PORTFOLIO:
DESIGN/TYPE/COLOR AL TOMPKINS|04.2014
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FIRST POSTER DRAFTS
FINAL POSTER
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This poster promoted the 2014 First Amendment celebration by the Gateway Journalism Review. The design makes the point that free speech, free press and the other three freedoms that live in the First Amendment are as central to Americans as the flag.
My original design set the flag inside a series of frames but the design became too busy and square. The design also began to feel like two posters smashed into one so the final design used only the flag. The US flag has specific RGB values that I adopted. I used Adobe InDesign to produce the project. 3
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I tried one other concept incorporating a crosshair target on letters in the design, signaling that the press is under fire around the globe.
The main lessons that I learned in the poster project is that a simple concept can have far greater visual impact that complex shapes that compete with the message.
The streak of red added urgency and tension to the design. In this design I attempted to use all three tools, design, type and color to build a message.
I was impressed by the power of a heavy black serif font on a white background with a streak of color that adds emotion to the words.
Ultimately, the design was too busy, and had too many messages. I either had to lose the flag or lose the headline font with the red streak. I thought the flag made the boldest statement so that is what I kept.
SECOND POSTER CONCEPT 4
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I also learned the power of kerning letters together to add a flow to their shapes. And I recognized that too many fonts confuses the design.
LESSONS LEARNED 5
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FINAL TEXT LAYOUT PROJECT
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For the text design project I chose to produce a handout that teaches photojournalists the basics of motion, sequencing, sound, light and setting. The project, put together in InDesign, included original text and photographs that I captured while teaching my video students at The Poynter Institute. I wanted the power of the images to compliment the text and I incor
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The text design project was my first attempt to use a three-column design. I found it challenging to fit photos into the same three column grid as the text. In some cases, the design determined the photos I used. I had several pictures that were horizontal but would not fit into the vertical design. I learned that as a photographer, I should capture the same image in both vertical and horizontal layouts in case the design requires one or the other. In early versions of this design I attempted to use too many “pull quotes� to break up the heavy text columns. I wanted to keep dense text from sitting next to other large text blocks, so I used elements such as quotes to break up the text.
LESSONS LEARNED
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LAYERS PROJECT
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The first assignment in this class was, for me, by far, the most difficult. With no background for having used Photoshop layers, I had to learn how to place a photo inside a Kindle window and then add text and shadows.
LAYERS ELEMENTS
The first drafts of this design contained far too much text and not nearly enough space between the image and the text. I also quickly realized my main photo was too complex.
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COLOR PROJECT
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In this project I learned about color values, contrasting and complementary colors. In this design, I used Photoshop to identify the blue from the sky and designed it into the logo and the underline in the position line. The position line color comes from the building tile. The outer border comes from deep green hues of the shrubs.
COLOR PROJECT ELEMENTS AND DRAFTS 15
Hiring Improves for Journalism and Mass Communication Graduates
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A new study by the University of Georgia Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication shows students who graduate with a degree in communications stand a better chance of landing a job than they have in recent years. After a steady increase in employment for grads from 1994 to 1999, the percentage of employed graduates dropped steeply until 2009.
Then in 2008, as the housing mortgage crisis hit hard, media jobs dried up and unemployment soared to 14.9% in 2009 before settling down to 11% in 2011. Even as they land jobs, new grads are finding full-time pay is low. Entry level newspaper jobs pay $28,000 a year while radio and TV jobs pay less. The best paying jobs are in public relations and advertising where graduates earning $32,500 a year.
GRAPH AND CHART PROJECT 16
% of Journalism and Mass Comm. BA degree grads fulltime employed 1994-2011
71.1%
53.3% Source: Annual Survey of Journalism and Mass Communications Graduates
The study shows the second straight year of employment growth with 53.3% of grads employed now. That’s the highest since 2008. Put another way, the study found that Journalism and Mass Communications grads felt the oncoming recession faster than the rest of the population with a 12.2% jobless rate in 1987. In 2001, when media companies suffered the first major decline because of the effect of Craig’slist and eBay, media companies laid off workers in the first round of pullbacks.
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12.2%
% of Journalism and Mass Comm. BA degree grads who were unemployed 1987-2011
5.4%
$31.1k
All Media
46.2%
11%
Source: Annual Survey of Journalism and Mass Communications Graduates
20 11 Salaries in Thousands $
$28k Daily Paper
$27.5k Radio
$32.5k
$25.5k TV
Adv & PR
Source: Annual Survey of Journalism and Mass Communications Graduates
I built this project in Adobe Illustrator using data from a Grady School study on how recent journalism and mass communication students were faring. I added fonts after importing to Adobe InDesign.
GRAPH AND CHART PROJECT
This chart was the product of Adobe Illustrator to produce the line, then InDesign to place the images, boxes, lines and font. I chose a three-column design for the bottom text and put the middle box in shadow to create separa17