OUGD603 - Photography Book - Initial Ideas

A lot of Akshay's photography consists of night shots, photographing subjects such as street scenes, petrol stations, supermarkets, as well as experimenting with long exposures. In the production of a photography book of his work, it was considered that it would be interesting to make this more specific in its themes to convey the nature of Akshay's photography, utilising layout to create a narrative throughout the book. Some very initial ideas included:

- Explore the aesthetics and nature of petrol stations at night - these are often dark, empty and isolated, especially those on motorways for instance. Use this to inform the layout - isolated images, a good use of negative space, do not overcrowd or bunch too many images together.

- Use the aesthetics of petrol station signs to inform a part of the book's design - tall and long - inside first page could include foreword/information about the photographer/credit lines in a columned structure like a petrol station sign - format of the book itself could be long to match these aesthetics.

- Format of the book could be longer in width than height in order to work more effectively with the size and format of images, as well as the context mostly being petrol stations in conveying their typical nature in size.

- Use rubber tyre material as the front cover in order to reflect the nature and content of the book, as well as adding an element of user experience to the book.