: a Fable" cover*

 "Silence: a Fable" book cover.

  "Silence: a Fable" chapter index and first chapter.

  "Silence: a Fable" last two chapters.

*exit out to the bookshelf and click on the "The Tell-Tale Heart" cover*

  "The Tell-Tale Heart" book cover.

   "The Tell-Tale Heart" chapter index and first chapter.

  "The Tell-Tale Heart" last two chapters.

Illustrating An Idea: The iPad Layouts

Illustrating An Idea: Book Cover Final

Below are my final book covers for the Illustrating An Idea project.  The first part of the process was to create three theme image compositions for three different stories.  The second part was to create a cover for each story based off of the theme compositions and the story in general.  I struggled a lot in the beginning with designing the theme compositions but I feel that it really came together when I designed the covers.  It seemed as if the story came alive with the covers, creating the emotions that I wanted to associate with the stories.  I feel that the emotions associated with Edgar Allan Poe and each story are just as important as the plot itself.  One of the main style elements that is repeated in Poe's work is a dark, eerie, and off settling feeling.  His work is normally read more often near Halloween, so I definitely wanted to keep that within my covers.  I also wanted to keep the themes evident through the use of an image, object, or color scheme from the three themes.

From the first and only class critique on my book covers, the response was fairly positive.  I had two solid designs, that needed no work.  "The Tell-Tale Heart" cover was the only cover that still needed work done post critique.  The main changes that needed to happen was editing the layout of the title and author.

"The Pit and the Pendulum"

themes: suffering/depression, fear/unknown, torture

"Silence: a Fable"

themes: control, insecurity, solitude

"The Tell-Tale Heart"

themes: guilt, time/change, identity

Illustrating An Idea: Book Cover Almost Finals

At this part of the assignment we were to create a book cover for each story we read.  I wanted to pull ideas, colors, layout and images straight from my final 3 theme layouts from each story.  The only requirement was the title and author's name.  Below are the title of the short story follow by my initial sketch, an after that is the variations that I did of each cover.

The Pit and the Pendulum

quick cover sketch

The difference between these two variations is the color.

Silence: a Fable

quick cover sketch

The difference between these two variations are the cropping of the image.

The Tell-Tale Heart

quick cover sketch

The main difference between these three variations were the placement of the title and author.

Illustrating An Idea: The Final 9

The object of this project was to "Communicate/illustrate, through symbolism and metaphor, the key themes of three short stories." My chosen author was Edgar Allen Poe, and my three stories were: "Silence: A Fable," "Pit and the Pendulum," and "The Tell Tale Heart." Below are my final images for each theme as well as the sketch idea, underneath each set of images will be the story name and the theme that it is demonstrating.


With this project, I definitely feel like I grew from the initial sketches to the final pieces.  It was difficult because I didn't have any idea where to start initially, but when I eventually pushed out some sketches and went and took some photographs, my wheels started to spin and I reworked my sketches.  I'm fairly happy with how they ended up turning out; they're definitely better than I thought they would end up.

"Silence: A Fable" | Control

"Silence: A Fable" | Insecurity

"Silence: A Fable" | Solitude

"The Pit and the Pendulum" | Suffering/Depression

 "The Pit and the Pendulum" | Fear/Unknown

 "The Pit and the Pendulum" | Torture

"The Tell Tale Heart" | Guilt

"The Tell Tale Heart" | Time/Change

"The Tell Tale Heart" | Identity