TOC Feedback Process and Final Revisions

In this blog, I will be discussing the comments that I received from the feedback of my Final TOC. I will also show the revisions that I made to my previous Final TOC, the before and after. I will include the suggestions that I got from my peers during the feedback session and from my family. I will discuss whether I want to keep the changes or not, by aligning them with my magazine genre conventions.  I will also explain the choices that I decided to go with, in great detail, as well as the ones I did not necessarily agree with and will be explaining the reasons why. Lastly, I will include a summary of all the elements that I used in my Final TOC and explain the process behind its production.

 

 

 

 

 

 My Final Table Of Contents

 

This is my Final Magazine TOC. This table of contents incorporates some colorful elements, such as the bronze columns that are separating the different types of article, in order to make the Final TOC look more organized. These elements not only make the TOC attention-grabbing, visually appealing and professional, but also give it an artistic style and personality. Keep in mind, this TOC is a 1-page spread, as it subverts the conventions of an Art magazine. 1-page TOC's are very rare in Art magazines, as most of the time, the reader gets bombarded by unnecessary information because all of the article titles are fit in 1 page. Even Though, 1-page TOC subverts my genre's conventions, I included it, as my magazine does not have that many article titles, allowing me to explore a wider range of designs and formats. I did have to make my images smaller, in order to fit 1-page, but this makes them look more organized and defined, giving the reader an opportunity to connect the article title they are searching for, with the preview of the art that is going to be featured in the magazine. This design is both informational and visually appealing as the article titles that are included in the TOC can easily be seen by the reader. This gives the reader the required information, in order to make a decision, on which article they are most interested in, and where they can find that article. By bolding out the page numbers of the article, I am not only making these page numbers look more defined and clear, but also giving them more power, so that the reader can easily figure out which page number is their chosen article on. The boldness also adds to the visual appeal of the TOC and makes it look more professional. The font I used for the Final TOC is Open Sans, as it is a Sans serif font, which are used in many Art magazines, because of the power and definition they give to the text. I also used Playfair Display Black for my main TOC title, as it expresses an old charm with a modern twist, because it uses a rounded and pointy serif font. The font also creates a traditional, reliable, and respectable design. It’s great for magazine Table Of Contents that aim to communicate credibility. Playfair Display is one of the best fonts for Art magazine TOC headers, as it is a display type. Which offers contrast through its expressive shape, without being pushy with the magazine TOC design. Lastly, Playfair Display Black and Opens Sans are a perfect pair as they give a clean and modern body copy for the magazine TOC design. By changing my text into a sans serif font, I am not only giving it more power and definition, but also increasing the impact of the text on the reader. A sans serif font can really impact the reader's mind, when they are scrolling through the magazine, as they first catch the reader's attention, and then impact them, with the emotions of power and definition. This gives the reader an opportunity to connect with the magazine and the contents present in it. I also made some article titles larger than others, as this gives the reader an incentive to look at the article itself, as these larger article titles do not give a preview of the image they are going to feature, creating a sense of suspense and inquisitiveness in the reader's mind. Lastly, I gave the article titles a more paragraph-like structure, in order to give more definition and power. This paragraph structure also makes the article titles easier to read, as words use less space and seem more concise. The images I used for this magazine convey various emotions of power, sadness, fear, tranquility, calmness, excitedness and most importantly, happiness and positivity. When formatting images, I chose to place them on the brighter and more vivid side of the spectrum, as this aligns with the conventions of my genre. Most Art magazine TOC's have very bright and vivid imagery, in order to keep the reader interested in the magazine, and encourage them to look over and go through the table of contents. The brightness used in most of my images is probably like a 10/100, which not only makes the image bright, but also makes it more clean and clear to the eyes. Keep in mind, increasing the brightness of an image is not always the right thing, as if you increase the brightness too much, then the image will become much harder to see, and will also cause a lot of stress on the eyes. I also increased the saturation of my images, as the saturation makes the image more vivid and colorful, giving the images more definition and power. The saturation for these images is probably around 35/100.  Keep in mind that increasing the saturation of an image is not always a good thing, as the saturation is too much, then the art starts to look fake. Increased saturation can also lead to too much color, which can stress the reader's eyes, making it harder to see the original image. So, in order to prevent this from happening, I also increased the contrast of the image, in order to balance out the brightness and saturation. The contrast for these images is probably 65/100. The contrast not only gives the images a beautiful and appealing effect, but also makes it attention-grabbing and easy on the eyes, as it increases the amount of clashing between the colors, which prevents them from blending and gives them more definition and style. 

 

 

Process Behind My Final TOC 

 

This is the first part of my process, when making My Final TOC. In this part, I chose the images I wanted to include in the 1-page spread of my final table of contents.  The images that I chose were taken by me, and the reason why I chose these images is because they represent various emotions, and are very clean, appealing, attention-grabbing, and professional. They also have an artistic personality to them, which aligns with the conventions of an Art magazine. 

 

This is the part where I started formatting my images. I did this, in order to make them look clean, appealing, attention grabbing and professional. I was able to achieve this by changing the brightness, contrast and saturation for each image. I also cropped these images, so that they could properly fit the page. Contrast and saturation are two very important elements, in relation to photos. This is because, contrast manages the amount of difference there is between the colors of the image, as if the colors are clashing together, then the image becomes painful to see, which is a very bad sign. The saturation is what makes the colors bright or dark. Saturation and Contrast go hand in hand, as if the saturation is too much, then the contrast has to be enough to balance it out and vice versa. The balance in this image results in it being very beautiful and visually appealing, which is good for catching the audience's eyes and peaking their interest in the magazine.

 

 

This is the part where I started positioning my images. By positioning them like this, the reader will easily be able to see which article is featuring which piece/photo of art. I positioned these images, in an organized column style, as most of my images are center aligned. I chose this style so that the article titles can be easily seen throughout the page. Also, the organized column style gives the table of contents a professional touch, which is needed in order to make it look more appealing, in order to peak the interest of the reader.

 

 

This is the part where I started adding text boxes to my Final TOC. By adding text to my final table of contents, I am making it more balanced and informative. As, a table of contents with just images, isn't informative and is practically of no use. Also, an image with only text, isn't good either, as it bombards the reader with what would seem like unnecessary information and makes the table of contents less appealing and attention-grabbing.

 

 

This is the final part of my process. This is where I added creative elements to my Final TOC, in order to make it more appealing and professional. By adding these elements, I'm not only making the table of contents look good, but also encouraging the reader to actually look at the contents and focus on it, as it was one of the most essential elements of a magazine. I also added some final touches to the table of contents, by inserting bright, bronze lines in order to depict a column, which is responsible for making the final TOC look organized and professional. This was also the part where I reviewed my process, as it is very common for designers to revise their table of contents and look at it from a reader’s perspective, so that they know whether the table of contents is going to benefit or harm the magazine’s sales. This is a very important method, as it gives the designer the opportunity to reevaluate their magazine table of contents, to make sure that it aligns with most of the conventions of their selected genre, correct their mistakes, if any, so that the final table of contents looks professional, appealing, and attention grabbing, in order to ensure that the magazine is interesting from the inside.  

 

 

 

Changes 

Before 

After

 

After creating my Final Table Of Contents, I asked my family and peers about what they felt about my final TOC. After taking their feedback into account, I completely changed my Final TOC. I did this, because there were too many inconsistencies in my previous Final TOC, so instead of changing those inconsistencies one-by-one, I just decided to make a whole new Final TOC. This final TOC incorporates most of the feedback that I was given, by my family and my peers. The first feedback, I was given on my previous Final TOC, was to take clearer pictures that I use, because the reflection off of them was not looking professional. Also, my numbering of pages was confusing as the color scheme did not match up with the coordination. The page numbers would make the reader feel confused as they could not have told which title would be connected to which art being featured. So, to rectify this inconsistency, I decided to make my images smaller and less brighter, in order to reduce the reflection that was coming off of them. I also decided to position my page numbers and article titles, on top of the art being featured, so that the reader doesn't feel confused, as is easily able to tell which page number features which art. I changed the colors of my page numbers as well, so that they match with the color scheme. I changed them to black, as black text and white background create a beautiful contrast, and the color black, also gives more power and definition to the text. The second feedback, I was given on my previous Final TOC, was to change the content names to something different and have the page numbers in order, instead of randomizing them. I decided not to incorporate this feedback in my Final TOC, as randomized page numbers are a part of an Art Magazine's conventions, as when we look inside a magazine, there are several spreads between the content that are responsible for featuring advertisements. These advertisements are a way to represent the sponsors of the magazine, which are very important, as they are the ones funding the production of the magazines in the first place. Also, I decided not to incorporate this feedback, as most of my articles are going to be a continuation of the coverlines that I included in my magazine's cover. I also did not change the random numbers, in order to keep the reader interested in the magazine, as if I had all my articles in a consecutive order, then the reader would most likely feel bored of the article, and will stop reading the magazine, even without knowing what's next. So, in order to prevent this from happening, my article spreads are going to represent different parts of the coverlines, which are located on different pages. This will invoke a sense of curiosity in the reader, and will expose them to different articles, within a short period of time, and if the reader wants to continue reading the same article, then they can just go back to the table of contents, and look up the next page of that same article. This in turn, increases the use of the TOC as well. The third and final feedback, I was given on my previous Final TOC, was to add better fonts that look more professional and appealing. I was told to look for different font choices, as the font I had in my previous TOC looked very basic and did not have the right level of professionalism, which made the TOC look, not very attention-grabbing, unappealing, tacky, and unprofessional.  I decided to take this feedback into consideration, and rectified the inconsistency. I did this, by changing my article titles font from Sergio Trendy to Open Sans. Open Sans was a really good choice as it is a Sans serif font, which is used in many Art magazines, because of the power and definition it gives to the text. By changing my article titles into a sans serif font, I am not only giving it more power and definition, but also increasing the impact of the text on the reader. Another advantage of using Open Sans, is that it perfectly pairs with the font, Playfair Display Black, which I used for the main TOC title. This pairing allows me to give a clean and modern body copy for my magazine TOC design. Playfair Display Black expresses an old charm with a modern twist, as it uses a rounded and pointy serif font. The font also creates a traditional, reliable, and respectable design. It’s great for the magazine Table Of Contents that aims to communicate credibility. Playfair Display is one of the best fonts for Art magazine TOC headers, as it is a display type. Which offers contrast through its expressive shape, without being pushy with the magazine TOC design. After incorporating most of these feedbacks, I decided to add a few elements of my own. Firstly, I updated my Final Table Of Contents to be a 1-page spread, as even though it subverts my genre's conventions, I included the 1-page spread, as my magazine does not have that many article titles, allowing me to explore a wider range of designs and formats. I did have to make my images smaller, in order to fit 1-page, but this makes them look more organized and defined, giving the reader an opportunity to connect the article title they are searching for, with the preview of the art that is going to be featured in the magazine. This design is both informational and visually appealing as the article titles that are included in the TOC can easily be seen by the reader. This gives the reader the required information, in order to make a decision, on which article they are most interested in, and where they can find that article. Lastly, I also included colorful elements to my Final TOC, such as the bronze columns which are responsible for separating the different types of articles. I did this, in order to make the TOC look more organized. These elements not only make the TOC attention-grabbing, visually appealing and professional, but also give it an artistic style and personality.

 

 

Tools And Sources

  

N/A, Martina. “19 Of the Best Fonts for Websites.” Zyro Blog, Zyro, 24 Feb. 2022, https://zyro.com/blog/best-fonts-for-websites/.  

  

Canva, Canva. “Collaborate & Create Amazing Graphic Design for Free - CANVA.” Canva, Canva, 2013, https://www.canva.com/. 

  

C, Aditya. “Mockups, Process and Final Choice Elaboration.” Mockups, Process and Final Choice Elaboration, Blogger, 24 Feb. 2022, https://adityachhabria.blogspot.com/2022/02/mockups-process-and-final-choice.html.

  

C, Aditya. “Cover Photo Editing/Selection.” Cover Photo Editing/Selection, Blogger, 12 Feb. 2022, https://adityachhabria.blogspot.com/2022/02/cover-photo-editingselection.html.  

 

C, Aditya. “TOC Images and Original Content.” TOC Images and Original Content, Blogger, 19 Feb. 2022, https://adityachhabria.blogspot.com/2022/02/toc-images-and-original-content.html. 

 

Fussell, Grace. “10 Tips for Designing High-Impact Magazines.” Design & Illustration Envato Tuts+, Envato Tuts, 15 June 2020, https://design.tutsplus.com/articles/10-tips-for-designing-high-impact-magazines--cms-25956.