Visual Rhetoric, October 9, 2013

TODAY

1) Logos– Max is going to talk with you about his work and yours

2) Brochure: What we know3) Brochure: how we’re going to grade it4) Brochure: Timeline5) Activity: build YOUR timeline6) Work time/predicting next week

Logos

As a part of your first assignment, Max, too designed a logo. He’s going to talk to you a bit about his process now.

The Brochure

We’ve now talked to all of our stake-holders on the client side. We have a vision of what they want. I’ve gone through the notes and tried to distill every key element we know they want into a slide. So… here comes a BUNCH of slides.

They’d like a one-sheet foldable creation– or a flat.

Personally, I don’t think a flat gives us the real estate to do the work.

We need to represent 4 majors/minors. In alphabetical order:

-Creative Writing-Linguistics-Literature-Professional Writing

We should include information about the department. A mission statement sort of thing.

Perhaps with that, or leading from it, a good “why major in English?” blurb.

I think infographics would be good here.

A portion of that could/should include discussion of job viability and graduate/professional school opportunities (again– infographic!)

We need a blurb about opportunities, like internships, partner projects, study abroad, publications.

Or maybe blurbs, plural?

They’d like to make the department look contemporary– Andrew said “the 21st century English department.” I like that impression a bit more than “steampunky,” but let’s keep both in mind.

Audience key point 1:

This is for potential students AND parents (this was a big stress from Heidi and cris)

Audience key point 2:

Will be used at events like “make it Miami.”

Will likely NOT be mailed, at least not alone.

Audience key point 3:

Remember these are potential students– we’re trying to entice and recruit, so we don’t need depth about majors; stress flexibility, employability, etc.

Audience key point 4:

Stress “experiential learning opportunities,” but make it sound better.

Audience key point 5:

Alumni quotes/senior quotes = good.

This is also a good place for some graphics/photos.

Audience key point 6:

Copy language = consistent. Target for copy language = student.

But don’t go silly with it. We’re not trying to write “What up gnarly Pre-froshies!” or anything like that.

Design point 1:

Miami branding needed.

Design point 2:

Heidi said “sexy” four times. Remember she doesn’t mean sexy like a Hardee’s commercial, but more like slick/professional– visually stunning.

Design point 3:

Modern… but still traditional. Contemporary!

Design point 4:

Pictures of collaboration = good.

Pictures of Bachelor Hall =good…ish.

Max has an idea about that.

Design point 5:

We can’t make a logo.

Don’t get confused; that means we cannot make a DEPARTMENT logo. It doesn’t mean we cannot use icons or icon-like images.

Design point 6:

This needs to look good– to pop. It should look good sitting in a folder, too (think about the bottom being covered partially by a flap.

At the same time

Dr. Phill pro tip:

Remember the words of the great architect Frank Lloyd Wright: FORM follows FUNCTION.

This should look good, but NEVER at the expense of being an effective brochure.

Design point 7:

We need to know what it means to represent an academic department.

I will help you with this, but keep that in mind. There are expectations we must maintain and stereotypes we might want to fight.

Design point 8:

We need to think about stuff like how ugly the folds were on the old brochure (e.g. no glossy paper– matte this time) and about design flow from fold-to-fold

Design point 9:

This should NOT be information dense.

That might be trick to pull off.

Dr. Phill Pro tip:

One place the ball was dropped with the current brochure is with the URL. Our goal is to sell the department and GET CLICKS!

STRESS THINE URL!

Design point 10:

How can we make this something the student WANTS to interact with?

That might be trick to pull off, too. How do you make a brochure fun?

So there’s what we know.

Here are some updated due date sort of things for you. Poor Max– he will have to change up your visual schedule again. Again. Sorry, Max! :)

But on the next slide are our current schedule changes.

Coming Soon

I made your current design task, which is task six, a two-weeker (so it’s due this Friday instead of last). Your next one will be due next week, but it is already posted on my blog if you want to work ahead. It might present a bit of a challenge, but I think you’ll have fun with it, too.

Coming Soon

Rough drafts of the brochure are still due on October 30th, but we will be pitching to the chair of the English department, Dr. LuMing Mao, on November 4th, so you will unofficially have the weekend after the 30th for any last-minute tweaks.

With the rest of class, I want you to work with your team to produce a work plan. Look at the time you have, the tasks you know we have, and start to determine what can be done, what you need by when, what you need from me and from the department, etc.

When that document is done, email it to me.

For Monday, I want you to read the PDF I emailed out. It should help you to think about the brochure, and it will be a huge help as we work on the website project next. It’s a little dense, so we might talk about it more than once.