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Newspaper design, Goldilocks and critiques

Bob — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 13:37:06 +0000

I’m usually no big fan of “Usability” studies — largely because I think the term itself is inaccurate — but I am going to make an exception here.

This post is about a couple of articles that use the Goldilocks principle to test designs. The Goldilocks principle is just what you think it is: after trying something that is too hot, hard or whatever, and something else that is too cold, soft, blah blah you settle on one that is just right.

Like a design that has too many elements, then one that has too few, and finally one that is j-u-s-t right.

In fact, the researchers found that the number of elements and symmetry played an important part in how subjects rated pages. There are lessons to be learned from the testing of others.

More important, the article pointed out that getting someone with experience to critique your work is not just helpful, it’s smart.

Why don’t you let News Design School help you by performing a video critique of a design, even just a page idea, before you reveal your new design? E-mail me with PDFs of your pages or with inquiries.

What works, what doesn’t V

Bob — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:44:54 +0000

Something must have been in the air: a lot of papers used reverses in their centerpiece presentation on Sunday. Granted, one sure way to say “here is a special story” is to reverse the type. There are clearly two ways to go about this: use reverse type for your story or put the type in a [...] Related posts:

What works, what doesn’t IV

Bob — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 14:22:09 +0000

Let’s take a look at last Saturday’s The Frederick (MD) News-Post, an example of what
can go wrong with an otherwise good design. I hate to pick on somebody, but this week, there’s just no room for a “What Works.”

Obviously, we have to talk about color. First is the huge tease to… Tomorrow’s
Coupons! I don’t mind the tease as much as I mind the heavy-handed treatment of the
reverse. The two-tone color treatment for the main head is a bit much as well.

The layout of the top of the page is a bit hard to follow. The large photo of the kids in the snow has a cutline that is off to the side, under the main story! It needs an arrow to help the reader. The two photos look like they go together, but the second photo is a post office story and goes with the story with the little headline beneath the photo.

The first column rail is a bit of a mishmash. The cutline beneath the flag indicates that the governor has ordered the state’s flag at half-staff, but it doesn’t say why.

Then there’s a Good Morning quote, followed by a weather bug without a headline. The rail info also shares a gray background, but with several different shades and spacing.

There’s the blue box with all the purplish bullets in it. Now I suppose someone at the paper thought it would be cool to use the two colors from the headline again to create sort of vertical bookends for the package, but it doesn’t work. It is way too much, the type is hard to read and the color should just be removed.

The Haiti story is not bad, although the logo for the series is played too large and interrupts the head.

Finally, I know that papers have to place ads on A-1 today. That’s fine. But pay attention to the colors so the editorial side color doesn’t clash with it. This is an example of an uncomfortable color combination that could/should be avoided.

As bad as this page is, it would be easy to fix: all the pieces are there for a good page. A better-organized rail, a little more white space, heads with more contrast, and most important, restraint in the use of color would go a long way to making this page work.

What works, what doesn't, III

Bob — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 16:11:27 +0000

In this iteration of What Works, What Doesn’t, we are going to look at two Indiana papers:
The Elkhart Truth and the Wabash Plain Dealer.

Elkhart Truth

Wabash Plain Dealer

The Truth — great name! — has a handsome flag that is somewhat ruined by busy teasers that don’t add a thing to the page. The teasers, by the way, need more type contrast. Blue is such a quiet color that the type needs to be larger/bolder to make it work. I think there needs to be a line beneath the flag, too.

Speaking of lines, we have another example of the proliferation: the lines on the page are
simply not needed! Remember: if you can remove it from the page and it makes no difference in reader understanding of the content: delete it.

Finally, speaking of typography, the list (good idea!) at the end of the spelling bee story
needs more type contrast and the last line needs to be indented, as it is not a school
listing, but the continuation of a line. Good typography demands attention to such small
details.

The Plain Dealer is another example of the continuing move to a narrower web with its five-column grid. The flag is interrupted by the clock-tower photo, which to me at first glance looked like a duck (the clocks are its eyes, the beak right below it, etc.). Only when I zoomed in did it look like a clock tower.

The head faces are weak choices as well, with the high contrast sans serif against the no-contrast roman face, which is set too loose. The “King” headline is a good example of the lack of contrast, with the byline being the weightiest element.

The bottom two stories have heads that are much too small, and the “Local students” head is set with linespacing so tight that the apostrophe on one line actually touches the loop of the “g” above.

The below-the-flag tease doesn’t work for me either: it’s virtually invisible. The bottom of
the page is extremely gray, and they could have done more with the Inside box. Lots of missed opportunities.

Need help with your newspaper design? Contact me for more information.

What works, what doesn't, II

Bob — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 13:02:44 +0000

For this iteration of “What Works, What Doesn’t,” we are going to look at two California papers and one from Alabama. I have discovered it is easier for me — ever the critic — to find things I think don’t work as things that do. Click on image for larger view.

Press-Telegram

Up first is the Long Beach (Calif.) Press-Telegram. I like the format of the second deck heds, with the bold sans serif lead-in to the roman. I also like the “More Inside” refers and the use of a two-picture package (parade floats). You should always tease from A-1, and a well-done two-pic package is preferred to a single large photo.

The above-the-flag content doesn’t work for me. The date and weather just sort of float there almost invisibly. The teases below the flag are both bad, one being weak typographically, and the Hooters one with that awful color. Ugh!

Times Daily

Another bad use of spot color is from the Times Daily (Alabama). The D in the flag seems superfluous, taking away from the silhouettes to the right. Worse yet is the column one rail colors: the old 80s blue and pink(ish). Not needed. Put color on things, not background.

At least the TD used a different line measure and extra white space (though probably too much!) with the special story.

This is a good place to compare the use of column rules to separate elements. Much of the time the line is not necessary. On the TD page, the tint block — poorly chosen as it is — separates well enough by itself. Take out the line. Same with the line between the bottom two stories.

Oakland Tribune

On the Oakland Tribune front, the lines to the left and above the main photo are unnecessary. The two-picture package is the best of the bunch, however, because the main picture is a great close-up. In the other presentations, the scale of the people in the photos are too similar. Use the bigger photo for a close-in shot of something and the smaller photo for a scene-setter.

Appeal-Democrat

The Appeal-Democrat (California) uses the old-fashioned box to separate the Postal package rather than the rules. It looks cleaner and makes graphic sense. Let’s also compare the white space around the package (larger than the gutters, but not overly large — good) to the Times Daily. Doesn’t that framing white space look too large now?

Finally, a word about cutlines. Most every paper uses sans serif, and I think that’s a good way to differentiate it from the body type. But I do think it needs to be a bold or semi-bold to visually separate the cutlines even more from the body type. Plus, the darker type better matches, and thus connects with, the photo itself. Compare these two (OT on left, TD on right).

Oakland Tribune cutline

Times Daily cutline

What works, what doesn't

Bob — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 12:52:43 +0000

The difference between beautiful and plain is sometimes small, even in newspaper design.

This is the first in a series of critiques I am calling, “What Works, What Doesn’t.” I’ll use
it as a way to discuss newspaper design. I hope you will join in and leave comments, so we can have a real conversation about each pair of pages. Let me know your thoughts.

The two papers are the Niagara (NY) Gazette and the Albany (NY) Times-Union. (Click on images for larger versions.)

Both are fairly typical fronts at first glance, but a closer comparison shows some important differences. The Gazette, which is a taller page in reality, uses teasers above the flag; the T-U uses a series of teasers in a partial rail in column one. Both use all-caps, red labels well. Red is best used in small doses.

I really like the clean, traditional nameplate of the T-U, uncluttered except for the weather ear. On the other hand, the Gazette displays what happens when designers hear the siren song of the Silhouette Overlap. Not only is the name of the paper unnecessarily and unattractively occluded, the silhouette includes a part of the boxing ring rope that the figure is leaning on! It looks quite odd.

The Gazette’s skybox typography looks a little jammed in there, but I do like the nameplate typography and the Niagara Falls graphic in the center is cool.

The Gazette’s headlines are largely the same sans serif typeface, and it’s not that pleasing to the eye. It looks a bit over-condensed (enlarge for best view). Weak typographically. The T-U headlines are superior, in part because of better contrast, which is easier to get with serif faces. The Gazette also uses italics for the deck heads. I like italics to stay away from the news pages. Please.

I prefer the look of the main heads in serif, with the decks in sans (compared to the sans over roman italic in the Gazette). Also, the largest head on the Gazette page is the Whistle Pig (for some reason), but it is almost invisible against the bold, condensed sans main heads.

The T-U art is played large — especially considering the smaller space — whereas the Gazette’s main art is too small.

The T-U layout uses both horizontal and vertical modules well. The Gazette page is largely vertical.

The initial cap in the Gazette’s Whistle Pig story is a good idea, but it should be the same typeface as the headline, which would reduce its overwhelming presence. It ends up being too strong a visual element. Always use the head face as an initial cap.

The T-U uses a map and a small info graphic (“2008 storm”), which adds to the visual interest as well as the information density. The Gazette presentation is pretty standard and lacks visual interest.

The Gazette uses a fairly standard Index in one column, whereas the T-U has a nice, six-column presentation, which includes art and references to the web site and to the next day’s paper, both excellent ideas.

I think these two pages show how little things on a page, how small decisions about type and color and layout can make the difference between a page that works well and one that doesn’t.

What do you think?