This is the final draft of my feature story for Modern Midwest about the Top 10 seafood restaurants in the Midwest. It was the only design I changed fairly drastically and felt worthy of posting again. Through the recommendation of the class, I worked with the headline typography a lot and also made my images a lot larger. The headline typography is a play-off of the Chicken of the Sea logo. As I explained to the publishing team I thought that worked well because of the whole Jessica Simpson thing (you're welcome). In contrast to that, the typical Midwesterner would recognize that typography and get the reference. I played around with different words for a while. I tried Chicken of the Great Plains, but the Great Plains don't really cover all of the Midwest by definition. I think that headline would have worked better with the illustration though. Right now, I think it's kind of weird, because I have this headline about fish coming from the Great Lakes, but then I have an illustration of them growing out of the ground on corn stalks. I made the photo a lot larger too because I thought it was very appealing. I have no idea where it was taken, but who wouldn't want to go to a restaurant with a 20 pound lobster on top!? (I mean, unless you're afraid it's going to fall through the roof, in which case I would avoid at all costs.) I shortened up the text on the left page a bit to give the headline and deck some more breathing room. Overall, I was pleased with how it turned out. The presentation to the publishing team was pretty painless as well. They asked a lot of great questions. I'm looking forward to working with them as well as the design team as the semester progresses.
You're illustration is funny, and we all agreed that the photo is great! Although the spread is very clean and organized, it probably could stand to use some more white space (especially since we don't have any of the actual content yet). I think I probably used a bit too much text on my department page. We should definitely take advantage of all the space we have whenever we can (like when we don't have any actual content, ha).
ReplyDeleteYour final draft of Modern Midwest turned out good! I love the illustration; you executed the idea well. The content is well organized and easy to follow.
ReplyDeleteHahaha thank you for reminding me of that lovely Jessica Simpson moment, Joe. Of course I clicked on your link and watched it and was reminded of when I watched it the first time. Also, I think you made some great changes to this spread. It looks much better and less cluttered.
ReplyDeleteI thought your concept for the illustration was really strong! I grew up in a suburb of Chicago, Plainfield, IL, and before all the houses and Wal-Marts and what not went up, all there was was corn. I definitely get the illustration, and I love that it's so witty.
ReplyDeleteYour Jessica Simpson reference in the pitch was amazing, first off. Way to start the presentations on the right note. :) I also loved the illustration you presented to the class even with the rough draft. It doesn't look like you changed it much, but way to play up the strongest element of the page. Finding photos was difficult throughout, but at least you got to throw in some humor with the giant lobster! The publishing team said they wanted to have some comedy in this prototype, and you did just that.
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