Ideas for the binding for Brave New World.

I've had this post ready to be done since before Christmas and my procrastination has reached new levels!
I decided that as much as I was dreading it I had to bite the bullet and at least play with the few ideas I had for the cover of the Folio Brave New World submission. I grabbed my folder with my ideas in, my laptop and drawing tablet and opened a new Illustrator document.
I started off by looking at the outline ideas I did as I wanted something that was crisp and clean on the cover, fitting with the other Folio books. I created simple outlines of the little things I thought helped best fit the book. I chose roses, test tubes, tear drops and thunder bolts. I created crisp outlines of each and then grouped them together in a line.
By looking at my designs in a line I thought that it could be interesting if I created a repetitive wall paper style to the cover, something clear and eye catching that I could also use to capture the mood of the book with through the content and the colours I would use.
Opening up the template, I copied and pasted multiple rows onto the front cover of the line work. I shifted them all about so no too designs met. When I got a composition I was happy with I experimented with colours. I settled on a scab-like red for the main background colour as it looks like a slightly dead colour compared to bright red that is usually associated with passion. I thought that this worked well as love and emotions aren't a thing in BNW as everything is so controlled and everyone is basically brainwashed. After experimenting with other colours to be used on the line work, I felt a slightly off yellow would work well.
I came to this conclusion because sunlight and nature is one of the things that the young children were brainwashed and shocked against so I thought if I used a slightly 'dead' coloured yellow that's a bit muted and almost wilting it would help show the tone of the book through the line work.

I'm really happy with the mock up so far. I want to fully adjust it with all of the logos etc on it to see how it would look as a while finished piece.

I also have to admit that as much as I was dreading doing it as I felt clueless about it all, I'm really happy about it and really enjoyed doing it too - especially doing something digital as in very rarely do anything on a computer!