final project

• what did you attempt to emphasize in your visualization of the poem?
After reading Maya Angelou’s poem, “Phenomenal Woman” I felt a personal connection because I felt the deeper meaning of the poem was to be context with who you are. I am a very self-conscious person and reading this poem made me realize that you can be beautiful as you are as long as you are confident in yourself. I want to emphasize that fact that woman can be beautiful no matter what their size was.

• why did you chose the specific book structure —how does it relate to your interpretation/visualization of the poem?
I went with a typical handmade book because making the book look hand made symbolizes that you make whom you are. You choose your clothing hairstyle and size. You can make yourself who ever you want to be. I decided to go with a square rather than a rectangle because I wanted everything to be very balanced and visually appealing. Creating the book hand made was very complicated, however after much precision I think I came close to a book that could be sold.

• what processes did you use in creating the imagery and type for the book? for ex: made drawings, scanned them, worked them in PS, placed in ILL, did type in ILL, printed on the Phaser.
To create my images I first found images off the Internet of larger women who seemed to have someone happy expressions. I then used the magic lasso tool to crop the image off of the background and place them into a new Photoshop document. I then placed with different filters to create a playful look of the images. I create the background myself my rendering the clouds effect. I chose colors that correlated with the outfits of the women. I then put the images into illustrator to play with different fonts for the poem. I then took them to Staples to be printed on glossy paper.

• how did you construct the actual book? for ex: bought a binder and recovered it or made my own cover and hand bound it by sewing the binding, etc.
For the actual construction of the book I cut out each image don’t in Photoshop and Illustrator then pasted it on Bristol board. I cut the Bristol board out by hand and attempted to bend the edges to create a crease to be able to glue all the pages together. Although the book looks childish that was the way I was going in my ideas. There is not much that can be done when not having enough money to purchase the items I wanted, so I think the book came out well for the materials I had at hand. I decided to place a ribbon around the binding to give it an elegant look.

• list of typeface(s) used
Myriad pro
Lucida Handwriting Italic
Papyrus
Harrington