Dissertation Design

Introducing me to the dissertation design project was a short workshop whereby I had to make different spreads with pre provided content, but with a varying strict amount of criteria set with each spread. I found this exercise useful, mainly for the short time frames given for each spread, rather than the restrictive parameters, I found short timeframes forced me to think quickly and act efficiently in order to design a cohesive spread. It taught me how to complete a task to the highest standard i can in the too short a time frame I have been given for it, testing my prioritisation skills while simultaneously giving me further practice in designing editorial spreads.

Here I think the second spread is most effective. I think this is because while the first spread was not worked for long enough, the second spread was designed still with a large amount of restrictions added alongside it, but those restrictions made me iron out the details that were allowed to be introduced, making it a simply but effective outcome. the third spread perhaps tries to be too fancy with the short amount of time that I was given to design it.

The most useful part of this workshop was, in my opinion the focus on building a good foundation to THEN add typographic flair and details. With already having a functional spread, I could then add the details and fleuron’s to it from there in order to build on what I have already made, rather than trying to do too much too quickly without enough of an idea on what I want to make or what should go where. Moving forward I feel more confident in my typography, after not being able to work on these spreads for very long and looking back at them now, I think i’ve executed them to a good standard and I’m learning that obsessively overworking often leads to poorer work.

https://www.behance.net/collection/182252469/Diss-Design

My research for this project looked at a plethora of different editorial spreads, from experimental to more standard formats and layouts. I found that I was already aware of a of the different types of experimental formats from my ISTD project, but I feel this project will be different and should take on a different form, rather than being experimental in the format, as I have already done I should fill holes in my portfolio and use a more typical page bound, while executing as high a quality typography as possible, but leaving it plain to see and easily accessible and comprehensible.

Given my topic area of dissertation, My editorial needs to play with the idea of branding and propaganda, in particular the interactions between the two and how they have existed and reacted to each other, this being a dynamic and fluid relationship, the manipulation of propaganda and branding seems perfect for making a consistent but interesting pace, experimenting with manipulation of type is something well documented within typography, and therefore there is lots of research that I can pull from in order to get inspired as well as referencing from. Initial the examples above that use the redacted bars to isolate information is interesting to me, just using the bars themselves to hide information is very cliche but I wonder how I could take the idea and the effects and style of a redacted bar, and make it fresh, new and interesting with varying techniques so that it could be used throughout the different editorial spreads that I create.

Above are my initial experimentations after research and sketches, I tried to play on this idea of selected and redacted information, by alluding to the smudge like shapes of redacted bars, but without having them appear in the usual sense. I think by doing this I’m able to layer my spreads and incorporate a larger variance in hierarchy without having to implement too many colours, having information hiding around the borders of the smudges would elude to the idea that there is more information concealed, but the spread is only allowing you to see a select portion of the information, much like how propaganda and branding function in the real world, this technique used above allows me to do that without having to explicitly say it, making the spreads more intelligently packed with meaning and metaphors overall boosting the sophistication and desire to uncover the information within.

I have also taken inspiration from government style documents, within my mood board above these were among the first things to be found when searching to topic areas that exist within my dissertation and so they would clearly create an obvious link between the visual and typographic language and the content of the body copy. Large stamp like letterforms bring further layers to the spread and help to make the hierarchy less typical and what you would expect, although I like this effect it is not really what I wanted this editorial to do. I mentioned earlier about how this editorial should perhaps not be so experimental as ISTD shows that I have already done that, the typography should be focussed more in a conventional sense, like the justified paragraph of body copy on page 2, the absence of rivers and optimal line length may perhaps be less exciting to make than a massively experimental outcomes, but it does have a greater long term life as well as show a wider skillset when everything is evidenced within my portfolio.

With that in mind, I do like the colour scheme used here, the splash of colour are given more impact and the typography contrasts well to make for an interesting and varied paced set of editorial spreads.

Moving forward with the notes from me previous experimentation in mind, I have sketched further and made further editorial spreads, using a different set of colours, techniques as well as playing around further with the typefaces. While I mentioned I did like the colours used in the previous attempt, the rich purple reminds me of royalty and a higher class, almost as if the content is too high to be viewed by the people who are reading the spreads, it also reminds me of Cadbury’s, a company that does have a case study about them within my dissertation itself, on top of this I also very commonly use either a black/white background for my designs in almost every project so far at university, in an effort to challenge myself further in different areas I have decided to push this colour scheme and see just how far it can be stretched, if I get to the end at it really is the inly think holding the spreads back it may be changed but at the moment it seems to be working far better and contain far more embedded meaning that the previous, black, white and red colour scheme.

My methods of manipulation are much more varied than previously, these were more interesting to make as well as play with the type in more ways, I also feel like I have more ideas for thiis type of manipulation, stretching and contorting type can be done in a plethora of ways and I really have only scratched the surface of this concept.

The idea of a fine line is also floated about these spreads, I explore the ‘line’ throughout my dissertation, as seen in the sketches & brainstorms below.

Putting this line in different places within the earlier spreads and then moving forward with the spreads the line becomes more distorted and less obvious, reflecting perfectly with the content within the spreads. However, I feel if this line is to be introduced, it needs to be one of the only visual language effects, as the messages behind it need to be so easily understood with only some thought that It would need to take centre stage. I feel the manipulation of type and headings is very successful now and I would like the push it as far as I can before decided if I am going to take on other alternative techniques, taking inspiration from my previous lessons learnt in the workshop at the start of this project and not take too much on at once.

My next round of experimentation heed advice from previous reflection and tighten up the typography as well as choose a smaller number of techniques and then flesh those out further in order to create a more cohesive story as you are progressing through the spreads, and I think I’ve done that successfully. These spreads are not finished at all but I think sufficient progress has been made on pushing my spreads further to make them more effective.

The spreads still feel slightly too experimental and so should be brought back a tiny bit, focussing on the typographic rules when it comes to editorial as well as really refining and condensing the techniques used will help to finalise my spreads until they are ready for presentation.

My final outcomes are below, I feel these as done the job that my editorial spreads needed to do, although I do really want to be more experimental I now know that this is not always the best idea, my designs sometimes just need to do the job well, they do not need to be a huge expansive story that challenges everything, knowing when to follow the rules is just as important as knowing when to break them, and on reflection of this project, I feel that this the most important thing I have learn throughout the time working on it.