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deekeeees's picture
21 pencils

eye sight

this was from a class project last quarter. i would really like to put it in my portfolio but need some feedback. what do you think?
thanks for any feedback!

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Ivan's picture

There is no grid that I can discover in this layout, which makes it uncomfortable to look at. You may want to redesign it with a grid. Otherwise it's ok.

gwells's picture
1711 pencils

generally the concept looks nice, but there are a lot of details that need work.

what ivan said, a consistent grid will help.

also, you're inconsistent with whether you indent paragraphs and whether they're right rag or full justified.

your fully justified paragraphs have awkward word spacing (particularly in the description paragraphs on your graphic) and some widows (ok, it's 2 words, not 1, but it still looks awkward).

your leadin sentence (nowadays, it's important...) has that short line at the end, which makes it look unbalanced.

centered headings on the blue bar look awkward. I would left-justify them.

personally, when you're indenting, i prefer to see the first paragraph after a heading *not* indented. the indent is to show you a new paragraph is starting, but after a heading, it's not necessary. it's a little more work for something short, but worth it. newspapers often don't do this because it's a lot more work, especially on something that's changing constantly and is on tight deadlines, but it looks much more visually pleasing.

leading on the four main paragraphs on the left seems a little tight, like you're trying to cram the content in there.

hope that helps.

mara06's picture
2549 pencils

I'm with Greg on paragraph styles and copyfitting in general.

I've designed a lot of "fake newspapers" as direct mail pieces for nonprofit environmental groups, so I wind up spending a lot of time on this kind of copy fitting. My default style sheet is always for the lead 'graph to have no indent. I also usually do small caps for the first word or two in straight news stories, a drop cap in editorials, and so on. By assigning F keys to your most-used styles, or even just having the palette open and handy, it takes almost no time to do this kind of polishing. The difference in overall impact is dramatic.

—

Mara

deekeeees's picture
21 pencils

thank you so much for your advice!

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