The Secret Ingredient of the Secret Ingredient

by Adonis Durado, Design Director, Times of Oman // SND STL Conference, 2011

Visual Conceit

W H AT C O N S T I T U T E S A G O O D PA G E ?
Every designer knows that the classic recipe is good headline and good art. But we all know that the newsroom is not a perfect world. Most often we get a good story with a crappy art. And this has become our existential wound, yet this does not mean that as creative we'll cease to engage our readers. Were told that putting the readers rst would be the key to our survival. But designers must learn to develop visualization techniques to captivate and engage its readers. This is not anymore a question of designing a good page but designers must produce pages that constantly grab readers by the balls, tickle their imagination, and perhaps propel them to utter the magic word: Wow! So how do we create a page that passes the wow-o-meter? And what is the secret to a wow page? Well, the key ingredient is simply to learn the concept of visual conceit.

DEFINITION
Visual conceit is a device, a method of dressing up, enriching, adding layer or dimension to a story. Its a visual treatment other than employing metaphor within the context of the story and the parameter of printed form.

TYPES OF VISUAL CONCEIT

The concept or idea as controlling element

CONCEPTUAL CONCEIT

STYLISTIC CONCEIT

The visual style as controlling element

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C O N C E I T E D A P P R O A C H E S : T H E M A N Y W AY S T O S K I N T H E C AT

Be funny or die.
Use humor and wit.

Dont be at.
Go beyond two dimensions... Try tactile.

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Art attack
Explore various visual styles Be ecclectic.

Textual attack.
Headline treatment in shock and awe.

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Create narrative.
Be it pictorial or textual.

Challenge and provoke.

Create defamiliarization and deconstruct existing notion. Be interactive.

INTERACTIVE

CONCEIT

Is it possible to have the headline size similar to its body text?

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Nothing succeeds like excess.

Exploit design elements. Use of dominant art or a minimalist layout.

Contextualize or texturize.
Be literal or be ambiguous. Create an architectonic quality.

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Play on readers perception.

Make reading an experience.

HEADLINE

How to spot a spinning blackhole

See micro, think macro.

A view from a grain of sand.

10

Creating motif to tie multiple pages or whole section

Creating motif to tie multiple pages or whole section

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CRACKING THE NUTS: DESIGN TIPS AND CARDINAL RULES

Execution is critical. Concept alone is not enough... style alone is not enough

Design is problem solving. Design with panache and with great respect to content

Exercise restraint. The beauty of simplicity. The image at the right is more simplier and cleaner.

Headline is the key. Consider rewriting to connect with your art

Dont be afraid to experiment. I created two design studies below and opted for the rst concept because it's the one I haven't tried before. Look for inspiration from other works. Build a "agging wall" where you can post concepts and visual styles.

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