Workshop – The Graphic Language of a Magazine / Magazine Layout and Narrative: Theory and Practice
Workshop – The Graphic Language of a Magazine / Magazine Layout and Narrative: Theory and Practice
My first session back allowed me to communicate the combined ideas of the individuals within my group about the possible starting point of our magazine in regards to ideas for a theme. As a collective, we know that successful magazines should be engaging, unique and informative which we kept in mind while discussing ideas as well as making it personal to us; what we find interesting as well was what a large number of customers could find engaging enough to buy into.
Ideas of identity, youth culture, working class culture and sustainability all came to mind however we agreed that with influences from LAW magazine and Off-licence magazine, it would be exciting to create a magazine that touches upon ideas of British culture; actively avoiding the stereotypical and less engaging ideas of upper class and rich Britain instead focusing more on workers, builders, kebab shop and chip shops and the culture surrounding that. Personally, I love the idea; important and highly influential magazines like Dazed and i-D magazine create some articles around this content which proves that it’s something worth looking into, and we couldn’t find too many magazines particularly similar to the theme we had which allows us to create a more niche product.
My group all seemed excited and passionate to explore around the idea and successfully had a group effort to broaden the theme and find different aspects to look into. As I had a prior commitment and couldn’t make it to the first lesson, I looked at the brand boards that my groups created, as we all agreed it was important to stay visual within the group so we were all on the same page, and the themes included: cigarette packets, beers, council estates, ashtrays and cigarette butts, all allowing us to pick out concepts and material to explore further.
Looking into types of graphic designers, graphic themes and forms as well as lots of visual examples encouraged me, the graphic designer in the group, to stay aware of trends, typography, engaging new and exciting layouts which are effective and how these can be used within a magazine. David Carson was an example of an artist we looked at who is personally one of my favourite graphic designers as he pushes the boundaries of typography and graphics which I aspire to do.
The lecture made me feel like I need to stay aware of using illustration and typography (especially trialling with some handmade typography) within my work and merge it with photography, ultimately to play around and have fun to see what works and to not be afraid of what doesn’t as sometimes I can stay in my comfort zone when it comes to creating content.
The energy of my group has excited me with this project as we all collectively come up with a large range of small ideas and suggestions of things to think about, to play with or to explore or artists, designers, films and music we could link to our work too. Within the lecture we were encouraged to think deeper about our magazine before we go any further; looking into the actual aim of it, the ideas and messages we want to send and most importantly why. As we get on really well and bounce off of each other; we came up with some ideas such as creating beer mats, rave posters, cigarette packets of the magazine logos, graffiti, incorporating benefit sheets and takeaway menus- all original and exciting ideas with relevance to our theme which is the most important part.
Self Directed Study:
Magazine Research; for my self-directed study I looked into the magazine store in Brighton as this would be the perfect opportunity to get a better insight of the less conventional and more conceptual fashion and lifestyle magazines on the market currently as I feel it’s important to look further than Vogue and Dazed (for example) if my magazine is obviously a smaller one. I discovered some lovely magazines and was able to look further into ones that I had seen before but able to look at the contents and layouts clearer. I really liked Off-licence Magazine, Brick Magazine, Office Magazine amongst many others.
Placements Research; after the placement talk from the level 6 students, I felt really inspired to have s deeper look into what the placement application process is like and tried to start my CV. This was a challenge as all CVs look so similar and have the same content so I was finding it hard for mine to stand out. However with more practise I should be able to cater my CV to a more professional setting than the usual one I use for jobs.
