Magazine Design (Graphics)

Shape
This magazine encloses each paragraph and subsection within rectangles. The rectangle shape, after all, means stability and structure, while its direction emphasizes horizontal and vertical. Not only do these add extra structure to the page, but the paragraphs and graphics conform to the rectangle's shape more easily than do circles and triangles. The rectangles also manage to enclose the separate sections, dividing the page into bite-sized portions more pleasing to the eyes of the younger readers.

Notice, too, the circle beneath Cyber-Stein. It is the only circle that the design employs, intended to be out of place and to draw the eye. The text within the circle is important information which the readers must know, hence the contrast.

Dot
The dot, as Dondis established, is the irreducibly minimum unit of visual communication. The dot, as in the case of these bullets, serves as the marker, or reference point, drawing the eye to each sequentially. In this case, dots act as bullets, separating a sequence of tips beneath a common heading. The boxes that surround them alone are insufficient, and would seem cluttered due to quantity, but the dot-bullets mark and separate each point adequately.








Lines
One of the most basic uses of the line, in magazines or in any other publication: in the table of contents. The line's energy is used to direct the eye from each section to the page; without them, the reader might easily become confused as to which page went with which section, irritating him or her and preventing them from easily referencing the section they want. Especially with the text rotated slightly, the line's decisiveness allows the user to ignore the otherwise unsettling position, making it simple different and not jarring.

(On a side-note, all the scans were taken from this month's Shonen Jump magazine; the reason for my selection being not only that my intended eventual career will be in graphics desing (specifically in Magazine design), but this month's issue contained my first freelance article. So, I'm slightly biased towards this particular magazine and issue, needless to say.)

Week 6 Exercise

My area of interest in taking DAI has been graphics design - specifically that which relates to printed material. Here are two of my former textbooks which have quite different designs - Great American Prose Poetry on the right, which has a very intriguing and interesting design that works for the targeted audience, and Sudden Fiction international on the left, which is garish and in descriptive.

Apart from the bright, mismatched colors of SFI, the composition itself really leaves a lot to be desired. The placement of the text 'Sudden Fiction' was on the right track, but the slanted 'International', in a different font no less, did not sharpen the effect but rather made it more ambiguous (and less legible). The grouping both at the top and bottom really prevented the words emphasized from appearing especially remarkable - 'edited by' is less noticible than the people it connotes. There really isn't much stress in the design either - all the components feel so mismatched that wherever stress was intended instead feels like an eyesore, or else downright confusing.

GAPP, on the other hand, manages for a more pleasing look. The text is grouped and balanced nicely; the placement of the title and editor just off-center attracts the eye with a smidge of sharpness but still comes off as more-or-less leveled. The lines on the left add more sharpness by reminding the prospective reader of ruled school paper. This provides a comforting, homey touch that carries with it the approachability of the familiar and lack judgment and also draws the viewer's eye back to the text. The image below adds a fine element of whimsy, reminding everyone that poetry doesn't need to make sense in order to be great: the woman with her parrot in the desert thunderstorm hardly looks very serious, yet compels the viewer to probe deeper for meaning beneath the nonsense. Which is, after all, what poetry so often aspires to do.

Week 5 Exercise

Sosuke Aizen's splash portrait (from the manga Bleach by Tite Kubo).

At first glance, Aizen appears to be a rather nondescript character. While in the realm of manga, glasses are frequently shown as being "cool" or "trendy", his thick-rimmed glasses are an almost universal symbol of a soft-spoken intellectual; weak in both mind and body. His expression, too, is bland, though friendly. However, this portrait (published in the volume where he is established as the story's true antagonist), suggests that this impression is false.

Of note is the extreme contrast, which throws the blandness of his expression into an eerie light. His eyes lack color or reflection, giving him a very piercing gaze. Note, too, that his eyes aren't "smiling" - there's something sardonic, almost ironic in his demeanor. The seemingly kindly nerd is actually evil and dangerous, and has since discarded his mask. Finally, his name (written behind him in traditional brush strokes) is drawn very aggressively, even savagely; it's a very violent signature.

On "splash" (eyecatch) pages, it's not unusual in manga for the manga-ka (writer/artist) to do a picture of a character who figures heavily into the plot or story arc. Generally speaking, said portraits are of the character behaving in a characteristic manner - a shy character might take a more submissive, defensive pose, for instance. Aizen dominates his page, gazing down at the audience, serene and pitiless.

Week 3 Exercise

Image scanned from Shonen Jump Magazine issue Volume 6, Issue 4 p.374. Shonen Jump is owned exclusively by Viz Media.

Although Shonen Jump’s color scheme is varied, it still manages to use the Color Feature Channel, highlighting the various sections with “bursts” of contrasting hues. The intensity of the blue, green and purple highlights further draw the eye to what they frame, keeping a balance to be pleasing to the eye. Red also figures into the structure, as its used both as a frame and to highlight various points of interest. The burst shapes both use the Shape Feature Channel – furthermore, the lines draw the eye to the face of the character on the left, and centralize the gaze with the one on the right. Also, although all the shapes in and of themselves are unique, there’s a kind of uniformity insofar as both the bursts and the spikes maintain a passive similarity. Size and placement likewise play their roles - although the two sections below are important, the most space, and the position at the top, is given to the new manga appearing next month.

Week 2 Exercise

(Taken from this Sparkling Generation Valkyrie Yuuki Webpage)

My intended area of study is in web design and user interface, and this image, while simple, is oriented towards top-down visual processing. Comics in and of themselves are a kind of visual storytelling that tells a story through sequential images, the "cognitive goal" being to learn what happens next. This, being the first page, shows only one image, but the text interests the reader, and hints at the plot development that the main character is a man who is transformed magically into a woman.

Once the reader is done reading the page, he or she will probably want to proceed on - the "Next" button is available for just such an Action Goal; alternatively, other buttons are available if s/he wants to go to the latest page, to the homepage, forums or other areas to learn more about the story, its creator and the surrounding community. Because these are in a common format of taskbar and, in subsequent pages, the locations of these objects never change, the reader can easily remember or verify their locations for future use.

DAI 323 Visual Design Literacy, SFSU

This is Christopher Turner of DAI 323 Visual Design Literacy at San Francisco State University.