End of the Semester funk

I've been feeling horrible for most of the past 2 days. I skipped only one class though and managed to make it through yesterday's without being seriously unhappy. Then something like two hours of work in the Publishing IT room.

Time is running out (we have only two weeks left!) and we have a lot of group projects to hand in. Yesterday, I went to work early and finished putting in the pictures for our Design group's InDesign project. The assignment was to design a fashion book and my group picked Ethical Fashion. I was skeptical about our work at first but it's really come together. I did the page layout and inserted the pics. It's more work than it sounds really. However, there are two girls in my group (we're 4) who have very dominant personalities and basically they've taken over most of the work. They're not really teamworkers. Trouble is, we have to write a little about what we each did... It's not that I wasn't willing to do my share it's just that one of them stole most of my share. At least stuff gets done. There are groups out there who are way behind whereas we're practically done. It still is the most unpleasant of our projects (well, not counting marketing, haven't even started that yet!) but it's crazy how far we've come! It actually looks professional! Not very experienced maybe but definitely pro.

I can design a book!

In editorial class, we have to come up with a book proposal as if we were editors in some established UK company. We picked Random House because we wanted to do a book by Jacqueline Wilson. Easy you say. Not so much :) We picked something somewhat risky and interesting but that could pay big. A sex ed book for 9-11 year-olds. This is more like group work in that we each have a task we're expected to complete. Some work harder than others because they're more interested and it's coming a little bit slower than design but at least I don't dread every meeting (and it has nothing to do with my boyfriend being in the group). I have to do the costings. How many books should we print? How much of an advance do we offer the author? What percentage of royalties? How profitable is it likely to be? etc. Basically, is it worth the expense of using an author as expensive as Jacqueline Wilson?

It's very interesting but fairly labor intensive. I've been trying to get into the Nielsen BookScan online database but my name and password aren't working. A lot of people have been having trouble with the thing but it's got almost everything you could ask for, money wise anyway.

I also spent yesterday pm after class helping boyfriend out with photoshopping the cover art he made for the project. He doesn't know photoshop and I'd been using it for years. I'm no great digital artist but I can fiddle ok and they are looking better than okay if I may say so myself! He was geeking out on his covers :D More points for me, I hope.