Projects

Project 1: Typography (50 points)

Using only typography and color (no art), create two flyers for the made-up Elliott School Movie Nights. One flyer should be a standard 8.5″ by 11″ flyer that you would hang up around the building. The other should be a narrow version (4″ by 11″) that is easier for people to scroll through on their phones. The more narrow one would be for the school to send out via text, email or social media for students to view on their mobile devices. They should use the same fonts and colors, so get one of them completely done. I would start with the flyer for hanging up and then modify it to make it work in the long, narrow format.

  • Use the same fonts, styles and colors so the two go together
  • Probably start with the 8.5″ x 11″ flyer and then adapt
  • You may reorder content.
  • You may edit words/phrases slightly, but all content/ideas must be used.
  • You must include the movie descriptions.
  • You are limited to one or two fonts.
  • Since you may not use photos, clip art, etc, you need to create a headline that really stands out and grabs attention.

You will be graded on:

  • Hierarchy (& use of weight, size, color, case to achieve it)
  • Attention grabbing headline
  • Typeface choices (fits content and readability)
  • Type sizes, leading, tracking, justification, etc.
  • Information organization
  • Readability
  • Use of color
  • Overall effectiveness (the walk by test — would I look at/read it?)

IMPORTANT: Save your finished InDesign files somewhere that you can get back to them later if you want. After feedback, sometimes, I allow people to go back and make changes for more credit. If you do not have the InDesign files, you will not be able to do that, without starting over.

SUBMITTING: After saving the InDesign files, use FILE/EXPORT to export each file as a JPEG. Post those to the class website using category “Project 1: Typography.”


Project 2: Photography (50 points)

  1. Choose a story you can use photos to tell. Examples:
  • A car being worked on or restored
  • A gardener prepping and planting spring a spring garden
  • Students volunteering this Saturday
  • Food bank packing and handing out food boxes
  • Someone painting a house
  • A band practicing or performing
  • Students enjoying campus on a spring day (early morning or evening for that color!)

NOTE: This should not be a step by step series. I purposefully left cooking off the above list because I always get at least a couple step-by-step pasta or taco stories, which aren’t all that interesting. Too much food art, not enough people doing things.

This list could go on and on, but it has to have at least one human subject and be visual — don’t make this hard on yourself by choosing something that will not allow you to get various types of photos and composition.

2. Take a lot of photos. Remember to get wide, medium and tight. Show the reader where this is, but also get tight detail shots that can be really visually interesting. Experiment with composition. Try getting one wide/establishing shot, lots of “medium” shots and a few “tight” or detail shots. You might shoot 50 photos.

3. Take notes and talk to the subjects. Get the correct spelling of their names and some information about whatever it is they are doing.

4. Now edit your photos down to five or six that work together to tell a story. Remember, you want technically good photos with interesting composition and eye-catching visual interest. You also want each of your photos to look different — variety in angles, composition and each photo showing a different part of the overall story.

5. Write captions for each of your photos.

6. Post all your photos and their captions (use the caption option when you load the images into the media library or straight into your post).

7. Give the story a headline.

You will be graded on:

  • Human subject (6 pts)
  • Variety of shots (wide/medium/tight) — and visual interest (10 pts)
  • Photo composition techniques (10 pts)
  • Photos work well together to tell a story (6 pts)
  • Photos are candid, NOT posed (6 pts)
  • Captions are complete (6 pts)
  • Clean backgrounds (6 pts)

Project 3: Design (100 points)

Assignment: Design a 2-page magazine spread bringing together everything you’ve learned in class this semester.

  • You may choose between two subjects: drag or baseball. Each download folder has more than enough photos, plus a story and two quick read options.
  • You must use more than one photo on your spread
  • You must use at least one quick read (may use both for that topic, if you wish). You may edit the quick reads down. For example, one of the baseball quick reads is a list of baseball slang with definitions. There are a lot of terms, but you might choose to just use 10 of them.
  • You must have a headline plus at least the start of the story. You can assume that the story continues on the next page if you want.
  • Remember, when you open a new InDesign file, make sure you create 2 pages and that “facing pages” is checked. You also need to change the “start page #” to 2 so the pages will be side-by-side in InDesign.

Story package options: