Ken's Corner: Learning About Print Media

As we start to get into the visual aspect of marketing in my PR and Marketing course, I am learning a lot about how to make my work more effective. I do content creation for organizations on my campus and sometimes what I learn in my visual design classes bleeds over into the work that I create. For example, we talked about the difference between layout and composition in class, and I remember applying a lot of these concepts in my film class when we would have to film different shots for short films.

As president of the Agon magazine and a writer for the AM journalism magazine, I found it really helpful that we also started talking about printed mediums as well such as newspapers and magazines. One of my top priorities for the magazine is that we have an interesting cover for both semesters’ editions. I normally extend the offer to members of the club, but if no one wants to I normally take over. I have designed 2 covers already and I am currently working on the one for this fall semester. I try to make sure the composition is actually engaging and would compel someone to pick up the magazine and read its contents. This includes using elements such a color to create a specific mood, and we primarily focus on an illustrative cover.

For AM however, we try to use photography as the primary cover for the magazine since it is more journalism based. While I am the primary editor of the Agon magazines, I do not work on the actual layout for the AM magazine. Photography tends to convey that a source is trustworthy, so it makes sense that we would utilize it so much in the AM magazine. For Agon however, the primary focus is on the students’ original works, so a more illustrative approach is usually what we go for.

We also talked about the different styles of layouts and how they affect how a viewer interacts with a page. Agon primarily switches between the “All art” layout, the “Dominate type/All copy” layout, and the “picture windows” layout. AM uses the “All art” layout less however because the primary focus in the copy whereas Agon has two focuses, copy and illustrations and/or photography. The advantage of the “picture windows” layout is that it is much more likely to catch someone’s attention compared to a page filled with words. However, I find that I try to find photos or illustrations that have some common ground with some of the poems and short stories that get submitted and accepted into the magazine. I also try to make the photos as big as possible unless they are next to text so that the works do not overshadow each other.

I am excited to see how this section of the course continues to change my perspective on the work that I create. Since this is my last year serving as Agon president, I want to make sure my last two editions come out to everyone’s liking.