Looking Back [CRITIQUE]

Looking Back [CRITIQUE]

It's been a week of brainstorming and researching as I prepare for a number of design undertakings up ahead, including a cover competition and feature design for Columbia's True/False Film Festival issue of Vox, a design prototype for the semester-long Meredith Corporation publishing project (much more on this soon!) and finally, a logo design competition among the other advanced design students to create the Sports Journalism Institute's very own logo. So as the ideas begin brewing for each of these looming, and somewhat daunting, design ventures, I thought it would be a good opportunity to look at some of my past design work from the previous semester – specifically my final project for the Magazine Design course – to not only critique, but also to find areas in my work that could have been expanded on and pushed even further. My personal design style has certainly taken shape over the past year especially, but I think it's good to look at how that style can be expanded upon, particularly as I begin such a diverse group of design projects in the next several weeks.

Here I have my final design from last semester's Magazine Design course. The project was to create a magazine protoype for a Midwest magazine, complete with cover, table of contents, department page and feature stories. Below is the cover, table of contents and department page from my magazine prototype I called "Brink," meaning "verge" or "on the edge." I decided to apply this term to a magazine that would provide readers with the most fresh, cutting-edge information for the city of Chicago, a city on the brink. (Disclaimer: I didn't purchase the photograph on the cover from Getty images, so yes, the image is unfortunately stretched and very pixelated, but you get the idea.)

Brink magazine prototype: cover

Brink magazine prototype: table of contents

Brink magazine prototype: department page (story text was provided)

Although there are specifics that I could critique about these designs, I can't help but look at how much of my own personal design style shows through in these. I think I had the most fun designing my department page – I truly love the challenge of finding ways to organize a diverse set of stories and try to find ways to unify them on a single spread. Although the font and color choices were chosen to reflect the content and audience of this magazine, all of them are also ones that I'm very often drawn to and find myself using often. Varying font styles and making sure that they are truly content-driven is something I would like to continue to do in future designs. Although I think the geometric graphic elements and shapes I've used on these designs seem to work well here and work to unify the magazine's design style, I notice that I tend to use similar shapes and design elements in my other work. I think I would like to see more illustration in my future designs, and I would like to see new shapes and design elements in my upcoming work. Finally, looking back at these designs reminds me of how much agonizing went on to make these as neat, clean and as structured as possible. I realize now that I could have further succeed with these designs by further pushing my creativity in the area of text layout and overall organization of the spread content. I find myself often seeking ways to to organize the material logically, but I would like to see myself take that desire to be structured and sensical, and find creative ways to organize the information and content.

Well I think now it's time to trudge on and look to my many upcoming design endeavors, but I'd love to hear advice from any of you on ways to further push my future designs. I enjoy seeing each of our own personal design style and finding those elements and styles that are common in our work.


Thanks for taking a look back with me!

Tova


Looking Back: Part Deux [RESPONSE]

Harper's Bazaar, August 1940 – Alexey Brodovitch, art director

Now, it's time to look back at the work of some of the magazine industry's revolutionary art directors and how their design focus is still prominent in the work of today's magazine art direction.

William Owens' Modern Magazine Design allows us to look specifically at the work of Alexey Brodovitch (1898-1971), the notable art director of Harper's Bazaar, and how he came to become the most influential editorial designer of his time. During his time at Harper's Bazaar, Brodovitch can be attributed to many design elements and techniques of modern magazine design. Owens calls Brodovitch an "undogmatic and instinctive rather than rational designer" who strived to modernize his designs and to always "make it new." Owens points out Brodovitch's use of typography and fashion photography in particular. He explains that Brodovtich's typography was about "precision and lyricism," and his layouts were full of vibrancy, drama and movement. The fashion photography was impressionistic, where Owen says "the model carried as much weight as the clothing she wore."

Harper's Bazaar, March 1954 – Alexey Brodovitch, art director

Brodovitch's revolutionary design style has seemed to seamlessly transfer to the work of today's art direction at Harper's Bazaar. Here is a look at the award-winning cover with Demi Moore. As you look through the fashion photography in these designs, it's clear that the magazine still achieve the same level of demure and drama as Brodovitch did. The focus in this design is just as it was for Brodovitch: to allow the model to carry as much weight as the extravagant fashion – and in this case, be able to stand up against an 18-foot-tall giraffe as a co-cover model.













YOU CAN'T MISS: Elegant, organized blog design

From following the Designers Who Blog site regularly, I've found a number of magazine designers' blogs and portfolio sites to use as inspiration. Recently, I found a design blog called Uppercase. The screen shot doesn't do this site justice because the blog is beautifully done. Blog and web-page design has intrigued me for some time and I've constantly been bookmarking some of my favorites hoping that I might some day be able to create a blog or web-page design of my own that could possibly measure up to them. I think in this particular blog I was attracted by its layout organization combined with its elegant design. It's nice to see a blog that has been organized and designed with such care.


YOU CAN'T MISS: SPD's student design contest

I've fallen behind on my Google Reader lately, so in efforts to get caught up again with some of my favorite design blogs and tutorial sites, I stumbled upon an announcement from SPD (Society of Publication Designers) about this year's student design contest held in March. Winners of the contest receive an internship, prizes and are featured on the organization's blog and SPD Annual. The contest is divided into five categories: Entertainment, City/Regional, How-To, Business Trend and Green.

You can find out more about the contest and how to enter here. Entries are due March 7!