OUGD403 STUDIO BRIEF 3 - TASK 1

To help us with Studio Brief 3 we have been given a short afternoon task to undertake, to get us used to the kind of research we will have to do for the task, once we can choose your article tomorrow. We were split up into 10 different groups of around 4 or 5, and were given a question or theme for which we had to research, and design an appropriate newspaper or magazine article page for, whether that be an article or a front page headline or even a double page spread. 

My group were given the theme "Term-time holiday ban", which was basically about how there is currently a new ban on children taking time off school to go on holiday, and each parent gets fined £60 each day for each child that is absent from school. Although this is a new ban, there is already a petition to get rid of this ban, as it is unnecessary, and stricter rules should just be set in place with no fine, as it doesn't take into consideration different family situations. 

To prepare us for this task we had a brief seminar on The Independent newspaper, and the thorough redesign it has gone through, comparing the old design to the new one, and also comparing one article from the newspaper with the same article in The Sun newspaper.

The Independent newspaper went through a massive redesign in 2013, with Matt Willey heading it. The new look aimed to reflect the bold, forthright but sophisticated tone of the newspaper, but still referencing the original design when it launched in 1986. 

Old design.

New design.

In the photographs above of the two designs, you can clearly see the vast changes that have been made to the paper. The newspaper has gone from a very colourful design, to be almost completely monotone, except for the photograph. This makes the newspaper appear a lot more serious and sophisticated, like a traditional broadsheet newspaper rather than a tabloid. The logotype has also been changed vastly, from a blocky sans-serif typeface to a clean and sophisticated serif that is part of a family of new typefaces that The Independent had designed especially for them by Henrik Kubel of A2/SW/HK Design Studio. This again gives the newspaper a much more sophisticated and sensible appearance. The columns of body copy text in the redesign are now all a regular size, which is very different to the previous design when they were all shapes and sizes, making the newspaper look higgldy piggldy and unorganised. The subheadings in the old design are big and bold, had a heavy weight and were hard to read due to them taking up less than half the page, often only two words per line. However in the new design the subheadings span the whole width of the newspaper, have a lot lighter weight and are therefore a lot easier to read and much clearer as well. The Independent logotype now spans the whole height of the newspaper, with no prices or images obscuring it like there was previously. It is elegant, radical and striking, and the vertical masthead allow the logotype to be prominent without getting in the way of the content. A 12 column grid system allows the content to breathe and for the layout to be easily adaptable depending on content. 

These are the two front pages we compared as a class, both reporting the recent beheading of a British aid worked by ISIS, one by The Independent and the other by The Sun, two contrasting and vastly different newspapers.

The Sun front page is so insensitive and unsophisticated, using slang and being very blunt, whereas The Independent includes no photographs of the deceased, just a plain black box with simple, white writing, centrally aligned so it looks a bit like a gravestone. The photograph on The Sun front page has been fuzzed out at the edges, which looks unprofessional and just looks tacky. There is one similarity between the two front pages however, which is that they both use white text on a black background, which could symbolise deal and mourning. However just above the front page in The Sun, is a piece on Cheryl Cole's thigh, and a sexy photograph of her, alongside an advertisement for a free TV magazine inside the newspaper, both of which look very disrespectful and unsympathetic to the main headline.Although The Independent does have a similar thing going with advertising books above the commemorative piece in respect for the man, this is done much more tastefully and respectfully. 

This analysis of The Independent has been really helpful to me as it has made the consider the effect an article can have when it is displayed in different ways, depending on the text content or appearance and photographs chosen, it can either look very disrespectful or sincere. This is key for when I have to design my own newspaper or magazine layout for this task, as it wouldn't be appropriate to lay an article about someone whose recently died out like The Sun has.