Text numbers book

Today I am working on putting together one of my final outcomes books, the text numbers.

I have worked out the sequence of the numbers that i want, and have been tracing the numbers onto the pages...

A good few hours later and I've completed the numbers..

I'm pleased with the outcome, they look good a set. I had to be really careful to make sure the text fitted into the shape of the numbers, sometime its gone a little bit over the length of the number.. but i don't think this is really noticeable. Now i want to put in the bottom right hand corner the person's name & age. I think it will put their lucky number and quote in a bit more of a context, and show that these lucky numbers come from actual people! At the moment though I'm not sure what letraset to use, I've used uppercase Helvetica 5mm for the numbers, but the lowercase in the same type will be too big.. i want the names to be quite subtle in the corner and not detract from the numbers. I've got some Times New Roman in 3mm but I'm not sure about mixing the two types together. I'm going to wait and try and get hold of some Helvetica 3mm tomorrow and then the dilemma will hopefully be solved!

Final outcomes plan

I had a tutorial with Rob and we discussed my ideas for final outcomes. Because i was pleased with the lucky numbers photos book, and thought that the photos and the quotes about people's lucky numbers looked good together in sequence, we decided that it would make sense to create a series of books for my final outcome. I am going to make 3 books,
1 = Lucky numbers photos with cutout explanations.
This i have trialed already, but when i make the final one i need to think about not just sticking the photos onto the pages of the book, but having them printed onto the pages and also about the cutout explanation font/size etc. I'm going to use more photos in the final one as well, in the trial book there was only 4.
2 = A book just of the numbers made out of text, that I've practiced with number 6 'I've just always had a good feeling about it.' This is going to be on white paper, very clean and simple, using Letraset to write the text. I chose to make a book of these text numbers because this was the technique that i thought worked best in my experiments of combining the numbers & the explanations, because it was the most successful visually and also the process is one that can work for every number.
3 = Lucky routines. This one i still need to work out the format.. I think I'm going to have one page = one person, and have their lucky routine on that one page? Once i have completed one of the other books I can then concentrate on planning this one.

Screenprinting

Today i carried out a number of tests using screenprinting for displaying the lucky routines I collected from the members of the running club, here are a few examples...

First of all I just experimented with the formulas by themselves and then I started to overlap the text, which I like because it links with the whole idea that behind a good race is an individual's lucky routine.

Working with numbers & explanations

I decided to carry out some testing into what I could make using just the numbers & explanations and not the photos. I just used Becca's lucky 6 and her explanation - "I've just always had a good feeling about it." and trialed a few different ideas:

I used Letraset, cutouts and printouts to make these. I like the cut out one because it uses the shape of the number, but I think my favourite is the one of the three sixes, made from text. I like how the text becomes the number itself, combining the number & the personal explanation.

Adding explanations & photos together

I've been experimenting with ways of joining the photos of people with their lucky numbers/ charms and their explanations of why they are lucky to them. This is really important, because its the people's explanations that makes the project interesting. The explanations have got to blend in with the photos, i've got to really make sure it's known that they come as a pair.
I've been experimenting with ways in which I could do this,
I started with Becca's number 6, I stenciled the letters onto the photo and then cut them out. I like how the explanation is in the photo, but the problem is that the cutout looks really messy on the glossy paper. The shine on the paper gets scratched off when you cut it with a scalpel so it looks like the letters have been ripped out when you look up close.

I then experimented with Katryns lucky charm, simply using Letraset to add her explanations:

I like the simplicity of this, the Letraset fits in well with the photos because its quite soft, especially on the bottom photo of just the charm, the writing looks quite delicate.The problem I have with this now though, is that I think the photos look better when they are grouped together, espcially the numbers photos. The cutout explanation on Becca's photo look pretty random as just a single photo, I think the photos need to be seen in sequence all together so the concept makes more sense to the viewer. So because of this, I started to sample ideas for presenting the photos in sequence.
I first simply arranged the photos and then used Letraset to write the short explanation quotes underneath:

This works better, the photos make more sense in sequence and the captions underneath easily explain the concept when you see them all together.

Because I've been thinking a lot about sequence, I got onto the idea of books. I've really enjoyed working in book form previously on foundation, and I think this is the perfect way to display the set of photos. I worked out the layout for my book using one piece of A2 paper.

I want to have the captions on the page before the photo. I experimented with methods of presenting the captions through a worksheet, and I decided that cutouts would work best for this, because I again I want to captions to work with the photos, so by using cutouts on caption page, you'll be able to see through to the photo on the next. This is the book, (without a cover at the moment)

I'm pleased with the outcome of the book, the cutouts works well to combine the photos and the explanations, but there are some things i need to think about changing... such as the fact that the photos are just stuck onto the pages, it would look much better if they were printed onto the actual book pages. Also the cutouts aren't central to the page, so you can't really see much of the photo behind them. I've only used 4 photos as well, i really would want a lot more pages, at the moment it seems a bit brief and doesn't really make much of a point by just using 4 people.

Pick Me Up

Today I went to the graphic art fair, pick me up, that is going on at Somerset House. There was some really interesting work on display and for sale, and as I'm starting to create work and experiment with materials, it was a great time for me to get some inspiration! Also, Rob Ryan has moved his Studio into the fair, so you can see him and his team working and his paper cuts coming to life. I've been interested in his work for ages and it was amazing to see the paper cuts in their initial stages, and made me appreciate even more the painstaking work that goes into them.

Collecting more lucky charms info

I've got back some really interesting things from the questionnaire I sent to my friend's running club, here is one girl's response:

Do you have a certain routine that you stick to, the morning before a race?
e.g something you always eat, something you always do..
I always set my alarm for an even number, brush my teeth before breakfast instead of after and always always have two cups of tea.

Do you have a Lucky charm that you take with you to a race? Or something Lucky that you always wear?
I always wear my necklace my great grandma gave to me or wear a certain pair of socks that I trained well in during the week without washing them, a tad gross!

If so, why is that thing/object Lucky to you?
Ever since year five I have worn the necklace when competing or taking exams and now its routine to wear it when racing. I get superstitious and race badly if I don’t wear it.

Can you think of any times that it made you really lucky, or any times you didn’t do well because you didn’t have it with you?
Last year in the Kent champs I got through to the final and got two pb’s on one day and I thanked my necklace profusely :L I don’t know what Im going to do if the necklace breaks, it could be a potential disaster! When I wasn’t wearing the necklace for a x country race last season, I raced awfully because during the whole race I was thinking about not wearing my necklace and constantly worrying :/

On a different note, I got my friend Becca to bring in her lucky pants today..

When i've experimented with my lucky numbers book etc, I want to look at making similar things with the lucky charms photos I'm collecting, and then work on equations for luck.

Lottery

I didn't win last night, which is a bit of a shame. I bought two lines, I chose one myself, my lucky numbers and family members birthdays etc.. and then just had the second set as a lucky dip.

I actually got two numbers in each, showing that it doesn't matter how lucky your numbers are to you, when it comes to the lottery it really is complete chance. I just thought I should give it a go whilst i'm working on this project but I think I'm going to leave the whole lottery idea for a bit and concentrate on lucky charms & numbers because its sort of going off on a different tangent when I've already got lots of things I'm exploring within charms & numbers.