To this purpose, the students began conducting surveys and interviews to gather information not only from German companies and associations, but also from international organizations and, above all, in the students' respective home countries. The project ended with the production of the book "Global Impact of Covid-19 Pandemic on Print and Media Industries".

The students took everything into their own hands to produce the 500 copies, not only the survey and interviews, but also the data preparation, typesetting, printing and, above all, the complex manual finishing and book binding.

The project was financially supported by MVK-Versicherung (formerly Medien-Versicherung a.G. Karlsruhe), which will distribute the books to its customers as giveaways. The book will be presented at trade shows as soon as the Corona situation permits, probably next at the Frankfurt Book Fair in October 2021, but the book is also available online at https://pmt.hdm-stuttgart.de/covid-19s-effect-on-the-print-and-media-industries/.

Book highlights

In addition to the top-burning content, the student team had set itself the goal of taking a particularly sustainable approach to production by experimenting with materials advertised as especially environmentally friendly.

Environmentally friendly Finnish wood cardboard was used for the front cover of the book. The inside part of the book is divided into three sections, For the "interviews" section, Stora Enso's Lumisilk graphic standard paper, which bears the EU Ecolabel, was used. In the second part of the book, Vivus grass paper was used, which contains 40% grass material. The pages have a green, grass-like hue and were printed in two colours, black and the special colour HKS33. The third section with the readymade "articles" provided to us was printed on the so-called "Rockpaper". This Rockpaper consists of 80% calcium carbonate (quasi chalk) and 20% polyethylene. Rockpaper's advertising promises that no trees were felled for its production! In addition, according to the manufacturer, no water or harmful chemicals are used in the production process. This paper is said to be fully recyclable, oil and water resistant, tear resistant, flame retardant, anti-static and food safe! Flint Group vegetable oil-based inks were used to print the book

Design

A consistent design element is the use of the spot colour HKS33, which gives a high contrast, especially on the grass paper. The interview section with the black and white images is intended as a design element to emphasize the sombreness of the COVID-19 theme, and as a special feature, "invisible" ink was used that can only be seen under UV light. This ink was applied to a world map, where the size of the "invisible" viruses roughly correlates to the frequency of Corona case numbers.

Each book is equipped with a keychain UV lamp with the HdM and MVK logos to make the viruses visible. Instructions for use of the UV light are printed on the bookmarks to which the keychain UV lamps are attached The use of three different paper substrates offers different experiences both visually and haptically-sensory.