Responsive: In Cold Blood - Design Development

I wanted the cover design to be as simple as possible, but with a little bit of textures here and there to make the design more interesting. I did an experiment with watercolour, ink and masking tape to paint the title 'In Cold Blood'. I purposefully use the same tape all over again to smear the wet paint on the paper, and make some messy textures. It is a fun process and it is satisfying as I got an outcome that I am happy with. As for the prison bars, I use semi-dried brush and black ink. The look I am aiming for is similar to this Howard Jacobson cover design.

Here is what I came up with:

That design is not what I am working towards, it is just a test for the materials I am going to use for the real design. The smeared ink effect looks good with the dry brush texture, it gives the grungy feel to the design.

The method that I use to paint the house is painting over taped areas on a piece of paper paper. I found it challenging to deliberately make the messy textures look accidental, so I decided to make the design several times and use the parts that I like the most, and combine them together on Photoshop.

First attempt

Brainstorm of the composition for the book cover.

I did more ink smearing so that I can use it to add more textures to the existing designs that I have made. 

Some spray paint experiment that I tried in order to get the similar smeary texture like the one on top.

A mock up for the book cover to show the composition of the words and the illustration. 

Putting them together in Photoshop:

I still think the design is a bit empty at this stage, and the back cover was not thought through. 

The typewriter font works well because of the noise texture outlining the letters. However, when I applied the same font for both front and back cover the design looks dull, so I will consider using another font for the back cover.

The spine of the book was inspired by the penguin classic design with three stripes. I do think that the design for the spine should be kept minimal because there is not much space for elaborate details.

There are a lot of considerations, but right now I have become oversaturated by this book cover design project. I've decided that I will not finish it up until it is close to the deadline day.