Meredith

Glad we got to de-brief a bit after the Meredith "design fair" as you might call it. I'm really happy with the fact that we had a chance to show the editors what our original designs had looked like, especially since some of us (don't know who that would be) weren't as pleased with how our designs turned out in the final product. I do wish we could have had a little more time and a little bit more of a "critique." I would have loved to know their thoughts on how my designs could have been improved.

Overall, I'm glad we had the opportunity to be a part of this project, though I wish there would have been more guidance as to how we were ultimately going to be interacting with the editing teams. There's a first time for everything though, so I'm sure the next group of Mag Publishers and Advanced Designers will have a better idea of making this process work on both ends.

You Can't Miss: Voiceprints and New York Mag Covers

Cool post on designverb.com about "Voiceprints." It's an experiement by a man named Pierre Proske. He records a persons voice and then translates it into a design. How cool is that? I think this is a great example of how influencial our senses can and should be on design.



New York Magazine's cover archive is worth taking a peek at. You can find a cover gallery of issues since the beginning of the year on their website at www.nymag.com. I think some of the covers are a bit blah, but they do some interesting things in terms of photo illustrations. It's worth taking a look!

Critique: 5/3 Screen

Oh screen. There were a few mishaps on this one...mainly the fact that it was designed in a day...but I think it works. I like how the channel surfing illustration turned out, though I wish i could have made it look a little bit edgier. I feel like a lot of my illustrations end up looking very cartoon-ish. I think I need to be more experimental with my brushes and color choices.

Critique: the NEW website

Here's a preview of my updated website. I decided I wanted it to have a little more punch and spunk. I changed up the colors to make it a little more fun. My apologies...I haven't yet gotten it onto my bengal...but should be good to go for all to take a look at on Thursday.

Let me know what you think in the meantime!

Response: More Trends

It was great hearing the rest of the trends presentations this past week. Something I found comforting was the fact that we were all able to find designers who are diverse and represent incredibly different aspects of the design world. Sometimes I get anxious about graduating and trying to find a job in what seems like such a niche career field of magazine designing. What we've been trained for at MU can take us in a number of directions...not necessarily to New York to design for Martha Stewart (which hey, wouldn't be too bad). I think it's just so important to be flexible in the skills we've learned. There are designers all over, doing some really cool and different work. Hearing about the designers from cool magazines I've never even heard of, like Paste and Relevant, to designers who own their own firms, to more big name designers. There are hundreds of areas out there to become designers.

You Can't Miss: Crazy Cool Chair Set

From the fabulous designverb.com - I think these chairs are so cool! They are The Obelisk Chairs by designer Janus et Cie. And you can purchase them for only $9,000! What a steal. Ha. I think its a great example of when designers can create something both art and functional. For yet more cool items, check out http://www.janusetcie.com/.

You Can't Miss: Scrabble Pillows

I love these pillows! Hooray for something fun and inventive this week on designverb. I love interior design, and I think these pillows are so unique and unexpected. I love the way some designers can take such ordinary objects and look at them in a different light!

Critique: 4.19 Screen

Glad this one's over with...this was the bane of my existence this weekend. I had to work with an infographic and the info was so scattered and random that it made creating a cohesive graphic horribly difficult. I'm content with what I ended up with. If I had more time, I would have gone back and tweaked the film reel...I think it could look a lot cooler and not so cartoony.

I'm pretty happy about the way the super trooper illustration turned out, though. Again, that took me a freaking long time to do, and I wish I could have given him some more depth, but I'm happy with the style of it.

Response: Judging

I was really glad that we were able to attend the SND judging last week. I'm always curious to know the thought process that goes on when they're making these decisions, so to see it all was really helpful. Something I always have to keep in mind is that judging is incredibly subjective. Sometimes designs don't do well that I think are amazing, and sometimes designs that I think are dismal end up getting all of the awards. I've even seen this with my own work. I feel like often the designs that I'm not all that wild about are the most liked by others. It's just interesting to see how your work compares in the eyes of those on the outside...

You Can't Miss: AIGA Design Archives and Manufactured Landscapes

A great resource to check out is the AIGA Design Archives. If you go to http://designarchives.aiga.org/index.html, you can check out their selection of excellence in design. Categories include editorial design, package design, illustration, corporate communications design...check it out there's some really cool stuff to get you inspired!



This week on designverb.com, there was an interesting post on Manufactured Landscapes. After reading through dozens of April editions of magazines over the past week, I've discovered something interesting...just about every single magazine has some sort of "green" special - whether it was the whole magazine (like Domino) or a special section (like SELF). So I thought this post was quite timely. The photography in the film looks pretty incredible, and especially in the climate (no pun intended) of the environmentally concious world these days, it seems like something we designers should take note of.

Critique: Tapes 'n Tapes

Here's my cover for 4.12. It was a cover for a department story, so I found it a bit challenging. First of all, I'm not much of a music afficianado, so the brainstorming was a bit difficult in terms of coming up with a strong concept.

Overall, I'm satisfied though not incredibly thrilled by the way it turned out. I tried to incorporate a quirky line drawing of the tapes so reflect the group's indi-pop style. I think it works, though it seems a little unfinished. For the title I used Eurostyle for the type face because I think it reflects the groups modern style.

I think more than anything it was tough having to work with a show preview for the cover's concept. I went with a pub still, which I think was the best thing, but doing anything too interesting with it made things a bit difficult.

Response: Trends Assignment

I'm so excited for my interview with Blueprint's Debra Bishop. Blueprint is one of my very favorite magazines, so having the chance to talk with her is truly like talking to a celebrity for me! It's such an interesting magazine, and after a slow start (publishing just two issues over the past year and a half), the magazine recently kicked into gear with six issues coming out this year. I'm a huge Martha Stewart magazine fan, so this assignment is quite the treat.

It was really interesting hearing what Christine, Kate and Melissa found from their interviews. I was especially interested in Kate's interview with the founder of Simple Scrapbooks. As an scrapbooker myself, I've always thought about working for a scrapbooking magazine, so it was cool to hear more about it. Something I really took away from Kate's presentation was this woman's ability to be successful by doing what she was passionate about. She had an idea and passion and stuck with it to create an amazingly successful product. That's something I really admire and hope I am able to do the same with my career.

Response: My website

My website is still very much under construction, but I was very pleased with all the the feedback I received from the critique. It was interesting to see what people liked about my website...especially because I had so many reservations about it. After looking at everyone else's sites, I know there are some changes I need to make to make it ahve a little more personality and punch. I'm thinking about adding a background instead of the banner at the top so the pages doesn't look so block-y. I'd also like to spruce up the splash page. Like someone commented, it just feels like it's missing something. I might tweak the palette a bit and play around with some different design elements...maybe use what I incorporated in my mini portfolio. This will definitely be the big project of the next few weeks...

You Can't Miss: Step Magzine and Florence Sites

I've never seen Step Inside Design on newsstands, but I stumbled upon it online and found some really cool things on their site. They have some cool articles on the Interview/Profiles section (I actually was looking at this when researching for my trends project) and definitely check out the Design 100. The editorial section has some really inspiring designs and they have other cool categories like posters and product design. You can check it all out at www.stepinsidedesign.com



This week on designverb, my blogger friend is in Florence (ahhh) at a food conference (double ahhhh). I'm so jealous. But my blogger friend is still managing to keep us updated... above is a series of cool signs found in the city. You can check out designverb.com for more cool street findings and photos of yummy italian cuisine!

Critique: Mini Portfolio...the first version

Over break I was semi productive and managed to create the first version of my mini portfolio, which I sent out to Meredith and Martha Stewart Living. I think what took me the longest was just the production of it all. I used a cardstock for the inside pages, which I folded over, whole punched and secured with a ribbon at the top. For my next versions, I think I'll use the cardstock for the cover and then a thinner, maybe glossier paper on the inside.

For the design, I chose a palette of blue and green with a punch of bright pink. On the inside pages, I kept the simple design of the dashed line to carry the design through. I really tried to be simple in my page designs so that I showcased the design pieces first. I'm pretty happy about they way it turned out. I'm even thinking about changing my website to have the same look so that I have a cohesive portfolio package...what do you all think?

You Can't Miss: Virtual Sneakers and Marian Bantjes

This week on designverb.com, there were some pretty cool things posted in terms of technological design. This photo comes from a Paris shop, where instead of physically trying on shoes, patrons can stand in front of a green screen and virtually see how they would look. Especially in light of my becomign techno-savy via building a website (haha) I thought this was pretty cool step for innovative technologies. Just goes to show that it's important to keep up with the times.























I stumbled across the work of an illustrator named Marian Bantjes. She has some really cool, innovative designs, especially in terms of her use of typography. This illustration was used as a promotional project for NYC's Central Park. She has a digital portfolio, which was interesting to look at as well. I like her unique typography, but I was surprised that the site didn't have any kind of homepage or splash page. You can check out the site and more of her work at bantjes.com.

Critique: 3.29 Screen

Although I wasn't originally scheduled to design for this issue, I'm really glad I had the opportunity to try my hand at yet another illustration. I found this story particularly difficult to represent visually because of the subject matter. The story is about college students being incorporated into the Nielsen ratings. I'm relatively happy with the way the illustration turned out, although I wish I would have played with some more complex treatments for the image. The problem with being too complex though was that Nielsen ratings in themselves are rather difficult to represent visually. So I iked my color choices, but I think the heads on the couch could have been spruced up a bit. I guess it just looks a little elementary. In my next illustration I'd like to experiment a little bit more with a more unique style.

As far as page layout goes, however, I like the use of the cutout to add visual interest and I think the page flows really well with the sidebar not breaking up the text.

Response: Websites

It was great to see the beginnings of everyone's websites today. One of my favorite parts of this was watching everyone's personalities emerge through the setup and design of the sites. Building my first website has certainly been both exhilarating and frustrating. I know a lot of other people are probably feeling this, but it's so hard to layout something in 10 minutes in inDesign and then spending hours trying to get it all to look the way you'd planned in Dreamweaver. And then there's Flash. That's whole other story. But I'm really glad that we've had the chance to work on building this portfolio. I think having something on the web is essential looking at the job market, and though obviously I don't have a job yet, I can only imagine how enticing it will look to a potential employer.

I still have a long way to go on my website, but I feel like I'm continuing to improve on using the technology. It's just one of those things that takes practice, I think. Right now I'm also not completely sure I've created the look and feel I want for my site. I want something that pops and reflects my personality, but at the same time I want it simple and classy enough that it lets my portfolio pieces essentially do the talking. I can't wait to get some feedback on Thursday. Who knows, by the time I get back from Spring Break, my site might look entirely different.

You Can't Miss: 25 Logos and DIY Culture

Check out this great article from Print Magazine about DIY Culture. I know a lot of people have talked about hos Ready Made is one of their favorite magazines, so this article is perfect for you all! The article talks a lot about designers with formal training as opposed to those who don't have the education, but still consider themselves designers. What do you all think? Is a design degree essential to calling yourself a designer? Check out the article at - http://printmag.com/design_articles/your_design_here/tabid/214/Default.aspx


And this week on designverb.com, in keeping with our logo thoughts, there is an interesting link to the 25 Next Best Internet Start-Ups. But what's coolest about the article is the collage of logos on designverb. Take a look at them. There's a lot of simplicity in their designs. I found them quite inspirational!

Critique: Screen Design Number Trois

Designing this week's screen department was challenging due to some time constraints over the weekend. I'm fairly pleased with the way it turned out. I found the Irish Mob story quite a challenge to illustrate (and I know Sherin had some issues with the cover as well). I'm fairly happy with what I ended up with, although I wish I could have had a little more time to do some more manipulation with the Fighting Irish figure...maybe added a gun to his hand or something like that.

In terms of page layout, I tried to play around with the setup of the page...after designing a few of these now, I've started getting bored with the lack of variety there's been in terms of layout.

Response: Convergence Logos

It was really fun to see everyone's logos today. It's amazing to see how many different directions people went in with their logos. Looking back on my own logos, I wish I would have thought in more abstract, simple terms. In doing a lot of my sketches, I think I tried to be too literal and tried to include too much into a single logo. I think some of the most successful logos were those that took a single idea and ran with it by creating a common denominator of a simple design element. When I think of some of the most successful logos, like Adidas, Nike, Target, etc...they are all very simple. Moral of the story - next time I design logos, I'm going to try to be more simple.

Response: Flash

I'm really glad we've had a chance to get our feet wet in Flash over the past couple of weeks, although I'm feeling quite overwhelmed by it all. I just wish I had more time to sit down and play with the program a little bit more...but I'm definitely happy to know some of the basics.

Whether we like it or not, I think it's so important in this day and age to be familiar with multimedia technologies. While I believe there will always be jobs in print. I don't doubt nearly all magazine designers at some point will have to take over multimedia responsibilities. I know they talked about that at Meredith, and as I look more into possible jobs, it's obvious that the web and multimedia is where the growth is.

You Can't Miss: Fun Food Finds!

This week on design verb, I was directed to another really cool blog, . Not only has it been named one of Time Magazine's "50 Coolest Websites," it has a great section called "packaging" where it takes a look at some really uniqe and well-executed food packages. I've always loved flipping through CommArts where they have sections on packaging, so it was great finding this awesome website!



Keeping with the foodie theme, I found a really cool website on winebusiness.com about what makes a successful wine label. You can check out the rest of the story at http://winebusiness.com/ReferenceLibrary/webarticle.cfm?dataId=44322. The article talks about the label's ability to "tell a story and create memories." I love wine and have the best method of choosing a new bottle of wine when I go to the store...which one has the best label. Sometimes its a good wine, sometimes it's not, but whatever it tastes like you can always say, "well, at least it had a cool label."

Critique: Poise (Read Made-ish Version)

I really tried to push the envelope with this prototype, and I think I was successful in creating a cohesive package...although I agree with some of the insights today, it could be difficult to keep this feel issue after issue. But this is my favorite of the two prototypes. With so many women's magazines on the market, I feel like this is truly a unique product that could really jump out to consumers on the newsstand.

I'd like to play around with bringing the food and party stories over to this prototype and seeing if I could fit them into this feel. I think by switching out a few images and colors, I could make the switch quite easily.

Overall though, I'm really happy about the way this turned out. Whether or not the publishing class uses the designs, I feel like these pieces are innovative and unique for my portfolio.

Critique: Poise (Real Simple-ish Version)

While this prototype is a little more expected, I tried to still bring in some interesting elements and have fun with the design. I think the colors could use a little more punch, although I really like my treatment on the "put your work down now" story. I'm not crazy about the covers. I like the use of black and white, but I think it could get stale on newstands really quickly.

For the departments, I tried to include a lot of quick and easy pullouts and sidebars, although I think I could do an even better job of making those more reader-friendly. I love the way the winding down page turned out...I think it's a great escape that really fits in with this magazine's personality.

Critique: The Favorties

Here's my first draft of the opening spread for "The Favorites." I came up with two different concepts for this story, and this is what was chosen after last Thursday's critique. First of all, I'm really pleased with how the color palette works with this design. It's sophisticated and yet has some spunk and punch at the same time. My only worry is that the photos we get for the story won't have the same color scheme (as could be planned for in a Martha Stewart-esque magazine style), but I can adapt.

My favorite thing about the spread is the unusual placement of the title. It's unexpected and fun, and I think it really entices the reader in. I've got to tweak the chef a bit more, but I really like the way he looks against that dark burgundy background. I've also got to tweak the opening copy block so that it's more readable.

What do you all think? Since we didn't get to talk about my designs at last week's 1:30 meeting, I'd love to get any feedback!

You Can't Miss: Design Your Own Purse and Digital Graffitti

In honor of my turning 22...which happens in approximately one hour (woo hoo) I wanted to share my awesome designer-friendly birthday present. This weekend, I went home to Kansas City to celebrate with my family. We went to the plaza and as a gift from my mom, I got to make a custom-made purse at 1154 Lill.

It's a beautiful little shop that started in Chicago and now has a few other boutiques in the US. You go in and get to pick out the style of bag as well as the fabrics. After about an hour and a half I finally settled on an adorable pink paisley brink with a brown strap and pink interior. It was such a fun designer-ish place. My bag will be ready in about three weeks and I'll have to show it off to you all! For more info, you can go to 1154LILL.com



designverb.com finally had something really cool...and it was perfect for this week because it was all about digital graffiti! It involved a user, a green laser pointer, a projector and some code. There's also a really cool YouTube video that goes along with it...check it out!

Response: Prototypes

It was great today seeing everyone's designs today. I think it's really interesting that four people can be designing for the same general concept and come up with visual voices and attitudes that are so distinct. It was also comforting to see that I wasn't the only one struggling with creating a protoype based on very limited feature and department ideas. But I guess that's good in a way...I liked having some creative freedom to play around with the magazine's content and voice. I may be a designer but there's definitely an opinionated editor side to me, too.

Something that I thought was difficult today though, was attempting to be a "hard-ass" when critiquing. I'm definitely opinionated when it comes to magazine design. There are things I like and things I strongly dislike. But this field is sooooooo subjective. Something I might think is hideous, someone else might think is brilliant...and there were times that I saw that today. It's just so difficult to be critical when a big part comes down to taste. But at the same time, I'm really excited to get my designs critiqued...I like when people are nice and give flowery comments, but in the end that doesn't really make me a better designer. I can't wait to see everyone else's designs on Thursday, too

You Can't Miss: Mowing Kiwi and Fortune Covers

kiwi
Originally uploaded by maggiemeyer.

This week on designverb.com, there wasn't a whole lot new to discuss, so I found this post in one of the archives. I thought it was really fun, especially since I'm working on food with the restaurant issue this week. You can see more of these fun images at minimiam.com

fortune
Originally uploaded by maggiemeyer.

I found a great cover gallery at http://nmca.boico.net/index.html. There is a selected gallery of cover images from mainstays such as Esquire and Harper's Baazar, but there are also images from more obscure mags such as Grafik and Vogue Paris. I found these images in the Fortune photo gallery. It was neat to see the creativity of these covers from the 50s, 60s and 70s, especially in light of the history projects we've been working on over the past few weeks

Response: Theme Issue Brainstorming

Restaurant fonts
Originally uploaded by maggiemeyer.

This afternoon Kristin, Melissa and I sat down and did some brainstorming for the Restaurant Design theme issue for the 8th. I've never worked on an issue like this, so I'm pretty excited about the challenge. Out main goal for our meeting today was coming up with a selection of fonts and a color palette that will tie the issue together. From there, Melissa will be working on a cover design, and we'll also need to come up with some sort of iconic element to further tie the pages together.

Selecting the fonts and colors for this issue was more of a challenge than I'd anticipated. For the fonts, we knew we wanted something kitchy and modern....something a little bit more fun and playful than what you see in the typical "foodie' magazine. We picked a serif and sans serif font that we thought expressed this pretty well...and we also played with different pairings for a while to make sure they'd work together. For the color palette, we went through and picked out shades for each of the basic colors. After our initial selection, we felt like the colors were way too "Crayola" and boring, so we played with the saturation a bit and tweaked them to make them a little more interesting.

We'll still need to come up with a sort of "one-time style guide" for the issue, so that everything has a cohesive look to it. Let us know what you think of what we have so far...Kristin is playing with it some more in the next day or two.

Critique: Screen Design Number Two

screen. 2.22
Originally uploaded by maggiemeyer.

Here's what I ended up with for my screen design for this week. I'm pretty happy about how it turned out. I think I did a good job of balancing the pages with more horizontal elements on the left page and more vertical ones on the right. I also think I did a good job of varying the headlines so that there is a sense of variety.

If I'd had another week, I probably would have worked on improving the oscar illustration. I spent a lot of time on it and went through several drafts, but after tweaking and retweaking, I ended up sticking with one of my earliest attempts. I'm still learning on illustrator...and I'm finally starting to get a grasp on that pesky pen tool! I'm also pretty happy about the way the envelope turned out. It was a last minute addition, but I think I did a good job of keeping with the style of the other illustration, which is good.

You Can't Miss: Colorful Crayons and Mideast Magazine

pete.goldlust.crayons
Originally uploaded by maggiemeyer.

I found this on an archived blog entry from designverb.com, and I thought it was appropriate seeing as we've been reading about color. I think it's really cool when people take really simple, ordinary objects and do unexpected things with them.

Mideast_opener
Originally uploaded by maggiemeyer.

I also found an interesting article at Print Magazine's website: http://printmag.com/design_articles/found_in_translation/tabid/186/Default.aspx

It talks about three magazines that are focused on Middle East identities. Two are based in New York and one in tne Netherlands. I thought it was interesting to see a magazine with such a unique, cultural perspective, not to mention they seem to be doing some really cool things in terms of design.

Critique: Oscar Illustration

oscarillustration
Originally uploaded by maggiemeyer.

This is the illustration I've been working on for screen this week. The anchor story is about Oscar acceptance speeches. I've gone through several versions of it and I'm relatively happy about the way this looks. I originally wanted to do something with putting different faces on several statuettes, but my execution wasn't looking so good. I'm definitely a novice at Illustrator, so I'm trying to improve my skills.