Front Cover Ideas

Coming up with a title and front cover proved really challenging for me as I couldn't see a clear idea emerging from the theme of shared living. I needed the book to be eye-catching and interesting enough to appeal to my audience while communicating such a mundane theme as shared living. The book contents itself are really urban and follow the conventions of a zine, therefore I wanted the book cover to also look like a zine.

I began searching student housing agency published magazines/books as a starting point and source of research to then apply to my own cover in a way that fits in with the contents of the book and the aesthetic I've developed. I chose this Unipol one as I live in a Unipol house and therefore am continuing the idea of relating back to my own experiences with shared living as my living room was my starting point.

I began experimenting with the title "fifty-fifty" as it's catchy and well known, and connotes the idea of halves however I don't want to stick with it as it connotes the idea of two people only, and splitting things rather than sharing them.
The beige background was to represent the recycled, beige paper I was planning on using for a cover.

I used an image of housing I took to imitate the illustrated housing Unipol used, and then applied a layer effect that changed its hue to a trendy darker green that works well with the beige background as it's all earth tones. The use of a layer effect rather than me having control over the colour relates to the idea of the lack of control i have over the book and others over a shared space. I then overlaid my bitmapped house key to imitate the arrows through the idea of its angles imitating the pointing however this makes the book more appealing to a student audience as it's a house key that many students would be familiar with, and also has a fun keychain representing a cartoon character that's quite known. The contrast of this cartoon character with the buildings also brings a sense of humour however doesn't stand out enough.

I then further developed this idea by changing the layer effect of the image to "Saturation" which created a pale orange and blue colour scheme which was unusual/unconventional with the beige background but works as the beige is neutral, and the blue and orange compliment each other without creating too much contrast as they're all pale colours. I then added my other keychains - the devil keychain adding more humour and appeal to the  cover as cartoon devils are a common trend in fashion and print among students, and unipol logo creating the direct link to housing.

Overall I'm not completely convinced on either styles and not happy with the title either. I think the cover should be something more useful and unconventional in its production rather than design.