Penguin Book Cover Ideas

I have now begun to sketch and brain storm ideas for the book 'Noughts and Crosses' for my penguin book cover competition entry. Sketching ideas before working digitally helps as I have a clearer idea of the themes that I can begin experimenting with instead of going straight in.

When brainstorming ideas, I considered the typical design decisions which have been made for the previous book covers for Noughts and Crosses. Typical designs involve a colour palette of red, black and white, the X and the O are always present somewhere, the covers tend to have quite a minimalistic dull aesthetic and everything is usually displayed in a straight line. These are design decisions that I will try to stay away from, in order for my book cover to be unique and different.

Some ideas that I have sketched that could be played on when designing my book cover;

• The idea of skin colour throughout the cover; use nudes, browns and pinks as previous covers only use black and white
• Be very experimental with layout! play around with scale using the X and the O. Could attempt a very abstract approach using these shapes.
• Layering through the use of colour; plays on the idea of race
• In the book Callum talks about how he has only had orange juice once at Sephys house; his family aren't privileged enough for even the smallest things like orange juice, his family only have milk and water. This could be imagery to play around with...interpret the X and O into illustrations of orange juice and milk somehow??
• As the previous covers are very minimal and digital, use collage as the main technique to create contrast; a handmade aesthetic to the cover would work well. Collage of people of different race and colours? facial features etc