My initial plan was to make backgrounds of repeated images that would have a hazy, hallucinogenic quality - of playing cards, tea cups and other recognisable Alice imagery, probably screen-printed. With this in mind, I drew these tea cups and saucers.

Image Research

To try to inspire me, I looked at a few different illustrators with a painterly/drawing lo-fi style and also had at look at some collage too. These have made me aware of the importance of not over-using colours. They employ the naive charm of drawing that I want to retain from the Anorak brief.

Alice in Wonderland

After the 30th October Anorak deadline, I began work on the Alice in Wonderland Puffin Brief. I was very anxious not to examine other Alice in Wonderland illustrations too closely as i was already well aware of the familiar imagery surrounding it. I wanted to move away from the familiar scenes that each illustrator has canvassed over and over. For example: Alice falling down the rabbit hole, the Mad Hatters tea party, Alice with the Caterpillar, Alice playing croquet with the Queen.. I decided instead to focus on the themes surrounding Alice in Wonderland, like her constant change of size as a metaphor for growing up and the madness of the wonderland which is a creation of her imagination and something she accepts quite readily. At first however, i was a little stuck, and decided first to try visualising the character of Alice. I didn't like them at all, but here they are.

Evaluation

I'm really pleased with the outcome of the Anorak brief. I think it worked coherently as an image and communicated the sentiment of the magazine well. It also had the child-like element i was trying to create. The only drawback was the 'happy mag for kids' sign which I don't think was in keeping with the style of the rest of the image, nor do I think it was big enough. I had chosen the size of it originally as I didn't want to crowd the image, but the reality was that it became part of the background. Had I have had the time, I think I would have experimented with a wooden-like sign like the Anorak one, which in all likelihood, would have worked much better.

Final Anorak Cover

This is the Final Cover Design that i sent into Anorak

Almost there..

The problem I then had was that my first image (the tree house with bike and all the other objects) was actually the one that worked best visually. It has a lot of elements to it, but doesn't look crowded, whereas the last version I posted does. My plan was to send three parts in - the cover without the cutout parts, the cutout parts as they would hopefully appear inside the magazine ready to be used, and the two put together, as shown below. My gut feeling however, was that that was just too much, and if the simpler image worked, even if it meant going back on my plan, then that’s the image I should go with. Above are the images that didn't make the cut!

The final thing I needed to do was the 'the happy mag for kids' part. I decided to have it as a sign hanging from the tree, like it was there to welcome friends to the tree house. I did wonder whether the sign could be a blank wood one that could be written by the reader and get stuck on with the rest of the cut-out parts, but then I decided that it had be part of the base, as its the whole message of the magazine!