critique

For the opening assignment about breast cancer, I knew I wanted to do an illustration on the cover because I felt the content lent itself well to illustration. The side profile illustration of a woman I drew in Illustrator didn't work so well because it didn't reflect the content of the story. The woman in the illustration also had breasts, which I was concerned about since the lady had lost both breasts. Though I liked the simplicity of the design, I decided to go come up with something else that said something about what I thought were the three main angles to the story-breast cancer, humor and the play.
Here's what the first design looked like.


I went back to illustrator and thought about visual signs and symbols that would represent the story-a performance by a lady who had had breast cancer but had used humor to keep her spirits up. I thought the illustration I arrived at served that purpose. Looking at it now, there are several things I would have changed. The woman on the cover looked pretty young and age was something I wasn't thinking about when I was designing. If you didn't know this, when working in Illustrator, a good way to come up with "illustraty" looking things is by tracing or drawing using the pen tool, click on the lines and then go to the Brushes palette to change the look of the lines. I don't know if this tool is available in Indesign or Photoshop but let me know if you do.






The spread I knew would be text-heavy, so I focused on making it not seem so intimidating. The "admit ones" in the corner are just to add some visual interest to the page. It works especially on the last page where there is no art.