How would you kern this? UPDATE: Please critique my final layout

[Krebstar]

Ok, here we are. Now, another question. Do I need to em space the beginning of each paragraph (except the first one under each subhead)? Nevermind, I found my answer. "…use either extra space between the paragraphs or an indent. You don't need both!"

I remember that line very well from the book 'The Mac is Not a Typewriter'. It's so true, using both insults the reader's intelligence.

 

[klymr]

I remember that line very well from the book 'The Mac is Not a Typewriter'. It's so true, using both insults the reader's intelligence.

Hahaha. I'm sure someday I'll also have the book memorized. We talked about that very point in my class today. Some people broke the rule, eeks.


My teacher liked the layout. He said I almost had a very bad layout due to the title being at the bottom, but having that opening paragraph set in italics really pulled the whole thing off. He said out of all his classes and the people that set the title at the bottom mine was the only one that worked successfully. Most of them you couldn't tell where to start reading because of the way their type was set.

He also told me to close the space after each subhead. You can really notice it in the very first paragraph. There is a line just hanging out by itself up top. Oops. That and a couple other minor things and he said it's great. Now to rework it for the BFA review in a couple months to see if I'm accepted into the graphic design program up here at school.

 

[RedTomato]

My £0.02:

The kerning is fine now. However, I personally, and this is just my personal opinion, don't like the way your material is laid out on the 2 page spread.

Squint your eyes, so that the text is blurred, and consider the overall pattern formed by the relationship between the text areas and the illustrations. Also consider the ink density of the illustrations.

It all seems jumbled and unbalanced to me. The first page has two light, small images, and a large block of text. The second page has two large dark images and a small block of text. The positioning of the images doesn't form a harmonic whole that attracts the eye from across the room.

Purely from a layout view, I would consider swapping over an image from each page, so that each page has both a large and a small image, and both a light and a dark image, and also roughly the same amount of text. Also reposition the images so that when the spread is seen from across the room (or at first glance), some sort of subtle harmonious pattern is seen.

Sorry if this seems harsh, and I certainly am not a trained designer, but you did ask for design feedback.

 

[klymr]

My £0.02:

The kerning is fine now. However, I personally, and this is just my personal opinion, don't like the way your material is laid out on the 2 page spread.

Squint your eyes, so that the text is blurred, and consider the overall pattern formed by the relationship between the text areas and the illustrations. Also consider the ink density of the illustrations.

It all seems jumbled and unbalanced to me. The first page has two light, small images, and a large block of text. The second page has two large dark images and a small block of text. The positioning of the images doesn't form a harmonic whole that attracts the eye from across the room.

Purely from a layout view, I would consider swapping over an image from each page, so that each page has both a large and a small image, and both a light and a dark image, and also roughly the same amount of text. Also reposition the images so that when the spread is seen from across the room (or at first glance), some sort of subtle harmonious pattern is seen.

Sorry if this seems harsh, and I certainly am not a trained designer, but you did ask for design feedback.

Hey, I am only happy with page two in the sense that it's done! I take no offense in what you said. I may scale the printed text image down on page two and add a pull quote to the mix. We will see. Again, at this point it's just for my portfolio. The professor kept the other design to grade (he won't allow reworks to fix these small things).

 

[i3iz]

The R and the A in Graphic is the thing that hits me in the face right away. Only solution I see to that is using a different font. Thats just my thoughts.

i second this.