Journey Project

This Journal is my Piece for the "journey project" I drew from the Churches around the city centre in Leicester.

I wanted it to feel to the viewer as if they were looking through an old explorer’s journal and to make each page different and interesting which makes the viewer feel as if they were apart of the journey.

I tried to keep the sketches reasonably loose which some of the detail left out just hinting at what’s there to keep that sketchbook looking appearance. I also used short annotations to work with the pictures and to emphasise a journey by documentation and capturing elements that one make take from being there at observation.

I aged the pages using coffee granules and water in a spray bottle, spraying the pages then wiping them with a cloth or using a hairdryer to manipulate how it would stain.

I used various old things such as photographs, postcards, cigarette cards and money etc. within the pages; while they are not all around the exact same time period I feel they all flow and give the book a more authentic aesthetic and a vibe towards it.

I aged the leather covers using sandpaper and a craft knife and grounded in charcoal into the crevices that were left by the process. In the critique for this project I was given good feed back by my peers with a few thinking I actually used an old book.

I felt as if everyone enjoyed looking through the book and it spurred me on to continue with the book and not change the scale in which I was working or my methods. The only criticism I felt that I received was a photocopy of a photo of my Granddad that I had forgot to “age” and thus clashed with the page. I took note of this and made sure this was not to happen again.

I enjoyed this project and enjoyed making a false history for the book giving it a little life of its own. If I could improve this project I would probably use more different types of media and experimentation but still making the book flow and not look too disconnected by doing so.