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| Wednesday, April 26, 2006 |
| Times, DNA, ET go for redesign |
We still cannot understand why a newspaper which is doing well should go for a design rejig, especially when the established design has no major problems. In the last couple of months, Econonic Times, DNA and now, Times have done some design "tweaking" - mostly changing the fonts, reducing and increasing column-widths and changing the artist's palette. Do they serve much of a purpose?
Economic Times did a redesign about 2 months back. The front page briefings column reduced in width. More headlines appeared in sans-serif fonts. Also, ET scrapped the popular CFM page (companies, finance and markets) and replaced it by an Economy, Finance and Markets page.
Many of the stories which appared on the erstwhile CFM page now appear in the Business of Brands pages, which are mostly left-hand side pages littered with ads. Those of us who used to turn to CFM after the front page have now lost interest. ET has successfully killed a sub-brand called CFM and replaced it with a weak economy page.
I am not a regular DNA reader; so won't be able to comment much on it. The redesign has made it look more spacious. It is clear that the re-designers had the HT format in mind when they attempted this task. But papers aspiring forthe HT design just cant make it because HT's mode of work is different from that of other papers, whereas newspapers these days are made mostly by the sub-editor clan & entry-level pagemakers who have has no training in design. What often happens in such cases is that the "integration" of page design and graphics dont happen. Many times, the grahics from the art depat dont gel well with the overall design. Not so with HT.
Times really had no reason to go for a design change I guess. or did they think they too have to go for the sans-serif fonts to make them look more contemporary? Times is already doing well as the largest English newspaper. Adding colour is one thing, but was the redesign rejig warranted?
Times does not seem to believe in the dictum that if somethng ain't broke, dont fix it.
But still, we are sure that Times can "carry off" the new design. They even got the entire industry and advertisers to shift from the broader format to a narrower format; didn't they?
I almost missed it: HT Style too had a design rejig sometime back. Now, HT Style is the only place where Ithink HT's design fundamentals have failed. Competitors Bombay Times and DNA After Hrs are far better. HT's design gives importance to a lot of free space and non-cluttered look. But this fails at HT Style. A celebrity-party-society section fails to catch attention if it looks loose and disconnected. HT Style looks more like a party where the invitees did not turn up. The buzzing-happening feel of Bombay Times is lacking in HT Style. It looks more like a Sunday afternoon read.
JM |
posted by a correspondent @ 6:46 AM  |
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