Critique: Magazine Prototype

This week we presented our first drafts for the Modern Midwest prototype I'm taking part in designing, along with Erica Hunt, Joe Bradley, and Michelle Pais (our creative director). I think one of our biggest obstacles was just getting on the same page with a cohesive design and template for our department pages. With all of the other projects we've had going on simultaneously, working to improve our designs as a team has taken a backseat. Turning in those first pages helped us to see where we needed improvement, which was great because now our pages will look much better for the formal presentation tomorrow. Everyone has been working really hard to get ready for tomorrow and things are looking great! I can't wait to see everyone's prototypes tomorrow. Here are the pages I designed for our prototype:

Calendar/Events department page - the copy really needs to be worked with for this page. We also need to replace most of the photos with studio shots. Photography will be a huge obstacle for our group because our topic is not exactly stereotypical of the style our publishers usually work with. The creative library had few options for all of my pages, if any. 

Here is the Music department page. This page is also desperately needing some photography and perhaps illustrations, depending on how many photos we end up needing in the end. 

Both spreads above are examples from the Bachelor(ette) Companion Feature. I tried to use color boxes to separate the text and make the pages appear less text-heavy, but I think it may need a little more color and vibrancy. The gray boxes seem a little dull now that I look at it again. The sidebars on pg. 4 are not completed because the text needs to be completely changed. These will be filled next time you see the spreads!