2. Planning
I used a lot of different methods to help me plan for the production of the booklet.
For my primary research I set up a survey that asked people questions revolving around
veganism. I ensured that every question I asked would later benefit me when it came to
production. An example question would be ‘what are your thoughts on a vegan diet?’. I gathered
a range of answers and used this when it came to the production of my booklet.
For my secondary research I looked upon a wide range of vegan websites and gained information
about them. I took the main element from each site and used this to help the article to my
booklet. I ensured that I gained a large amount of research by looking at website base around
every aspect of veganism. I looked at websites that mainly focused upon vegan foods and the
alternative meals, animal equality, the health risks and the health benefits of being vegan and
much more. I gathered quotes from each website that I found to be useful, and attempted to
implement this into my booklet.
Furthermore I researched pre-existing infographics as it felt this would help me when it came to
designing my own. I took a few pre-existing examples and analyzed the key elements of each one.
Listing the strengths and weaknesses.
3. Planning
For the planning of my infographics I created a mind map that allowed me to view all my ideas
into one. This helped me to cut down certain elements I felt did not work as well as others. I
separated my mind map into four key topics, these being; fonts, images, facts, and colours.
Leading from each of these four topics I added each element I felt could work well inside if my
info graphic.
I followed this up with the selection of colours I would use when it came to the production of the
infographic. I knew I wanted to use a range of colour to allow for my infographic to stand out
from the others. I achieved this by picking the colours green, blue, yellow and red, but felt these
were too brought and would distract the audience from the text. So I decided to find a more calm
version of each colour by choosing a pastel variant for each colour. From there I selected a topic
for each colour. The topics were decided from the previous research collected in the mind map. I
further collected a sample of fonts that I felt would work well upon my infographic. I chose a
mixture of fonts ranging from bold to italic.
Next I designed three quick drafts of different infographics that I felt could have a similarity with
my final design. This helped hugely in allowing me to identify what would work well and what
wouldn’t .
Finally I gathered a selection of mages together to create a mood board. These images consisted
of things that related to the design of the infographic and the text that would be inside of the
infographic.
4. Preparation
In preparation for the final booklet I created in depth research around every element about
veganism. In preparation for the final article I created two drafts. The first draft included a a wide
range of unorganized information about the three aspects of veganism (animal equality,
environmental benefits, health benefits). I also felt there was too many unneeded words that
drifted away from the main subject of the article. To change this I created a new draft. In this
draft I cut out a lot of unnecessary information. This lead to my final article being well thought
out and consisting of relevant information based around veganism.
Different elements of preparation went into the design of the info graphics I created. I attempted
many different styles of infographics until I came across the one I felt worked best.
Time management was created to separate the work into an easier process. For the first section
of creating the booklet I spent a few weeks gathering the researched required to help me figure
what has worked well and what hasn’t in other websites based around veganism. Following that I
then spent time researching the same with infogrpahics (working out what worked well and what
didn’t). I then spent a couple weeks preparing for the production of my booklet. This included
gathering images for mood boards, collecting fonts that I felt worked well, designing mind maps
and more. With the time used to collect all the research, it left me enough time (4 weeks) for the
production of the booklet itself.
5. Audience suitability
The booklet was mainly aimed for the audience of anyone above the age of 13. This particular
target audience was selected because I felt that some of the information within the booklet, for
example, the health risks within the infographic. To ensure that the booklet didn’t include
anything disturbing, explicit or unsuitable for a younger audience I didn’t add any images of the
process towards animal farming and I didn’t go into too much detail when explaining subjects
such as the health risks of eating meat. I was aiming to gain the attention of an older audience at
the age range of 16 and above. I chose this age range as the main purpose for the booklet was to
courage people into becoming vegan and someone of a mature age is more likely to be
persuaded than someone of a younger age.
6. The content
I chose a wide variety of images for my booklet. Each image links to the subject of text placed
upon each page. For example upon the fact file of celebrities I added images of the celebs I wrote
about. I did this as I thought It would help the reader to identify who the information provided
was about. For some of my images I created an original version. I did this by rotoscoping over a
selected image. For my infographic all the images I used were rotoscoped.
Vegan food is stereotyped to not look nice so for my front page I wanted to prove that wrong. So
for my first age I used the veganuary website to gain an image of vegan alternative meal. I placed
this in the middle of the page to put it directly into the view of the audience. I also followed this
by placing bright colours around the image.
For my multi-page article I kept it simple by minimizing it too be mainly text. I added a couple of
images and I ensured these linked with the text. I did this by placing the particular image next to
corresponding text. On the final page of my multi-page article I added a rotoscoped image of a
vegan burger. This related to the end of the article as it mentioned the health benefits to being
vegan.
For my page upon fast food restaurants that have vegan alternatives available, I added images of
the restaurants logos. These I did not rotoscope. I kept these the same as the original image, I did
this to ensure the image was kept to its originality so people could still easily identify it.
The veganuary logo that is shown at the top of near every page has been kept the same, the only
edit I made was changing the colour to fit the background.
7. The style
The style of the booklet was kept the same throughout. I focused on keeping the font of the text
the same as I felt the font chosen was bold and easy to read. However the font for the article
changed to ensure that the typography wasn’t kept the same and allowed for a more variety
within the booklet. I did this as I felt the article would feel more formal if placed into a different
font.
I tried to keep the colour scheme the same throughout the entire booklet as I thought this would
help the pages fit together more. I stayed with four pastel colours (red, blue, green and yellow).
For the pages that included the article I added no colour for the background to ensure the text
was visible to the reader but I feel that adding colour around the text could work.
The images used within the booklet are all linked the subject of the text near to the image itself
(the same page). All images have been chosen from the Veganuary website. To ensure that there
was a range of imagery I rotoscoped a few of the pictures. This style worked well and created a
wider range of imagery for the audience to view.
8. Skills
A wide range of skills have been used to create the booklet and due to this my skills have greatly
increased. For the production of all imagery used within the booklet, Photoshop came to great
use in allowing me to rotoscope certain images. As I already knew a lot about Photoshop my skills
helped greatly in allowing me to complete these certain tasks and giving me full potential to
rotoscope and design my pages to the best quality. Using Photoshop has helped to layout all my
pages.
I have a very small amount of experience with InDesign and using to layout my article has greatly
improved my experience with the software and therefore increasing my skills upon it. When it
came to implementing the text, headings/sub headings and images to the article I was unaware
of what to do at first. But after using the software more the tools and everything else become
somewhat easier to use and I feel that overall my skills have improved.
Not all skills were used when it came to the production of my booklet. I feel that my researching
skills have greatly improved after the process of researching everything about veganism. I already
had experience within researching but using the different methods that I came too when creating
my vegan sites research has allowed me to gain experience with new methods of research.
9. Areas for improvement
For my infographic I could add a couple of the pull quotes that I took from the pre-existing vegan
website research. This could also be implemented into my article. In my article I include one
quote and too improve this I could add another one or two quotes to a different section of the
article.
One page of the booklet (the page in witch the article finishes) where I added a large image of a
rotoscoped vegan meal. The page has a large empty area to it. To fix this I could add a recipe that
links to the vegan meal on the page. This would fill the space and also allow for more purpose
towards the rotoscoped image.
For a couple of the pages (Celebrity fact file and page about the environment) I could change the
typography, this could be done by pulling out more quotes and enlarging selected words to help
the reader identify the more important facts/key words. I could also improve the masthead of
certain pages by enlarging the font size.
For some pages I could implement more colour. Colour would be added to make the booklet look
more aesthetically pleasing. For the article pages I could add colour around the text instead
instead of behind, this way the text is still very visible and easy to read and the the colour will still
allow the pages to flow.
The majority of these ideas have come from the feedback given to me from my audience.
10. Criticism
I feel that my booklet lacks images and includes a lot of white space, this didn’t work very well
and could easily be countered. In this process of creating my booklet I could’ve added images
revolving around the subject of veganism and to reduce the amount of white space I could’ve
spaced out the text. I feel that the text within the booklet is good but the other elements didn’t
work out so well.
I also feel that a few pages lack colour. This goes for the design if the booklet, when creating the
booklet I felt that the less colour would’ve created a more professional look, but after looking at
the final product I can see that more colour would be needed to draw the audiences attention.
After looking at the final product I have noticed the lack of pull quotes throughout the booklet.
Finally, I also noticed that the masthead could be placed into a bolder font to draw the attention
of the audience. Not only this but I didn’t add a border to anything, this could have been a
successful method in presenting a certain section of the booklet.
