extended process case study
hobby project

This is one of my favorite projects to have worked on due to the freedom provided by the book’s subject matter: the experimental and strange genre of noise music. Before we begin, I must explain why I thought such a book was necessary in the first place. There already exist writings on noise music by people more qualified to discuss the subject than me (people with actual music degrees), but all of them already assume some level of familiarity with the subject. Most people are not aware of the history of the Futurist movement of the early 20th century, and it is assumed by these works that the reader understands that importance of Merzbow to the worldwide and Japanese music underground, and they assume that the reader will understand the motivations behind musicians who work in the genre. Most people are not familiar with what noise music is, and they will most certainly not be aware of the genre’s subtleties. What I wanted to do was help people gain a general, surface level understanding of the material so that they might continue to engage with the subject through more detailed books or on their own.

When I set out to create this book, I wasn’t sure of how I was going to approach it. I set a few basic goals to keep in mind as I worked on the project: keep the book accessible and use it as a delivery vehicle for the book’s content. Because of the subject matter, it was easy to steer in a direction that obfuscated the text of the book, but I wanted it to act as a legitimate introduction to noise music. However, I also wanted to use the opportunity to do some more extreme visuals as well. I knew from the outset that it was going to be important to strike a balance between these two things. I also wanted to keep it cheap and simple to produce so that it would be more easily distributed, were it ever to enter such a situation. For this reason, I knew before I even started researching the book’s content that I was going to use the “perfect bind” method to bind the book, as it relatively cheap while still serving my goals and budget appropriately.

I started my process by researching noise music, which I already had some familiarity with, and this required a great deal of exploration and music listening. My research process was a little different than my normal approach because of how abstract music really is. I did research things using the internet and read some books on the topic to more deeply familiarize myself with it, but I also took time to listen to noise music in a focused manner. My “notes” for this were not only my general thoughts on the albums I was listening to, but also some intuitive sketching so that I could attempt to capture the “visual mood” of what I was hearing for future reference. I knew that I wanted to begin the book with more accessible explorations of the genre, so I started making a list that indexed the book from beginning to end. After creating this list, I asked peers about their interest (or lack thereof) in the subject matter and found they wanted less accessibility and more of the “weird stuff” so I made some changes to my list and then began the writing process. All the content in the book was written and reviewed by me.

Sketch examples of A, D, and I

The original concept of the book was “the ABCs of noise music,” so when it came time to create the visuals, I started off creating 10-20 sketches of each letter of the alphabet as well as ampersand. I then analyzed the sketches and found the ones had ideas that I could develop further. Once I found some core ideas for each letter I moved on to another round of sketching before creating more “true-to-size” representations of the letterforms on gridded sketch vellum; this was so I could size each letter be at a point size of 216 (3 inches). Once I was happy with the vellum comps, I scanned them and recreated them digitally in Adobe Illustrator. My work on the letterforms was digital from this point onwards.

Digital comps of C and D

To get a better idea of how I was developing the letters, let’s follow the process that created the letter I, which was for Sonic Youth. This is located near the beginning of the book because of their general accessibility. I sketched some ideas related to their different albums. Some of my sketches were darker and aiming towards “creepy,” referencing to one of their first albums: Bad Moon Rising. However, the sketch I was most drawn to was instead a direct reference to their most successful album, Daydream Nation, which has an album cover that is just an image of a candle paired with some typography. I didn’t want to completely replicate the candle on the album cover. Not only would that be a little boring, it wouldn’t be very original either. After developing my first digital comp I liked the idea that had formed but needed to redraw it for more clarity.

Letter I Digital Iteration Progression

The second digital iteration thinned out the candle and streamlined the “wax lines” I had drawn on the original to make them more organic and less like sound waves, which was fitting but not intentional. I also redrew the flame to make it more realistic and “peaceful” instead than the first version’s heavily abstracted and cartoony flame. When it came time to create the graphic that would be paired with the letterform, I placed circles over each other in order to create an abstract background for the candle to rest over. This felt incomplete, so I added circles around it that appeared to “pulsing” in order to give the image some "movement" that guides the viewer’s eyes around the page.

Letter I Final Spread

I adjusted the contrast, width, and stress of the letterforms when applicable and added purely decorative elements when it was appropriate. The overall style of each letterform is vastly different as they are each modeled around the album or artist they represent. These visual representations were based on my visual notes. This adds a level of intrigue and visual appeal to the book because each spread has a stylistically different graphic. I counteracted this decision by limiting my color palette to 95% gray and a light red so that the book would still have some form of visual consistency. I chose red because it is a color that is associated with many types of passion, which fits the subject matter well due to the strong alienating emotions that so many of the artists I was writing about put into their music, more so than in most other genres. Once I had completed the letterforms, I moved on to developing a layout for the book.

Printed layout grid

One of my several type specification sheets

Physical layout Sketch

I created a flexible modular grid for each spread and then printed it so that I could sketch over top of it. I played with various different positions and sizes for both the letterforms as well as the type, slowly developing the layout. Once I had a general set of ideas that I liked I started creating digital prototypes of them. At this time, I also developed a set of type spec sheets to help me find strong font combinations that I could use. I received some feedback from peers once I developed these prototype spreads and then adjusted them before re-printing them and seeking more feedback. I eventually found that the most successful ideas I had developed were spreads that incorporated unique graphics around the letterforms

Digital layout iteration for Letter A

I decided to create one of these expressive graphics for each letterform, which was quite a bit of additional work. There was little sketching done for these graphics, instead I chose to create multiple digital versions in order to work with my heavily distorted typography settings more easily. It was hard to represent the “noisy type” on paper. At this point, I refined some of the letters to fit the page graphic that I had developed for them. This wasn’t always necessary, but it helped some of the letters feel a lot more natural and cohesive on their pages. The letter A (at the start of the book) is an example of a letter being modified to fit its graphic. On its page, I extended the legs of the letter A to the edge of the page so that they appear to be flowing off it. Once the spreads were complete, I created a simple table of contents and a book cover and then got to work producing the book. I printed the pages and then cut the “inner” edge, applied PVA glue and book binding cloth, and applied the cover print to the bound spreads.

Letter A graphic test print

Looking back on the project after its completion I was relatively happy with it. However, I disliked the final outcomes of some of the letterforms (M, N, Z, R, U, Y, &). As a result, I later returned to the project and reworked those characters and some of their page graphics. I learned a lot during the project about lettering, typography, and book binding. The lettering aspect of the project helped me get a better grasp on the intricacies of type and how I should go about utilizing hand lettering in my future projects. The reception of the project has been good; the unique subject matter of the book really draws in people’s attention and gives them numerous varied parts of the genre to explore, ranging from noise rock to harsh noise. The graphics have helped keep readers engaged with the book, at least during my observations.

— Justice / justicedsn@gmail.com