Newspaper // Design Sprint Day 3 - Development

Day 3 - Development

Day 3 was about developing the visuals for our two newspaper concepts: NNN.NEWS.PAPER and The Ubergine. Using the 'crazy 8s' method of drafting visual ideas, which we adopted from the google design sprint, we gave ourselves 5 minutes to come up with 8 variants of the Ubergine logo, then 7 minutes to draw 8 variations of the NNN.NEWS.PAPER logo. The extra time was to accommodate for drawing the extra length of the title.

5 minute sprints

7 minute sprints:

After this, we tried to look at common themes between our drawings. What was similar, what worked and what didn't? This was a useful discussion as it really gave us a common understanding of what we were looking for in the identity and how this reflected the wider concepts we had drafted on Day 2. 

We took these rough logo ideas and conducted a 10 minute crazy 8s sprint to create each as a front cover within a mock layout. 

UBERGINE

NNN.NEWS.PAPER

We stuck these layout pages on the wall and discussed our favourite attributes across both of the concepts. It was clear at this stage that the Ubergine was presenting the best opportunities as a brand. The sketches for NNN were all lacking the instant communication of the tone of the paper. 

In effect NNN.NEWSPAPER.PAPER, while conceptually strong and with a base for some really great satire for the internet, needs way too much explaining. When you pick up a paper, it needs to immediately give you a feel of its tone and what to expect inside. We would risk putting off potential readers with a title that lacks character and requires explanation to be funny or even make sense.

The google design sprint process advises at this stage that you can either go 'battle royale' and pit two ideas head to head in user testing, or pick just one to have tested. For our crit we are faced with the same decision. By going ahead with one idea we hope to avoid a 'should I pick this or this' style crit and instead get some deeper feedback to act upon in the second week

In the afternoon, we concentrated on finalising a layout for the Ubergine. By the end of the day we wanted to be fully prepared to prototype on the computer tomorrow. This process began by putting yellow stickers on the layouts which had qualities we liked. 

We discussed the elements we liked from the shortlist and how we could combine them. Following this we sketched out some rough front page designs which we translated into a full-size mock-up: 

Mock-up front page

Tomorrow we will create a complete prototype newspaper for the crit on Monday. This is perhaps the most challenging day, so we will have to work fast to get it all completed. Today feels like a big step forward in the project, and although we had to be ruthless and pick one concept over the other I think that this was best, and will allow us to get the most effective and detailed feedback in the crit.