Researching Penguin

Before I start to design a cover for the penguin design competition I am looking into previous winners of the competition. I noticed from this that the designs are more minimal with the use of hidden meaning. The Clockwork orange winner uses the language in the book that you do not understand unless you have read the book itself. Similar with Oranges are not the only fruit where In the book it has a large theme of christianity which the main character goes against. Looking at this has made me want to create a cover that links to a part of the story rather than going with the obvious. I also need to include the penguin logo etc.

I then began to look into covers that have already been created for the book. A common theme of the covers is including a tree, scout, and a mockingbird. This is something I want to stay clear of as I want my cover to focus on a different part of the book to be different from the others. I do want to keep the cover text simple and only have the name and author similar to the other covers.

Looking into the judges I wanted to know a bit about there designs and what they might find more visually appealing. 

Suzanne Dean

Suzanne Dean has created her own cover for To Kill a Mockingbird for the 50th anniversary, It is minimal but elegant and includes the mockingbird. It is in a more traditional style with easy to read type. However looking at some of her other cover designs they are all very different. She uses a mix of illustration and some photography. Some looks hand rendered and some digitally edited. This is good as she has a broad taste in design.

Richard Ogle

Looking at some of Richard Ogles book designs he mixes photography with illustration to make fun and bright covers. Reading an interview Richard was in he stated  'as a designer, the main thing we can offer is our interpretation of a book, so I think it’s very important to read the books to be able to distill your own vision rather than simply taking briefs at face value and supplying exactly what is asked for or expected.'
This is good as I have read the book which can give me an insight into other areas of the book I could show rather than just the mockingbird.

To Kill a Mockingbird

Genre- Southern Gothic, Coming-of-age story, Bildungsroman

Published in 1960