Art Directors portfolio, Milk magazine.

Rich CarterArt DirectorMilk Portfolio

www.milkartdirector.wordpress.com

Contents

Role Summary Art Director

Design Introduction Commissioning Posters Promotional Posters SU Screens Launch Posters Logo Design Commissioning Posters - Issue 2 Art Direction Launch Posters - Issue 2

Editorial Introduction Templates, Articles and Submission Guides On-screen Editing

Suggested Improvements

Summary

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Role Summary

Description –

Working closely with the Editor and Digital Publisher, I had full control of the overall look and feel of the publication. My main challenge in my role was to find a style for the magazine that would suit its new online territory. Other areas of responsibility included: commissioning artists and collaborators, running a commissioning work shop and speaking to would be contributors and presenting my ideas to them, creating a design style guide the team could follow, creating submission guidelines for artwork and editorial pieces, poster and logo design, writing articles, submitting article ideas to the team, photography and page design. Away from the general layout of the magazine I also had to consider fonts, colours and image placement, keeping in mind the feeling and personality I was trying to develop for milk. Finally once everything was uploaded I then had to inspect the overall quality of the site, making sure the whole publication fell within the agreed style.

How I found it –

I wont lie, I found it incredibly difficult and demanding, especially around the time of upload but I don’t regret applying for this role at all. It’s been everything I imagine, just a whole lot more too! It tested me and pushed my organisational skills to the max. It helped me realised I am capable of juggling multiple briefs, prioritising my work load, leading a team and managing them, whether its myself or a few contributors. The role has also proved I am adept at working under pressure and within a team unit. What Milk has done for me is it has really brought out my desire to work within a strong, stable team environment. To lead and to keep the team working towards the same shared goal. Something I wasn’t really aware of before.

How my role changed/evolved -

I felt my role changed on a daily basis. Seriously. In the early days it was about creating posters for commissioning events but as soon as the events came round I swiftly turned into sales man. I was selling the magazine to potential art contributors, promoting the brand, the platform it’d offer them and if they did worked with us how the opportunity would benefit them. As soon as commissioning was under way though my role soon turned into a position where I needed to be focused and disciplined. Where are my images for this piece? Does my contributor know what I’m after? I better email him/her. Questions constantly swirled round my mind and many late nights ensued. So away from my naive first thoughts about the role, it has infact changed dramatically but in a way I liked as it helped me become a well-rounded team member. The role took me from commissioning to interviewing, managing contributors to motivating them, writing articles to photographing images for them, editing work to promoting that work via poster designs and the SU screens. Not forgetting my roles real purpose, which was to upload everything the team had commissioned. Have I ever regretted taking on this role since finding out everything it has to offer? Umm…maybe once or twice along the way, yea! But looking back, it’s definitely been the one role that has provided the most fun!

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www.milkonline.org.uk

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Design

Design, the Art Directors home, an area that has provided me with an equal measure of pleasure as well as pain. Whether it was early research into a suitable theme I could use for milk or designing a last minute panic poster that’s needed for an event in the morning. It’s really been an area of highs and lows but one luckily for me where the highs have definitely out weighed the lows.Over the production of both issues the publication has helped developed my skills in a number of different areas. Whether it’s designing for print, for screen or learning new skills such as HTML code and CSS styling. I’ve feel as though I’ve been pushed, taken out of my comfort zone and then slapped in the face (in a good way). It’s been great though. I’ve learnt loads and it has taken me further, shown me areas of design I want to know more about and provided me with a hunger to continue my self-development in this field.

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Needs You!

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Commissioning Posters

Early commissioning posters were designed simply to stop people in their tracks and say, ‘look at me!’. I knew this so I kept them simple, clear and to the point. I hadn’t changed any of milks identity at that point so I kept with the look of past issues. The logo plus Myriad Pro font in bold. What needed to be communicated was to tell people what we were after, where they could find us and when. Nothing more. These posters filled their intended purpose well and ensure at our two commissioning events (Newton Park & Sion Hill) we attracted big crowds of people and took down the details of many new, would-be contributors.

Keep it simple - Early posters got straight to the point

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Promotional posters

Milk was beginning to take shape, articles had been commissioned and the site was in its early stages of being built. OK, I wasn’t exactly sat twiddling my thumbs but I was itching to crack on with something so I decided to create a run of promotional posters to coincide with the launch of the new look milk site. What I was going for was just a few posters to have up around the campuses that’ll cause a little intrigue. I wanted to create a buzz in the lead up to launch, to get the milk logo out there, to get people talking and to create some excitement!With this in mind, I didn’t want to give away too much so held back with providing too much information. I just included the date of the re-launch and a few differing puns or tag lines that kept in with the humorous tone of milks already established voice.

Promo campaign - Early posters to help spread the word

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SU Screens

After the success of the promo poster campaign, I decided to take the promotional work a step further. After talks with the Marketing team and the discovery of the SU screens availability I began designing promotional posters that would go on the multiple screens in the SU. These needed to be fun and offer plenty of what milk is all about. I got to work and produced a run of 8 entertaining designs which all incorporated the milk logo. On the day of our re-launch I re-designed the posters to include the sites URL address. These revised posters were now on a timer across all screens inside the SU and resulted in a dramatic spike in traffic to the site on the day of launch. SU Screen Campaign -

I’m on the tele!

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Launch Posters Issue 1

To coincide with the designs I developed for the SU screens, I decided to design further posters to celebrate the launch of Issue 1. Each needed to encapsulate the humour, feel and voice of milk. All were very warmly received by the team and readers of the site too, especially the poster with my cat Ruby, who’s since gone on to achieve cult status for milk without even knowing it!

Launch Campaign - We’ll see you soon!

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Logo designs

With the visual identity of the new site now beginning to take shape I decided to look at other areas of the site I could tweak and add a little more visual presence to. What started as a little experiment has turned what used to be tiny tab at the bottom of the home page in a giant red button. The idea behind the ‘Join Us’ logo was to create a striking difference to everything else on the page. This button needed to stand out and I knew it. During my early mock ups I was left unenthused with what I was coming up with. Dull white on black buttons that I thought were in keeping with the style of the home page. Then after a quick break I was refreshed again. I thought, why don’t I used all my own influences and make it something in it’s own right? Which is exactly what I did. Using my passion for hand painted signs and psychedelic lettering, the new ‘join us logo’ was born. Although not simple to design, I used both Photoshop and Illustrator to get to the final artwork. I’m pretty happy with the end result and so was the team. It does draw the eye of the reader and has lead to many more commissions coming via the site. Further benefitting all commissioning editors.

Please DO touch - The final design for the ‘Join Us’ button.

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Issue 2

Towards the end of issue 1 my energy and enthusiasm fell flat. I knew I needed a pick me up. I stood back and reassessed my role in the team, what being Art Director meant to me, how others saw my role, how and what I could change to feel I was getting the best out of this experience and what I needed to do to achieve this. The stage was set. I returned refreshed, re-focused and full of enthusiasm once more and now more eager than ever to make my contribution count and help make issue 2 the best it could be. For me this meant recruiting the freshest new talent, new launch posters with a more focused identity and getting more hands on with my contributors, meaning full art direction on all commissions. This issue I knew what I wanted and what I needed to change to get the magazine to a place where I envisaged on day one.

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Commission Posters Issue 2

Similar to the launch of milk I was aware of the need to get us some exposure. I was inspired and driven on to attract the best artistic talent out there and I was aware this wouldn’t be done if I stuck to the same formula as past posters. The new batch of posters needed colour! I still wanted them all to have the playful nature milk is all about but they needed to be eye-catching, attractive and instant. This run of posters celebrating the next wave of commissioning for milk really brought in huge numbers of different contributors to issue 1, especially on the art side of the publication. With the help of Facebook and Twitter the posters had a huge reach and fulfilled their intended purpose brilliantly.

Back Again - Fresh new designs looking for fresh new talent

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Art Direction

One reply to my commission posters in particularly struck a chord with me. I received an email from a guy called Jordan Wright. A 2nd year Graphic Communication student on a year out, studying in JAPAN! Insane I thought but I messaged him back all the same and we got talking. He’s a really lovely guy and we seemed to share the same passion and enthusiasm for design so we immediately hit it off. What was so extordinary about this commission was the fact that I would be art directing him from Bath whilst he was in Japan. The time difference was never an issue though, thank god.This experience of not only art directing someone but also communicating ideas with him and bouncing concepts off him whilst he was on the other side of the world was just incredible. This will probably sound lame but its one of my proudest moments on milk. To commission, art direct then receive the final artwork was all I needed. Job done as far as i’m concerned, I was happy! It’s probably one of my biggest achievements and one that I will take away with me and look back on with pride. It’s made the whole experience worth it. Definitely what I needed to make me feel my role was not only justified but also fulfilled, even if just from a personal perspective.

‘It’s probably one of my biggest achievements and one that I will take away with me and look back on with pride.’

Left - Early drafts of initial ideas discussed via email. We spoke of the link Facebook

invaribly has with procrastinating

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The Final Artwork - After much discussion, the final, finished artwork for Pot & Procrastination

Almost There - After throwing ideas back and forth we both agreed on a

suitable angle for the image

Options - Collage effect. A very serious contender but due to difficult time constraints it had to be shelved

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Art Direction

I believe my role as Art Director has worked due to my passion for finding out new techniques and ecploring different mediums to produce a finished piece of art. During early dialogue with my contributors I would constantly ask them how they did something, what they used, where they heard about it and what their own influences are. I did this as I am genuinely interested in learning new techniques so I guess I used my role not only to motivate and direct my contributors but also as a way of learning new things myself. This was evident in the way I worked with my issue 1 contributors. I commissioned two polar opposite examples of work, one a hand drawn piece finished in Photoshop and the other a collage artwork full of collected material. This was brilliant though as it gave me a greater insight into two varying art forms whilst also helping me to build a professional and strong working relationship with both of these collaborators for the production of the issue.

Commissioned Artwork - Left - Sophie Freeman

Right - Rebbeca Bagley

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We had the content and I had the images, all we needed now was to get the word out there that its coming! Again I put together a few designs, mostly a few re-designs of my earlier commissioning posters. I felt this way it’d keep consistency with the look and hopefully carry the momentum they generated during the commissioning stage right through to the delivery of issue 2.

Launch Posters Issue 2

Launch - We have lift off… again!

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Editorial

Although I wouldn’t class myself as part of the editorial team, I still had my own part to play. Be it suggestions for articles, on screen editing during upload, writing articles, editing work in lectures, mocking up commissioning templates, writing up the design style guide, creating sub headings for articles or writing up image lists to pass onto Commissioning Editors. My role was varied and looking back, it wasn’t just the design side I had to concentrate on. A lot of my work heavily involved my editorial skills I’ve learnt so far in order for me to deliver a fully formed publication to a professional standard I was happy with.

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Email templates –

At the beginning of the commissioning stage before I relied on posters to do the work for me, I had devised my own commissioning template I could use for each contributor. This was intended for anyone who had previously stated a desire to work on milk. At one of the first commissioning events I had accumulated a list of potential contributors. This email template would act as my first contact with them since they left the event. What was included in the template was blank spaces where I could insert the students name, the article and any art direction I felt was necessary for the article.

Article written –

Take to the Stage was my first foray into writing an article for milk. It was going to be the main feature for the music section so no pressure! What also added to the growing stress for me was that it was a piece centred on a good friend of mine, Dan Flitcroft and his studio, Stage 2.For me, once I had the initial plan for the article sorted I visited Dan at his studio for an interview. Shortly afterwards, once all the information had been gathered, the article just flowed. I was happy with the end result and even happier after it came back from editing. Hardly any errors or re-writes were found or needed. Great feedback was also received from the readers and the milk team. I was ecstatic!

Suggested articles over both issues –

The Beatles – How have they enjoyed such longevity?Bath Half Marathon – How do you train for a race?Money Management – A student’s survival guideSource – Upcycling profileStage 2 Studios – Music featureWhat Makes a Good Gig? – Music featureBattle Of The Bands – Now successfully running as milk soundsBand On The Run! – Tour diary, daily updates from 3rd year music students on tourSketchbook Corner – Showcase’s little brother, showing how the final pieces for showcase featured work came about. Giving a look at early sketches of the finished, featured work.Fashion Profile – Paul Smith. A life in styleMilk’s FIFA League – An xbox live/Playstation 3 Fifa tournament with prizes on offer, insult ability via comments boardDamien Hurst Returns To The Tate – Art ProfileStudents Who Are Making The Most Of Technology – A piece on students who make their own apps, sell their own music, set up their own labels, make their own clothes etcIpad 3 New Release - Is it worth the money? Do we need another one? Isn’t it just another object we are told we need in our lives?Andy Warhol – Genius or overrated? – Art feature

Submission Guidelines

After a difficult first upload I began to think of ways that would help me when it came to uploading for issue two. Suggestions to the rest of the team included: asking all Commissioning Editors to inform their contributors to submit all written work in a certain font with no leading, spacing or any other stylising except for italics and bold (when required), pictures must be supplied with original URL or address in order for me to re-direct or credit original source. Since this small change was implemented, I really had noticed the difference when it came to uploading multiple documents once they were all submitted in the same format, it not only saved me time but also a lot of stress.

Editorial

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On Screen Editing

During the many hours I spent on the upload I did come across the odd mistake. Not everything can get picked up at every stage so I made sure when I upload each article I give them all a quick read through, just in case something has slipped through. This can involve re-writing a simple sentence to help it flow better to correcting a spelling or an Americanisation or even to change a sub header. I’m also looking out for any design inconsistencies that may happen during upload too. Common areas I needed to constantly be on my guard against are: Text alignment, use of bold and italic’s, making sure the correct paragraph style has been applied to the text to making sure pictures are of a consistent size and are aligned according to the text.

Be Bold - An error easy to miss. I often caught the milk logo without its bold character style prior to going live.

Makes Sense? - I have re-worded a couple of articles prior to uploading the content if I felt it helped the flow of the article

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Slide along - It’d be up to me to consider the flow of the slider images so i’d think about colour balance, harmony of pictures and importance of the chosen articles when deciding the running order for the slider

Image Selection - Although some contributors supplied their own images, most weren’t of a good enough standard for milk. That’s when I would read the article and select an appropriate replacement image.

Push The Button - The ‘Join Us’ logo fighting for attention

Sub Headers - An area of milk I thoroughly enjoyed. Once all articles had been written and uploaded this was an area I could really kick back and enjoy myself on and create some truly awful puns…

Pull Quotes - Although not my idea, the styling for the pull quotes was something I was able to embrace and really help push the article in a new fresh direction. The finished look of each quote offers each article an even higher standard

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Suggested Improvements For Milk

Splitting showcase in half - One visual and one written. I’d of liked to be in charge of the visual side given extra time because I felt I had no input whatsoever in the first issue and I feel that’s a big part of being art director on Milk.

2 meetings per week –Thursdays can be the action meetings in class when ideas are put forward and feedback on them received. Tuesday’s meetings (even if just for 20 minutes) can be used for keeping momentum on those ideas and to keep them going. Hopefully meaning most will actually be put into place.

Decision making structure – If a change is going to alter the look of the entire site I feel it should be checked with the Art Director and Editor. If it alters the structure of a written piece – run it over with the relevant Section Editor and Editor. This isn’t about feeling in control, I just feel its common courtesy to keep the relevant person in the loop at all times…

Re-evaluate roles – When roles ends coming up to publication date, re-assign the team member who’s job has finished to another section of production. Whether that’s flyering, promotion, tweeting, further editing etc

Progress targets – I feel at the end of each session there is no real set targets to aim for, individually anyway. What we need is if at the end of every meeting we draw up a list of achievable goals each person has to achieve and by a certain set date. That way no one will be in the dark and no one person will be doing things on they’re own and struggling whilst another team member is free.

Article Session – The team will always bring varying ideas for articles to the table but none ever fully get developed. The idea of this creative session (max of an hour long) is to develop suggested ideas, look at different angles, tie in pieces, potential writers for them, image ideas and art direction etc. Giving the team an overall feel that all of the articles have been a team effort and further bringing the publication inline with a real live magazine.

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www.milkartdirector.wordpress.com

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Summary

The transition from page to screen has been a relatively simple one for me in all honesty. Not working so much on the design side of the magazine last year has actually benefitted me as all I know is the online process. If I had to adapt from working on the print version last year to online this year then I would of found it harder, but as it is, I found it ok.I feel the new look milk fits perfectly in its new home. I’m not only proud of it, I’m actually ecstatic. With the changes over both issues I’m sure the publication will only get better.The areas I feel particularly work well are the little touches I’ve incorporated which brings it back to its magazine style routes. From sub headers to pull quotes, mixes of illustration and photography and the use of different colours per section in particular are areas I feel helps make it stands out in its own right as a publication to talk about.In all, milk’s transition to its new online home for me has been a tremendous success. From day one I had a vision for what I’d like the site to look and feel like and looking back over this huge body of work I can see its almost there. Things I’d changed for the future? Maybe make the design side a little bigger, but then I’m bound to say that! In all seriousness though, I do feel the Art Director would benefit from having an assistant, especially around the time of upload. Someone who’ll help upload the content, email contributors and check in with them, set up photo-shoots and help give the final look of the publication that little bit extra, something that time constraints meant I couldn’t do. Overall though, given the constraints we all worked under, milk looks and feels exactly how I had hoped. It’s a publication I’m happy and very proud to have brought into its new online territory and I’m adamant that it’ll go from strength to strength over the coming years.

Art Directors portfolio, Milk magazine.

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