Visual literacy
Initial ideas
I started the process by thinking about the different ways I could present the findings from the creative report. I tried to take into consideration the different formats that are of relevance to those being interviewed so that the publication would be more interesting.
Podcast - I thought it would be interesting to try to podcast some of the findings from the interview as this is a format that the creatives often use. I would have to create a script that I could read out in an interesting and engaging way. Podcasts are known more to be based on a conversation between 1 or more people, so as the feedback is written this idea could be developed to be a moving video that could potentially be spoken over a moving animation style video presenting the findings. This would be relevant to me as I am looking at the power of motion for my dissertation in Level 6.
Blog post - As the creative report is based on creative blogging alongside Graphic Design and how it can enhance someones practice, a blog post seemed to be an appropriate format to publish the findings on. Without an established blog of my own this would not effectively reach a large number of people so I decided against this idea but thought that design wise this could feed into the presentation of the final publication.
Newspaper - This would be an interesting format to present the findings in because it is a well known format for things such as interviews. The layout would take on that of a newspaper, bold headings, columned text and images. As the creative report needs to be around 500 words, this isn't long enough for a full newspaper, maybe only one article.
Zine - This is a good format for easily presenting information about a specific thing as it is easy to print and can be distributed to a large number of people. In terms of design style I could either design it to suit my own personal branding, or respond to the content of the zine. I think it would be effect to combine both of them and create something that it obviously crated by me, but also suggestive of the kind of content that will be included.
Development
I started by experimenting with a very large heading on each left hand side page, the use of a quote and then a paragraph of text from each of the interviewees. This worked well, but in terms of user engagement it was decided that rewriting the responses for each of the sections into one flowing paragraph and then including quotes and references to the designers would work better as a final publication on this topic.
The full colour background was experimented with as a way of incorporating hjrdesigns personal branding very obviously, but this seemed to be a little overpowering when images were then added on the pages as well. The sizing of the title was another element that needed to be considered as it needs to stand out because it gave an overview of exactly what was being discussed in the section, but consistency throughout the whole zine needed to be established. Consistency is important but with it being this bold it became to predictable and boring as there was not much room for experimenting with the placement of the different pieces of text.
To overcome this design problem the background of the zine was left white and the colours were used for the text. The typeface Avenir was used for it all originally as this is the one used for hjrdesigns branding.
The development process then lead to the idea of designing it to appear like a blog post, which would be contextually relevant. Taking inspiration from Medium as this is the blogging platform that I use and the creatives also recommended I found a typeface similar to that used for the heading. The zine was then designed to be landscape but long-edge bound so that the width and length of a blogging platform was taken into consideration.
A similar typeface was found using Adobe Typekit:
Titles: Mr Eaves XL Serif Nar OT 35pt
Quotes: Mr Eaves XL Serif Nar OT 30pt
Body: Avenir Light 12pt
The design started by taking on the same format to ensure consistency, but once a visual style had been developed throughout it became more interesting to be a little experimental with the placement of the all of the elements on each of the pages. It is important to ensure that consistency is achieved but variation makes it more interesting to rad and for the reader to engage with. The central area for text worked well to ensure that all text took on the same visual appearance no matter what point on the page it was placed. The placement of the elements was based on the composition and harmony between everything else, ensuring that there was even spacing between it all to avid a top heavy or bottom heavy layout.
The profiles section of the zine is at the beginning but as it has a completely different type of text that is needing to be displayed it was hard to find a way to present it consistently with the rest of the design. The title was kept to the top and then each of the descriptions of the creatives were presented in the same font used throughout and then to the same width. Keeping it all central very simply presented a quick overview of those who are in the interviews whilst also sticking with the same design style.
Initially the zine was designed so that each section had one colour, but once all elements had been placed colour experiments lead to the decision that the mixture of colours on a page made it look less 'washed out' and the different elements stood out against each other and complimented each other.
The final pages are minimal and have a lot of white space, based in the design of the Medium blog website. The white space is in replacement of adverts but it could act as a good space for those reading the guide to jot down some of their thoughts and responses to what is being said on the page. This proactive engagement just once again references the content and how it is then the act of being proactive that sets you apart from others and will ensure that you go far in the Graphic Design industry.
Production
The software used to design this zine was Adobe Indesign because it allowed for the layout to be accurately set up ready to print. The 2 up-saddle stitch meant that the pages needed to be paginated to groups of 4 so that the double sided printing would work and the pages would fall into the right place.
The plan was to print this down in the digital printing room, but unfortunately there was no availability for a lot anytime close to the deadline. This means that I had to print it myself in the printers in uni. A zine is a publication that is meant to be printed on a standard stock to ensure that costs are low and distribution can be high. I had some trouble setting up the printer to print the booklet exactly how I needed it to be so that it could be bound.
As I was having to print it myself I did a couple of test runs so that I could get all of the setting correct. Initially I printed it out in the booklet format but without it being double sided and then I printed it short-edge binding which was not what I needed. Once I had printed out a copy I the main check that I undertook was ensuring that the images that went across the spine aligned correctly. It all was ok so I could then print the final thing.
The final zine size is just below A5 once folded which works well in terms of user engagement.
The binding method chosen is pamphlet stitch because it will add a personal touch, representing the advice within. I think this will look better than stapling and the thread can match one of the colours within the zine. This will allow for the zine to be opened flat which is important because a lot of elements are printed across the spine.
(To understand the ISSUU upload correctly tilt the screen)
