Photo Inspiration

It's getting warmer outside and, I love a good spring rain. What is crazy is last summer I started my interest in shooting firework photography. This was one of my first shots of a fountain going off. Persistence and determination, that's the key.

Critique

Mini Portfolio

We all have to make one for class, but I had to accelerate my production for an internship interview. This made me thrilled, yet anxious at the same time. While making it, I wanted it to represent myself in the pages. The cover went through many different revisions, but the main body of my portfolio is organized with identification bars to the sides and then I have introduction pages with quotes. I chose my favorite quotes and decided to place them on section pages, so Sara Steffens (AD at Anthem) could get a little sense of my personality. 

I think I chose nice colors throughout, but I think when I get the bound version I'm definitely going to adjust the layout and make things a little more uniform. Below is a little "taste" of my portfolio. 

You Can't Miss: Swiss-Miss

Ok. Okay. I don't know how much easier things can get for kids these days. Yes, I'm aware I sound like an 80-year-old grandparent. But when I was young if we were going to have a bake sale, lemonade stand, or any other way to increase our piggy bank's weight we had to make posters for "advertisement." It was real "homemade" looking, but it was my childhood.

That being said, I will now step off my soap box.

Ikea thinks of everything and now they've done it again. While this cardboard stand is meant for play, it is definitely a way for kids to have a business with a professional look. It's wonderful to see the different items that appear on Swiss-Miss. This is what I posted from my blog this week because when I first saw this, I thought, "wow, how things have changed." If even a lemonade stand business is changing this much, it only makes sense our field can and will drastically change over the next 15+ years.

Wired's most recent cover, April 2013. 

Wired's first cover, 1993.

Hannah was talking yesterday in class about how Wired has developed and changed so much over the years. And before that, I talked with Sara Steffens about Anthem Media and KC Magazine doing a redesign this summer and how she things digital magazines are becoming bigger, I just keep seeing change everywhere in this industry. I had another interview with Steffens and she kept stressing all the different programs we use constantly developing and it'd be really hard to ever know everything about them.
-AMA

Response

I could respond to many things, but my main response would have to involve our Meredith presentations. First, I don't want to sound mean, but working with a group of people who don't seem as interested in getting things done as you can be a little frustrating. When we were working on our designs we didn't have over half of our content and the only thing I can say is sometimes we have to realize people think our jobs are easy. Talking with somebody outside of school and telling them what I am majoring in, they think it's a joke. I take offense to that and you designers out there should too. I think sometimes we do such a great job (yes, our class has some pretty talented people) that people begin to think it's the easiest thing in the world and it only takes minutes. Well, we all know that's not true; while we can bust out good designs in hours, I know I prefer at least a day to prepare. I don't know, just something quick I thought I would respond to.

• What do y'all think? 
• Are you having problems with you Meredith groups?

-AMA

Photo Inspirations

FLORIDA...

When I was on spring break, I actually did a lot of homework, but also wanted to boost my photography skills. I took this "artsy" type photo of the bridge crossing over the Missouri River in STL. I like the old-timey bridges Missouri has and I think the rust along with the colors help to add an old kind of feeling.

So this photo is to remind us all [journalists] that sometimes we deserve to 

be apart of actual life. We should some times, step back and remember we

should capture ourselves in the moment. That's why I took this photo, it's

my trip too and I wanted at least one picture of me on Spring Break, even

if it's a picture of me in the car through the side car mirrors. 

You Can't Miss

Farmers Markets Friends

As journalists we are turning more and more to digital ways to provide the news and keep our readers updated on what's new. With spring here and farmers markets about to be in full swing this new app called Farmstand is a great way for shoppers to help other shoppers at. I think this is genius seeing that we as journalists are wanting to give our readers the best ways to get local food for great prices and the best product isn't always easy and timely. This is going to be great for the new going "green" trends. Check out the link above.

Floating Vases

As you may very well know, I am working on Debut magazine for our Meredith prototypes, I'm very excited to say that I have found something I think would be perfect in our magazines. Floating vases look really cool in my opinion and would definitely be an interesting decorating element for any outdoor party somebody may be hosting. I think these vases would make something so simple as displaying flowers, elegant and interesting to your guests. 

What the vase looks like out of water, 

this would work perfectly in pools and 

other bodies of water near the parties

you are going to host.

Critique

While I did have some time to relax on spring break, I spent a lot of time working and designing. Over break my men of Stephens feature design was published. Overall, I don't really have anything to critique on this feature seeing as we revised it 3-4 times before it was sent off to print. My only critique was on myself and like I said patience is a virtue. I received everything for the story the night before the first draft was due. While this has happened before with the covers, it was a little more nerve wrecking for a feature. 
 

The Friday of break I found out that I was designing the "On the Map" feature, it was interesting working on that considering it was several vignettes. I wanted to include an element throughout each of the vignettes that could tie them all together, so I added a sliver of the map behind each title. I was really interested reading the stories and wanted to have a cool way to display all of the stories on one page and draw the reader in. I'm not sure if Hayley's cover was chosen, but I kind of played with her idea of having the collage. I thought if hers was chosen it would be the best way to have a correlation between the print and digital versions. Also I liked the leads of most of the stories and thought that would be a great way to draw the reader in, so I paired them with pictures and made them into the table of contents. I really like Abadi (font) right now for it's clean, thin look so I paired that with Baskerville on the pages. I'm gonna save my 3 Martini Lunch covers until next week, as well as my department pages for 04.04.13. That's all for now. Hope you had a great break and Easter holiday.
-AMA