Project #5—VIVID Magazine

VIVID magazine is geared toward people who appreciate vivid color and use it in their artistry. The audience includes florists, photographers, fine artists, quilters and cloth artisans, as well as chefs, all of whom consider color when presenting their work. Because color from one medium may inform how color is used in another medium, the breadth within the audience can inspire artists across many disciplines.Topics include color combinations, sources of colors, why certain colors fade more than others, as well as simply celebrating the range of colors in the world.

SUGGESTED CHANGES:
1) Cover Page—No changes needed.
2) Contents Page—Rotate the boutonniere to more of an angle and possibly reduce it slightly.
3) Spread—Try different colors on ampersand—white, lighter, or skin tone?
4) Spread—Is the drop shadow on "Inspired" the same as used on the other words? It looks too far away from the script lettering.
5) Spread—The blog info needs something (lower right of left page). Draw the green line to the left across the top of the blog info? Add more space above it? Somehow help to separate it visually from the body of the story.

CHANGES MADE:
1) Cover Page—No changes.
2) Contents Page—I have three versions for this page—the original, a little rotated, and more rotated. Each of them presents a different problem for me. The original version with the flower straight up and down looks too static and intersects the group shot awkwardly, but closes up the space above the flower so that the space doesn't look particularly trapped. The slightly rotated version interferes the least with the group shot. However, there is some trapped white space above the flower, to the right of the group shot. The most rotated version is a little looser than the others and creates a more dynamic visual flow on the page, but it has trapped space as well. Does that trapped space bother anyone besides me on the angled versions?
3) Spread—After trying several options, I reduced the opacity of the ampersand from 50% to 30%, using the original color. The skin color looked too dull and white was too much of a contrast, drawing too much attention to it.
4) Spread—I fixed the drop shadow on "Inspired." Good catch!
5) Spread—I ended up changing the fonts of the blog headline and body copy below it, which helped to more clearly distinguish the blog text from the feature article. I also lined up the second line of the headline with the green line to the right. This alignment helps tie them together without making that area too boxy.