The readings for this week were a combination of the Robin William’s Design Handbook and an article on Document Design by Klein and Shackelford. The reading for today from the book was about tips and tricks to consider when designing visual items such as business or post cards, articles, brochures, websites and virtually any other piece that could stand some good visual elements. I personally found the section about business cards to be the most important for me in my career. In the media industry many things rely heavily on proper networking and lasting connections. First appearances and impressions are critical moments and it is crucial that you don't do anything to make yourself look bad. One of the best aids in first appearances is a well designed business card. Business cards provide key insights into a person and their line of work. The book stresses the importance of a well organized and interestingly designed business card because it is a representation of who you are, and for potential contacts or employers a proper business card will help to ensure that they will want to get ahold of you. A proper business card needs to be designed so that it is appealing and draws the clients attention, and well organized so that they only need to glance at it to understand everything presented.
The second section that I found to be very important from the Design Handbook was about website design. Website design is also very important in the media field, once a potential employer or client had your business card they need someplace to go to examine your work and background. A proper website is a major asset in media and entertainment and can often draw in clients that you haven’t actually met in person. A well designed website for a media professional should include a brief introduction to welcome the viewer and give them some insight as to who you are. A good media website will also contain a portfolio of works and projects so that potential clients can see exactly what you have worked on and are offered samples of what you are capable of doing. Another good section for a professional website is a list of qualifications or awards that show they quality and passion of your work. All of this should be presented in a clear and easily readable format. It is important that a professional website be easy to navigate and be relatively simple in layout because you want viewers to be able to experience all of it without having difficulty engaging in the website.
The article reading by Klein and Shackleford seemed to elaborate on many of the ideas of basic design principles brought up by Robin Williams in her design manual. They too stress the importance of basic structural and visual elements such as contrast, repetition, alignment and proximity but they seem to strive to apply that to every piece of writing, rather than just mainly for formal or professional projects, or even just for sake of creativity. Klein and Shackelford seem much more strict in their approach, stressing precision and formulaic repetition of guidelines whereas the Williams book outlines those ideas but continuously stresses the idea of individual creativity. Klein and Shackelford would have us write everything in a very strict and regulated way, utilizing MLA above all else. I think that this is extremely limiting in that not every thing is written for the same purpose or to the same end. What matters more than anything is context and an appropriate choice in design based on that context. I personally do not use the MLA format for anything, when I use citations I utilize the Chicago Style which I find much more effective and a lot less distracting to my readers.
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