Saturday, January 28, 2006
Critique: Minor Drinking Feature (2.9.06)
Minor Drinking Feature Critique
This week I was in charge of the four page feature. It was tough coming up with new, creative ideas after last week’s contest. Many times while designing I had to stop myself from using the same techniques that I used last time, or that Andrea used for the feature. For instance, I kept wanting to make my lead photo bigger, but the bigger it became, the more it looked like last week’s design.
I ended up using one of the ideas I had sketched out earlier, using silhouetteses of liquor bottles to create a headline that really pulls the reader into the story. Originally I also made prison bars that mirrored the bottles, but that was taken out because 1. MIC offenders don't actually go to jail and 2. It made the spread look too busy.
The headline was originally behind a black background, but that made it compete with the photograph. We changed it Monday night to a lighter shade of blue to go with the lead photograph. Then tuesday afternoon we changed it again to just be the black line. Overall I was very happy with the headline art, and I think the color background just didn't fit with the tone of the story. I'm glad I took it out.
There were also photo issues this week. The lead photograph started out as a girl of-age being carded at a club. The ethical issue about the photo was that paring that image with the headline saying 'Minor drinking,' gives the impression that the girl is trying to pass for overage instead of actually being 21. We changed the photo order around, so the lead picture is now used bottles and cups of alcohol. I am still pleased with it. The colors are much more vibrant than the original photo, and the verticle line within the picture contrasts nicely with the horizontal layout. It also shows very bluntly what the article is about: drinking.
My second page was a little difficult to create because I knew there would be a 300-word sidebar, two pull quotes that played off each other, and two photographs. This seems like a lot, and it is, so it was very important to me that I fit everything on the page without making it seem busy or crowded. I think it worked very well. I'm proud of this feature, and happy it turned out well.
This week I was in charge of the four page feature. It was tough coming up with new, creative ideas after last week’s contest. Many times while designing I had to stop myself from using the same techniques that I used last time, or that Andrea used for the feature. For instance, I kept wanting to make my lead photo bigger, but the bigger it became, the more it looked like last week’s design.
I ended up using one of the ideas I had sketched out earlier, using silhouetteses of liquor bottles to create a headline that really pulls the reader into the story. Originally I also made prison bars that mirrored the bottles, but that was taken out because 1. MIC offenders don't actually go to jail and 2. It made the spread look too busy.
The headline was originally behind a black background, but that made it compete with the photograph. We changed it Monday night to a lighter shade of blue to go with the lead photograph. Then tuesday afternoon we changed it again to just be the black line. Overall I was very happy with the headline art, and I think the color background just didn't fit with the tone of the story. I'm glad I took it out.
There were also photo issues this week. The lead photograph started out as a girl of-age being carded at a club. The ethical issue about the photo was that paring that image with the headline saying 'Minor drinking,' gives the impression that the girl is trying to pass for overage instead of actually being 21. We changed the photo order around, so the lead picture is now used bottles and cups of alcohol. I am still pleased with it. The colors are much more vibrant than the original photo, and the verticle line within the picture contrasts nicely with the horizontal layout. It also shows very bluntly what the article is about: drinking.
My second page was a little difficult to create because I knew there would be a 300-word sidebar, two pull quotes that played off each other, and two photographs. This seems like a lot, and it is, so it was very important to me that I fit everything on the page without making it seem busy or crowded. I think it worked very well. I'm proud of this feature, and happy it turned out well.
Monday, January 23, 2006
Rants: Does JANE design well, or is it just the red type that attracts me...
You Can'’t Miss: JANE Magazine
This week I wanted to point out JANE magazine. I usually donÂ’t read it, but I was at the bookstore and the cover really popped out at me. It i’s cheap, like $1.99, and the cover has four black and white pictures of celebrities on it. Apparently it ’is their celebrity issue, where the celebrities write everything. When I skimmed through the magazine, I was actually impressed with some of the design. The features definitely have a different style, with large pull quotes dominating the page, as well as white text over both a light grey background, as well as a photo (the Alicia Key'’s interview, pg. 80)
Here's the first page of the that feature:
The rest of the magazine had that bad design on par for most teen or beauty magazines. I wanted to mention JANE this week only because it surprised me. I expected really bad design, and I saw a few things that made me think this magazine is actually trying to create good designs--and you have to give them a little credit just for trying.
AGIA Blog
My website is AIGA, the American Institute for Graphic Arts, journal. I was really impressed with the articles I found on it, but one that definitely stood out was a discussion about the font used to teach young children how to read. Here is the link.
What they've done is redesign the alphabet with the purpose of clarifying what each letter is. It talked about how children sometimes have a hard time distinguishing between the upper and lower case of a letter, for instance they recognize 'r'’ as a letter, but not 'R'’ because they look different. The alphabet-26 takes away those non-matching letters, so that each letter has one symbol associated with it. For instance, the study uses a lowercase a,e, g, I, m and n, while keeping the uppercase B, D, T, etc. I thought this was interesting because it seems so wrong, to mix up the cases, but if it teaches children to read, it has its uses.
This week I wanted to point out JANE magazine. I usually donÂ’t read it, but I was at the bookstore and the cover really popped out at me. It i’s cheap, like $1.99, and the cover has four black and white pictures of celebrities on it. Apparently it ’is their celebrity issue, where the celebrities write everything. When I skimmed through the magazine, I was actually impressed with some of the design. The features definitely have a different style, with large pull quotes dominating the page, as well as white text over both a light grey background, as well as a photo (the Alicia Key'’s interview, pg. 80)
Here's the first page of the that feature:
The rest of the magazine had that bad design on par for most teen or beauty magazines. I wanted to mention JANE this week only because it surprised me. I expected really bad design, and I saw a few things that made me think this magazine is actually trying to create good designs--and you have to give them a little credit just for trying.
AGIA Blog
My website is AIGA, the American Institute for Graphic Arts, journal. I was really impressed with the articles I found on it, but one that definitely stood out was a discussion about the font used to teach young children how to read. Here is the link.
What they've done is redesign the alphabet with the purpose of clarifying what each letter is. It talked about how children sometimes have a hard time distinguishing between the upper and lower case of a letter, for instance they recognize 'r'’ as a letter, but not 'R'’ because they look different. The alphabet-26 takes away those non-matching letters, so that each letter has one symbol associated with it. For instance, the study uses a lowercase a,e, g, I, m and n, while keeping the uppercase B, D, T, etc. I thought this was interesting because it seems so wrong, to mix up the cases, but if it teaches children to read, it has its uses.
Critique: That Crazy Casino (1.25.06)
For our first assignment, we had a week to create a cover and feature design for the next Vox issue. To sum up the experience, I was rusty. I was nervous about my design, that it wouldn't be good enough, and I really tried too hard, which led to last minute changes of both the cover and features.
Critique: Casino Cover
After looking at previous issues, I realized there had been a lot of illustrations, and I wanted to use a photo. I created a cover design with on the photographs supplied by the photographer with the Patrolman facing the camera. Because just placing the photo and a headline on the cover seemed a little drab, I altered the photograph to create a blurred, more abstract background that made the man pop. Unfortunately, the Missourian has a 100% no-alter policy on photographs. When I showed it to Debbie on Sunday, she suggested I made a new cover, so I did that in the next few hours.
First, I chose the blue and purple colors because after looking on the Isle of Capri website, both of those featured prominently in the layout of the casino. I got the idea for the blue wavy lines also from the pictures of the casino online, everywhere on the floor were neon wavy lights boarding the casino. I created the blue waves on the cover because I wanted to bring an air of familiarity to the design—if people had gone to the casino, they would recognize my illustration as being of that same place.
I wanted to create a picture of a poker table, with chips and someone holding cards, so I featured the five cards prominently in the front to make it seem like the reader were holding the cards. This also went with my Sell line—Ante Up—to entice the reader into the story. I used Glypha for my font mainly because of how the A looked, I wanted something that resembled playing cards, and Glypha was the closest I could find to a bold, wide font.
The whiteness of the cards really pops against the colors in the background, and I thought it was fairly well executed, even if it was completed in an afternoon. I suppose I’ll be doing that a lot this semester, so it’s good I prepare myself now for being able to make drastic changes under a deadline.
Looking back, it looks WAY too clip-arty. We had a discussion about making the cover content-driven, and in all honesty, this cover had nothing to do with the story, which was about a highway patrolman who works at the casino. Unfortunately at this point, i was caught up in the 'card' theme, and carried my redesign over to my feature...
Feature Critique
The feature I also redesigned on Sunday, this time because I was not comfortable turning in my original idea, which centered on the wavy lines I eventually used on my cover. I showed the two ideas to a few of the other students, and the majority agreed they liked my new design better. I’ll post both so you can decide. The reason I did choose my second design was because the first seemed a bit too cheesy or hokey. Also, there wasn’t a good flow between the first and second pages of the spreads. **note: what's really funny now is that I think the second one is WAY hokier than the original. I should have gone with my original instinct. **
My design also used the colors I found around the casino—Blue and Purple. They seemed a bit cheesy, but isn’t that what a casino is? I liked the way my text font (the light green) popped against the other colors. The main design on the first page was using the idea of cards, but abstracting that a little bit. By overlapping the boxes, it gives the page depth and also makes them stand out more than if I had just done symmetrical alternating boxes. I wanted something to anchor the bylines and subhead, and used the icons for playing cards to accomplish that, as well as adding to the idea that the boxes were some abstract form of playing cards. I didn’t want the color to overtake the page, and I didn’t want my text on a colored background, so I kept that area white.
I chose my lead photographs because I saw the story as an interplay between Kevin Hunter and the casino. The craps table was a good shot that really put the reader into the picture, but I felt it needed to be played big. Also, the Kevin Hunter picture has him looking at the craps picture, which helps tie both pictures to my headline ‘Eyes on the Isle.’
One tool I used to tie both pages together was creating poker chip icons to go between the columns of text. Because the second page was in black and white, it was a simple visual aid that definitely told the reader the story continued. I also placed colored boxes over the second page photograph, as well as the pull quote to tie both pages into the overall design. I wanted the pages to be consistent. I used the two photos on the second page because one shows Kevin Hunter at work, watching the slot machines, and the other gives a larger view of the scene around the casino. It has movement to it, and I think it gives a good idea of the actual scene in the casino: a man working in the background while people around him gamble.
Here is my original first page:
Critique: Casino Cover
After looking at previous issues, I realized there had been a lot of illustrations, and I wanted to use a photo. I created a cover design with on the photographs supplied by the photographer with the Patrolman facing the camera. Because just placing the photo and a headline on the cover seemed a little drab, I altered the photograph to create a blurred, more abstract background that made the man pop. Unfortunately, the Missourian has a 100% no-alter policy on photographs. When I showed it to Debbie on Sunday, she suggested I made a new cover, so I did that in the next few hours.
First, I chose the blue and purple colors because after looking on the Isle of Capri website, both of those featured prominently in the layout of the casino. I got the idea for the blue wavy lines also from the pictures of the casino online, everywhere on the floor were neon wavy lights boarding the casino. I created the blue waves on the cover because I wanted to bring an air of familiarity to the design—if people had gone to the casino, they would recognize my illustration as being of that same place.
I wanted to create a picture of a poker table, with chips and someone holding cards, so I featured the five cards prominently in the front to make it seem like the reader were holding the cards. This also went with my Sell line—Ante Up—to entice the reader into the story. I used Glypha for my font mainly because of how the A looked, I wanted something that resembled playing cards, and Glypha was the closest I could find to a bold, wide font.
The whiteness of the cards really pops against the colors in the background, and I thought it was fairly well executed, even if it was completed in an afternoon. I suppose I’ll be doing that a lot this semester, so it’s good I prepare myself now for being able to make drastic changes under a deadline.
Looking back, it looks WAY too clip-arty. We had a discussion about making the cover content-driven, and in all honesty, this cover had nothing to do with the story, which was about a highway patrolman who works at the casino. Unfortunately at this point, i was caught up in the 'card' theme, and carried my redesign over to my feature...
Feature Critique
The feature I also redesigned on Sunday, this time because I was not comfortable turning in my original idea, which centered on the wavy lines I eventually used on my cover. I showed the two ideas to a few of the other students, and the majority agreed they liked my new design better. I’ll post both so you can decide. The reason I did choose my second design was because the first seemed a bit too cheesy or hokey. Also, there wasn’t a good flow between the first and second pages of the spreads. **note: what's really funny now is that I think the second one is WAY hokier than the original. I should have gone with my original instinct. **
My design also used the colors I found around the casino—Blue and Purple. They seemed a bit cheesy, but isn’t that what a casino is? I liked the way my text font (the light green) popped against the other colors. The main design on the first page was using the idea of cards, but abstracting that a little bit. By overlapping the boxes, it gives the page depth and also makes them stand out more than if I had just done symmetrical alternating boxes. I wanted something to anchor the bylines and subhead, and used the icons for playing cards to accomplish that, as well as adding to the idea that the boxes were some abstract form of playing cards. I didn’t want the color to overtake the page, and I didn’t want my text on a colored background, so I kept that area white.
I chose my lead photographs because I saw the story as an interplay between Kevin Hunter and the casino. The craps table was a good shot that really put the reader into the picture, but I felt it needed to be played big. Also, the Kevin Hunter picture has him looking at the craps picture, which helps tie both pictures to my headline ‘Eyes on the Isle.’
One tool I used to tie both pages together was creating poker chip icons to go between the columns of text. Because the second page was in black and white, it was a simple visual aid that definitely told the reader the story continued. I also placed colored boxes over the second page photograph, as well as the pull quote to tie both pages into the overall design. I wanted the pages to be consistent. I used the two photos on the second page because one shows Kevin Hunter at work, watching the slot machines, and the other gives a larger view of the scene around the casino. It has movement to it, and I think it gives a good idea of the actual scene in the casino: a man working in the background while people around him gamble.
Here is my original first page:
