Flatland Dimensions

In Flatland by Edwin A. Abbott, chronicles the journey of A. Square through many dimensions. On his journey, he visits and dreams of many different dimensions. While he lives in a two dimensional world, he imagines dimensions ranging from zero all the way to four. The wide range of dimensions he visits presents an interesting dilemma for a book cover designer. How does one portray multiple dimensions, while focusing on a central one, all on the same cover? These central ideas were what I chose to focus the design of the book cover on.
The most important part of the design process is where one brainstorms ideas and whittles them down to a final idea or set of ideas. To begin the design process for a book cover for Flatland, I created a list of concepts or ideas I wanted represented in the cover. I wanted to capture the overall idea and plot of the book. I decided that the central focus of the cover should be on Flatland itself as this

To do so, I had to achieve a balance between the map and the shapes. The first idea I had pertaining to this problem was to make one of the designs colored while making one black and white to create an instant and striking difference. However, I chose to keep the design black and white as this is how Flatland is described throughout most of the novel with the exception being the color revolution. Additionally, by keeping with the black and white, the emphasis is placed on the content rather than the color of the cover. To achieve a maximum contrast between the two central designs, I created the map in the background using a lighter gray and the figures were created using a darker color and a thicker stroke. This helped to layer the two designs and prevent them from conflicting with each other by making the map appear as if it was slightly