Development - New Mock Up (17th March)

Last night, following some feedback from Tulia, as well as some self critiquing, I decided to develop my brochure so that I would have another one ready for today. That way, I have a further developed brochure and can get more vital feedback, otherwise I would have to wait until next Monday, and since we are already in Week 4, it's best to take the feedback as thick and fast as possible.

So today, Caroline came around and got me to pin my work up on the pin board wall, so that I could see it from a bit further back and see how it looked. Again, this mock-up has been placed into my physical workbook, although this time the feedback has been written directly onto the brochure itself, rather than on separate print-outs.The images have also been attached to the this post. I am still working on creating a map for my brochure, which will complete it and give me the total of 12 pages required.

In these developments, I have changed the imagery on the colour, trying to give it more of a scenic look, showing a lookout of the city from the top of the botanic gardens. I have also added in some subtle texture into the cover, and I have the text in a dark blue/black, rather than white reversed out of a blueish colour. In my Mt. Vic spread, I have added in a view of the city. I felt like this gave the spread some very interesting line work and intricate detail, and also created more of a visual flow have the large Mt Victoria sign in the top right. There is quite an apparent flow on the diagonal from the bottom left to the top right. I also decreased the size of the heading to fit with the other spreads. In the Red Rocks spread, I've altered some of the text in terms of switching the third and fourth paragraph around, and I have also extended the line length. The pink behind the warning sign has also been faded more. In the Botanic Garden spread, I extended line length, and made the heading the same size as the other spreads. In the final spread, the journey planner, I added in some intricate linework from a view of the city, along with some hills in the background to give it a more interesting look, without covering the calendar planner or making it look confusing. I felt like this gave it more emotive qualities and ties it into my other spreads nicely.

The feedback from Caroline is as follows...
- Experiment with a landscape brochure, so that it is shorter but wider, as it will fit in better with the theme of scenic walks. It will allow more space for imagery, rather than having it all crammed in and taking away some 'breathing space' inside of each spread.
- Remove the lines from beside the text, as it makes your eyes want to stay over reading the text rather than go look at the beautiful imagery on the other page.
- Experiment with indenting the text, so put all of it into one big group and indent each paragraph (except for the first).
- The text looks too static at the moment, and there is almost too much consistency between the text layouts. Also, go back to having the more creative and expressive headings like in my initial Red Rocks development, where it helps to make each spread unique.
- Play around with the composition of the Red Rocks layout, as the warning sign at the top right is almost too dominant. Try having the "Owhiro Bay" sign up there instead, the seal beneath, and then the sign further down towards the bottom left hand side of the spread, to create a clear and consistent visual flow along the diagonal.

- Try to recreate the diagonal visual flow in the Botanic Gardens spread too. Possibly drop the flower down so that it is cropped off the page, and then start layering images behind it and slowly move them towards the top right hand corner. Try to create it in a way that there is also some 'breathing space'.
- On the botanic garden spread, change the colour of the icons in the bottom right, as they are quite difficult to see in white on red.

I have found this feedback extremely helpful, as it has given me a lot of aspects of my brochure to work on and develop, which means I can make quite big steps in my next few developments rather than small incremental developments as I last few have been. I really like the idea of doing the landscape brochure, and I fully agree that it would be better suited to the mood and nature of my brochure. Since I am doing scenic walks, it would make sense to have a wider, less cramped, and more open brochure, which 'allows the eye to walk'. I am really looking forward to working on the next few developments and seeing exactly how far I can go with these changes. I am glad that Caroline agreed to go back to the creative headings, as I can now use these to express a certain uniqueness to each of my chosen scenic destinations. I will keep my blog updated with my developments, as well as printing developments to put into my physical workbook.