Mag+ iPad Design [RESPONSE]

 Mike Haney joined us via Skype at our weekly Vox staff meeting on Monday to show the staff how Mag+ uses Adobe InDesign to create magazine layouts for the iPad. Haney is the deputy director of research and development for Popular Science and who oversees iPad work for both Popular Science and other Bonnier titles. Essentially, Mag+ allows you to not only use what is designed directly in InDesign for your iPad app, but it also uses a technique called "pinning," which allows you to have your design automatically reorient itself based on the way the tablet is oriented, rather than having to design for both orientations. His demonstration took us through the entire process of designing the app, with even a preview in InDesign of what the final design will look like on the iPad.

Although the idea seems so foreign to me now, the idea of being able to design magazine spread for the iPad is fascinating to me, and something I could see myself eventually designing exclusively at a publication. Haney pointed out during his presentation that with these tablets, you are reading with your hands just as much as you are with your eyes, and designers are given the challenge to find ways to engage their readers on an entirely new level. The possibilities are truly endless with tablet design, and I'm realizing the degree to which this is true the more I take the time to explore them.

Magazine Publishing Prototype Project [CRITIQUE]

One of the bigger design projects from this week (although it's hard to choose, there are quite a few in the works this week) is a design for a magazine prototype for our project for a large magazine publishing corporation in which we present them with a concept for a brand new magazine. For this project, the designers are divided into groups to collaborate with the publishing capstone to create a magazine, an iPad app and any other elements or platforms for the magazine deemed necessary by the group.

The publishing group I am working with has come up with a concept for a magazine they call Shindig. This magazine is described by them as "for the entertainer in all of us." It's about believing that anyone, anywhere and with any budget can entertain. Shindig would represent that cool friend of yours who always throws the best parties – they know what to do, when to do it and how to do it so that you're time is spent enjoying the party, rather than stressing about any of those last-minute details. The magazine is an all-inclusive party planning guide that includes menus, gift ideas, product reviews and expert advice with inspiration on every page.

I wanted the magazine's design to reflect that "cool best friend" vibe, by creating a look that was chic and clever, but not too much so as to turn away readers that are hesitant to learning to entertain, etc. I look forward to seeing how my design evolves over the next several days before presenting it to the publishing team and faculty members involved in the project next week. As we began critiques on these magazine prototypes in class on Tuesday, I realize how much work I have ahead in narrowing down my overall design concept (and color palette) and deciding how to carry out my concept throughout the magazine.

Here are some of my beginning designs and color palette for the magazine prototype...

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!

[Response]: Can graphic design really be summarized into just three styles?

 Victor Ginsburg Muller of Print Magazine's Imprint blog dares to try and sum of graphic design into just three distinct styles. He calls them "Swiss-style," "Grunge" and "Book." Mullers says that design has come full circle back to the "Grunge" style. He also points out that lately we're missing a "personal and unique touch" as well as "the feeling of something genuine and true" in most of today's design. Here he shows us an example of a graphic designer – Lowe Steiner – who stays true to his style and maintains that personal touch.
 

He also shows how a web designer also achieves this...

See more from Mike Kus here.

I have to say after getting lost in Mike Kus' website for quite some time, I began to wander to other graphic designer portfolio sites and blogs to find that yes, there are many designers out their who seem to have lost the personal, homemade touch or creating work that is "sweetly naive" as Muller puts it. The designs however that did seem to achieve this (like the ones above), I truly found inspiring. Everything from the color usage, to the type treatment, to the quirky patterns and shapes make the design so much more genuine. I look forward to see how this valued aspect of graphic design will transfer to my future designs.

See the full Imprint blog post here.


[You Can't Miss]: A type-tastic gift for your designer friends (Ahem...)

Imprint shows us that typography can be even more fun that we realized! (Sorry, last post on something from the Imprint blog for awhile after this one, I just couldn't resist.) This flashcard game has you guess the font, gives you interesting information about the letters and even gives a general history of each font. See the Imprint blog entry here, and purchase the game here... your designer friends will thank you.

[You Can't Miss]: Speaking of type...

 "You look like the right type." This blog is great, I found it off of the design blog I'm closely following this semester, designers-who-blog.com. I've enjoyed exploring this blog for typographic inspiration, obviously, but also to learn how to add a little quirkiness to my designs. The typography and illustrations on this blog are perfect examples of the success of designing the way Muller describes above in his "Back to Grunge?" post on Imprint.

Spring is in Sight [CRITIQUE]

Spring Preview Cover/Feature Contest

Last week's Spring Preview contest posed an interesting challenge for me, but one that I found to really enjoy. Vox Magazine's annual Spring Preview issue poses somewhat of an organizational and creative challenge for designers. The issue calls for a theme without the stereotypical spring themes (i.e. umbrellas, rain boots, flowers, baby chicks and so on), but instead with a clever and refreshing non-spring theme. In addition to coming up with a clever theme to execute into a cover and splash page, the design must also be incorporated into several text-heavy "feature" spreads and have enough readability and functionality for this type of feature.

My theme for the issue was neon. Although, it's clear on the cover with the Vox logo, in the finished product, the neon is not as apparent on the rest of the pages. The photos of downtown Columbia business signs were meant to help push the theme. If my design had been chosen, my plan was to add the effect used on the Vox logo to much of the other neon-colored text on the splash page and feature spreads. (If my design had been chosen, I would have worked to find photographs that would fit the cover.) My biggest challenge ended up being the execution of the neon effect. Finding a tutorial for creating neon in Photoshop that I could easily transfer to InDesign was surprisingly tricky. In the end, I was happy with the type treatment I decided to use and the way I decided to organize and lay the text on the feature spread, however, I do think the design and its theme could have been pushed much further.

[RESPONSE] + [YOU CAN'T MISS THIS]

[[ RESPONSE ]]

Tuesday's discussion with our guests from the Meredith Corporation was full of interesting anecdotes and perspectives on the design decision-making process at Better Homes and Gardens, for example, and the discussions and debates that stem from these decisions.

My time in the Magazine Design course last semester taught me a number of things about editorial design, but what was truly the one of the most important lessons I took from that was the concept of content-driven design and being able to fight for your work. In doing so, each placement of text, photographs and visual elements needs a purpose. However, it wasn't until our discussion in Advanced Magazine Design on Tuesday where I realized how this transfers over into the real world. I had no idea the extent to which a design or concept would need to be fought for, until we were told this story:

Nancy Hopkins, senior deputy editor and food brand catalyst for Better Homes and Gardens had a particularly entertaining story on her debate with the big wigs of the magazine over the art direction and concept of a piece on homemade birthday cakes, which according to Hopkins is a recent trend. Hopkins struggled to win over the powers that be with her simplistic, chic take on a homemade birthday cake because they seemed to think that there wasn't anything interesting about the photograph of the birthday cakes on the cover. "Well, why is there only one candle?" The editors asked. "And where's the decoration?"  Hopkins explained to us that what they seemed to be missing what the concept of a homemade birthday cake, and the idea that the photographs of these homemade birthday cakes needed to be believable. Her answer to the one-candle question? She says that putting just one candle on the cake would allow the piece to resonate with the greater majority of their 40 million readers – yes, that's 40 million, and would avoid trying to suggest a particular age. She also mentioned that she wanted these homemade cakes to lack any elaborate, overdone decoration because that just wouldn't be realistic for what most homemade birthday cakes would look like.

So in the end, Hopkins' perseverance proved to be successful, and the in the February 2011 issue appeared a beautiful piece on homemade birthday cakes. The design and photographs were chic and best of all, realistic. (Photo or screenshot of the BHG birthday cake feature to come, I just am having trouble locating it at the moment.)


[[ YOU CAN'T MISS THIS ]]

Wine on the Web

Despite my experience in the area, I am constantly looking for new and innovative Web page designs (I have a pretty extensive list of them bookmarked), so it seemed only fitting to include one in a "You can't miss this" post. This one actually comes from the blog I'll be carefully following this semester, designers-who-blog.com. This one – a website called Good Grape – was posted by one of the designers as an admirable, inspirational Web page designs. This one in particular had a unique way of organizing the links at the bottom of the homepage. I thought this site's design was full of all kinds of clever details that fit the contents of the website. See what you think!


"The Great Amazon-ing of Starbucks"

Imprint, one of my favorite design blogs (from Print Magazine) is full of all kinds of beautiful, creative and inspirational design work in all mediums. Now I know most of us have already heard of Starbucks and their new logo coming out later this year to mark 40 years and "a new chapter" for the company, but I enjoyed this interesting take on the re-design and its real purpose. It explains how this "new chapter" is really going to be about expanding their brand even further, beyond the coffee.

See the article here.

First Glance [CRITIQUE]

Here I have my first assignment for Advanced Magazine Design. The challenge: create a cover and five-page feature design for a photo essay based on the story of a former NASCAR racer and his daughter Elle, 2, taking on the baby beauty pageant world. I'll begin with the cover and take you through my design concept and choices, and of course, a personal critique and assessment on the finished product.











After initially being struck by Ronnie's intriguing background and his transformation into the ultimate stage dad, I couldn't help but be drawn to the photographer's beautiful portrayal of Ellie in the photograph I have on the cover. The pageant world's tendency to portray their contestants as elegant, sophisticated women is what drove my design decisions. My overall design was meant to portray Ellie as one of those elegant, sophisticated women regardless of her (very) young age. I thought the photographs combined with my fonts and other simple graphic elements helped emphasize this.

Regardless of my content-driven design, I see now where I seemed to miss the mark. I think it was clearly my fondness for these photographs of Ellie that caused me to veer off track from the story's true focus: this father, leaving his life on the racetracks to help build his daughter's confidence and self-esteem by becoming the ultimate pageant dad.

Although this first design wasn't on point, it was a great opportunity for me to understand the importance of having the right content drive the design.


To finding a toddler in a tiara not so terrifying,

Tova