Farmer Bob's Counting Farm will be a 9"x7" hardcover children's book. The book teaches children how to count using various farm animals.

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I decided to choose a farm theme for my children's counting book. I have a love for all animals, but as a vegetarian, I find that farm animals have a soft spot in my heart. Additionally, I feel that a farm theme is simple for younger children to understand. I also chose the title, Farmer Bob's Counting Farm because it is simple.

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I have created my entire design in Photoshop so far, but I plan on working with Illustrator as well. I first searched "farm scene clip art" for inspiration for the cover. I enjoyed the common theme of the rolling green hills with a blue sky and red barn. So, I incorporated it into my design. I used the brush tool to create the sky, hills, and and dirt path.

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Then, I searched "farmer clip art", "barn clip art", and "farm animal clip art" for the other aspects of the cover. I found images that I liked and incorporated them into my design, sizing them differently to make sure they matched the perspective of the foreground and background. 

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For the title, I searched for children's book fonts and found "Who Tells Your Story", "Bubblegum", and "Asparagus Sprouts". I liked the look of "Asparagus Sprouts" best and used it for the title, using white and the text color. I then duplicated the text layer and darkened the color of the second layer and placed it behind the first one, creating a shadow/3D effect. This created my first draft of the final cover, seen in the third image.

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After sharing my design with the class, I decided to change and add some things. First, I added the sun in the corner with the smiley face so the sky was not so empty. Then, I realized that the title might be difficult to read from far away and changed the coloring. I also darkened the blue of the sky so the title would "pop" more. Additionally, I moved some of the objects away from the edges (the title, the barn, and the sheep) in order to avoid them being cut off in printing and binding. 

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In the next few weeks, I will be designing more pages of the book with varied numbers of farm animals and text to go with them. 

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RESEARCH

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