Visual Editors
Visual Editors, NFP was incorporated as a 501(c)(3) non-profit in 2004.
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charles apple
Superhero
Joined: 09 Mar 2004
Posts: 3734
Location: Norfolk, Virginia
Posted:
Wed Sep 14, 2005 6:23 am
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The fabulous NewsDesigner, Mark Friesen, posted overnight low-rez prototype pages of the Baltimore Sun redesign that kicks in Monday:
He also provides a link to a pdf file of a brochure aimed at giving advertisers a clue what the new design is all about.
Among the "benefits" of the new design:
| Quote: | • A more attractive and energetic look — for instance, more color and eye-catching art above the fold.
• Easier to read, with larger type.
• More useful and helpful to readers.
• Added interactivity and connectivity, such as reporters’ e-mail addresses to encourage reader feedback.
• More sensitive to reader time constraints.
• Additional premium ad positions and ad adjacencies, such as the Traveler’s Forecast map. |
Mark also tells us about the new font designed especially for this redesign by Jean François Porchez, called -- appropriately enough -- Mencken:
| Quote: | | Porchez says it's "a sort of contemporary Didot" which moves to something more old-style in its text version and keeps a big x-height on the head version to ensure strong presence in headlines. |
See many more page samples and more info at the NewsDesigner.
Note to Baltimore Sun designers and editors:[i] Please pass along high-rez prototypes or Day One pages to Mark at Newsdesigner and Robb here at VizEds.
VizEds would like to feature them in a display in the new redesign wing of the site.
_________________
-Charles
Last edited by charles apple on Mon Sep 19, 2005 5:55 am; edited 1 time in total |
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charles apple
Superhero
Joined: 09 Mar 2004
Posts: 3734
Location: Norfolk, Virginia
Posted:
Mon Sep 19, 2005 6:43 pm
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Readers' comments on the new design are pouring in.
A few samples from the paper's moderated Web page...
From Richard Henderson:
| Quote: | | Well, you've done it. Killed your own newspaper. It's unreadable, and there's nothing in it. Nothing left there for me but to decide between picking up the Washington Post at the 7-11 or getting home delivery of the New York Times. For local news, I guess I'll be watching the murder and mayhem on TV. What a shame. |
From Laurie Taylor Mitchell:
| Quote: | | The new Baltimore Sun: the visual equivalent of FEMA. A disaster of too many different type fonts and sizes on one page, too many jarring colors and conflicting columns sizes and shapes on each page. This is a mess that points to the conclusion that whoever runs this paper has major USA Today envy. How interesting that the publisher cannot find the money to keep Thomas Friedman's column in the paper, but has plenty of money to waste on this visual drivel. If Dilbert were real, he' be delighted. |
From R. Flores:
| Quote: | | It's fine! I, for one, enjoy the changes. It's very attractive and quite readable. No, I'm not a budding critic fresh out of How To Design A Newspaper University and I don't have an Art degree but for goodness' sake, it's a newspaper with design elements that make sense to the general reading public. Thank you, Sun, for being fresh and innovative. |
In particular, folks seem to hate the colors, the inverted "L" on the section fronts and some of the typographical treatments. At first glance, sentiment on the web site appears to be about 85 percent negative.
Read 'em for yourself in the Baltimore Sun:
http://blogs.baltimoresun.com/about_sun_design/2005/09/sun_redesign.html
Memo to Monty: Hang in there, dude. It'll get better.
_________________
-Charles |
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mcookj64
Tiki Lounger
Joined: 22 Jul 2004
Posts: 16
Location: The Baltimore Sun
Posted:
Mon Sep 19, 2005 9:17 pm
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Thought I'd pass along a Day One update to all of those who have ventured into the blog on The Sun's website.
First, the numbers the conventional way. The Sun had geared itself for thousands -- one estimate by our marketing and circulation staff last week was an expectation of close to 10,000 -- of phone calls today based on the reaction to the redesign launch. This, in part, because the new design is a bold departure for a city that's always been rumored as change-averse.
We had our first company-wide redesign steering committee post-mortem at 4 p.m. today.
At that time, we had taken nearly 2,500 calls, a normal amount of calls for a Monday. Most of those were traditional starts and stops to the paper.
However, we had only about 170 phone calls related to the redesign -- this from more than 300,000 copies of The Sun out on the streets.
Of that total, 90 calls were negative. A little more than 40 were calls in favor of or congratulating us on the new look and the rest were "navigational" in nature, i.e., where did you move a particular feature.
We're not bothered by the contents of the blog. Sun readers are passionate, and this is quite common of their reactions on a host of issues.
We'll keep you updated. |
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mcookj64
Tiki Lounger
Joined: 22 Jul 2004
Posts: 16
Location: The Baltimore Sun
Posted:
Tue Sep 20, 2005 9:15 pm
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I promised a Day Two update of the reaction, in part because The Sun's blog generated much interest and seemed to be giving the impression that there was intense reaction against the redesign. Well, the blog WAS intense, no doubt about it.
As of 5 p.m. (when our call center closes down for the day), we had a two-day total of 257 calls. Of that number 158 were negative about the redesign, 62 positive, 21 were navigational (again, where a feature might be found).
Again, far fewer responses than we anticipated going in. If we are to count the emails in the responses (some of the people in the online blog are also people who have emailed), we have received a little more than 350 responses in two days.
We have had 16 subscription stops in two days, and 25 subscription starts.
On the circulation side, Monday's launch received an 8 percent bump in single-copy sales. This was on top of a bonus day when we flooded an extra 100,000 copies to Sunday-only subscribers. This was also on top of the Baltimore Ravens' lackluster performance Sunday against the Tennessee Titans. We had expected at best flat single-copy sales, and were prepared for a slight decrease.
The designers and all the hard-working staff at The Sun appreciates the interest we've received from a lot of you, and especially the kind words. |
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