Prior to this exercise, I was asked to collect examples of leaflets, brochures, magazines, and various other printed materials to reference and learn from. I have a large collection of these things to hand already and often bring home an assortment of printed ephemera whenever I leave the house. For the exercise itself, I was asked to select two designs from this collection that I like and think work. I was then challenged to try to copy the layout and design as closely as possible, using dummy text where necessary. The brief advised I measure the margins and column widths and use a typeface that is as close as possible to the one featured in the design.
I began by looking through the magazines I had to hand as I was eager to try copying one. I selected a layout from Elle Decoration – an interior design magazine – which I felt was effective in being both eye-catching and presenting the information within. I then wanted to challenge myself by choosing a very different type of publication and layout for my second design, and I chose a brochure from a funeral directors which I received in the post.
As I learned in my previous exercise, InDesign is a much better software to use for editorial design than Photoshop, so I installed the program and began identifying the typefaces in my first design. I began by writing down where each typeface was used, then I used the Identifont website to give me a good starting place for which ones I could use. As I didn’t have access to all of the fonts listed on Identifont, I used its comparison feature to find similar ones which were available on Adobe Fonts. The fonts I used were Kepler 3 for the ‘Style Scout’ header, Futura for the ‘Laura Jackson’ header and the image descriptions, and Nimbus Roman for the body text.
Next, I measured out the size of the magazine page and opened an InDesign document. I began by adjusting the margins to fit the existing layout, then marking out the divider between the main body of text and the images below. I felt like establishing this foundation would make it easier to build around. I then used the rectangle tool to mark out where I wanted the body text to go and then mirrored it to the other side of the page. I merged the rectangles which allowed me to use them as one large text box, which was very helpful!
Next, I added the ‘Style Scout’ heading and positioned it slightly outside of the margins as it was in the layout. I edited the body text to be justified and non-hyphenated, then began working on the image gallery below. I was careful to position each tinted box in the same position as shown in the magazine and added more dummy text where each description was positioned.
Throughout this whole process, I used a ruler to measure each element and ensure it was accurately portrayed in the document. Using the guides that InDesign has was extremely helpful for this. I was also learning how to use InDesign as I went through this first piece, having never used the software before. It felt mostly intuitive, but there were quite a few issues I had to troubleshoot. As I was so focused on this, I failed to take a lot of screenshots showing my progress.
Once finished, I saved my copied design as both a JPEG and a PDF. The JPEG is significantly lower quality than the PDF, so I have included both and advise you to look at the PDF too! I had so much fun doing this piece, I love editorial work and this heightened that love so much more. I didn’t realise how much I enjoyed this aspect of editorial work specifically, as my previous experience has been mostly in illustration and less in the design aspects. I would love to work in this field!
I moved on to the funeral brochure next, and repeated the same steps to set up my document, measuring the pages and the margins. I again used Identifont to select suitable fonts – and I ended up finding the exact font that was used as header text, Meta Serif. I chose Segoe UI for the body text which was not exact but felt close enough. I started on the first page by adding both images including a border and drop shadow on the foreground image, then began adding text. I did attempt to recreate the logo, but it felt a bit too perfectionist of me, and after struggling for half an hour I gave up and focused on the layout again.
Whilst I was designing these pages, I couldn’t help but think about how an actual graphic designer was hired to sit and produce these pages. This made me feel so inspired and excited for my potential future as a designer, which feels like a weird thing to say about a funeral brochure. I really enjoyed putting together the second page, as by this point I had a good understanding of both how InDesign works and also of the qualities of an editorial piece. Measuring became intuitive and I was able to guesstimate quite accurately the space between things.
Again, I saved this as both a JPEG and a PDF and I recommend viewing the PDF for the best quality reproduction. Choosing to do two pages for the second layout was really helpful as I got to think about how the pages interact with each other and how to make the whole brochure cohesive. I enjoyed this just as much as the magazine layout and feel good about how both designs turned out. They both look very accurate which I feel so proud of.
This exercise got me thinking about my future as a designer and where I want to go with my degree. I always said I was interested in editorial work but I had not seen this angle of it before, and it has only made me more passionate. I even went to look at available editorial positions with varying companies to see what sort of jobs are out there where I could utilise these skills. I still am passionate about branding/advertising and gallery work, and I feel like editorial production is dying out in the age of digital media, which makes me feel apprehensive about dedicating time to this. It makes me feel so happy though, and excited to work!
I enjoyed this exercise more than any other yet in this unit. I hope I can take what I’ve learned into the next exercise and assignment, and keep coming back to this going forward!
Learning Log 