So these final few days before hand-in have been spent working on the Augmented Reality video. Which works as a proof-of-concept video to explain how the AR part of the project is intended to work, if I were able to spend thousands on buying a Markerless AR program and then hundreds on each individual target. Markerless AR isn’t OpenSource and using QR Codes would ruin the ‘offline’ feel of the magazine by putting irrelevant icons on pages which only make sense to machines, not readers.

I completed the video today and it’s on the Versus website, which is aptly titled versusprint.com for the AR video, go to the AR section.

The video, the ‘instructions’ flap in the magazine and the cards that are part of the packaging for hand-in (above) all seem to hammer home the concept concisely. Which is what I want. I didn’t want to waste time and space in the formats overly explaining the concept of Versus. So I’m glad I’ve managed to keep it to a 1 minute video, a 3 point explanation and a half page (literally).

Here’s the video which is for the versusprint.com website, which gives you an example of how the magazine and the AR side of it is intended to work, by recognising pages from the magazine and then playing extra media based on what’s been shown. This is all part of the ‘print working with digital’ aspect of the project.

As it’s part of the digital—more ephemeral—edition, I decided to include a cat in the video. People love seeing cats in videos.

Yesterday was a very strange, but ultimately very good day! I got to Orange for 10 to 9am, they were really great and didn’t mind me pedantically addressing some of the things I wanted sorted for the prints. After that was done I killed some time. Sat in Soho Sq reading Grafik’s design education special—just weeks away from graduating—bird shit landed on the open pages. I searched for a meaning in this Coen bros-like scenario but came up blank. I guess we’ll have to see…

I called ahead to Bookbinders of London just to check what I was trying to do was possible, then headed to pick up my prints from Orange which were looking nice. Next stop: binding.

Had a brief set-back as I hadn’t specified on the phone that my prints were full-colour bleed—this requires a different binding machine and different glue, they had just turned it off and it takes £50 of glue and 45 minutes to warmup again. After trying to work out a solution, I guess they sympathised with my situation because they turned it back on again. I sat in a café and then collected the newly bound magazines an hour and a half later, under instruction not to open them until tomorrow. The spines still felt warm!

I resisted temptation and opened them up today, I’m really very happy with how they turned out!

I’ll keep the rest as a surprise.

Right now I’m working on the proof-of-concept video for the AR workings of the publication.

I’ll be boarding the 7:40 train tomorrow morning stuffed with commuters from Bedford to get to the printers as early as possible. I’m hoping to hit the binders at around lunchtime so I can take a perfect-bound copy of the magazine home with me to shoot for the video. My mock up was too scuffed to use this weekend!

I’m happy with the uncoated stock used, which is 320 GSM for the cover + ‘Instructions’ flap (which helps sell the ‘print merging with digital’ concept) but I really don’t like how the magazine sits. As there’s quite a lot of pages and the mock was staple-bound, it naturally opens at the centre spread. To counter this effect, I’m opting to get the magazines perfect bound at Book Binders of London.

This weekend I’m going to start shooting the Augmented Reality video which will work as a sort of ‘proof of concept’ explanation of how the tech side of the magazine is intended to work and going through last minute preparations for the magazines to be printed at Orange on Tuesday. On Wednesday I’ll then be collecting the prints and getting them perfect bound at Book Binders of London.

It’s going to be tight but Orange have assured me there’ll be a quick turnaround for what I want to do!

If I can finish the magazine on Monday then that’d be even better, but I think this is realistic enough for now.

Font Crisis: A fast-paced split-decision game where you reconsider every font you’ve chosen based on cultural impact & peer usage.

I’m meeting up with a couple of printers tomorrow and meeting Gareth from Bearded magazine next week as he has a few contacts, I’m hoping to finalise a printer all before next Tuesday. Which may be a bit ambitious but I just don’t want to get caught out with last minute printing!

This week I’ve been writing as much of the content as I can as well as trying to get articles from others, the sooner the writing is done the sooner I can get on with designing the magazine—which is fairly important(!) The tone of the magazine has shifted unconsciously towards music, which I’m fine with although it’s still quite a ragbag of different topics. I’ve enlisted the help of my friend Jon who occasionally writes for The Quietus (one of my favourite music websites and home to a lot of ex-Plan B writers) too and he’s been helping me work out the voice of the magazine.

I’m also enquiring with Becky Smith of Twin—where I’m interning as a digital designer—about advice for print, as well as another friend Gareth who used to run Bearded (interview with him here he mentions my fanzine from second year, ‘Shit and Stuff‘, too!) so I’m as prepared as possible before I head to the printers.

The main photo for this entry is a close-up of one of Andy Holden‘s pieces, I took about 150 photos at his studio and have got some great shots for the magazine. I’m looking forward to working with his pallete of colours to set a tone for the ‘profile’ feature on him and he’s got a pretty lengthy press release that I can use as part of the feature.

Oh and finally, I’m trying to arrange a meeting with Veronica So and Simon Whybray of L_A_N magazine particularly as I feel that their magazine has a great concept, summed up neatly by So here in an interview with Grafik:

“I wanted to prove, if only to myself, that it was possible to put together a great magazine that was mysterious, desirable and stylish using the internet as a sole means of research.”

I was sort of inspired by Ian Svenonius’s essays in his book, ‘The Pyschic Soviet’, to add a small bit of fiction to my articles to keep it entertaining to read (and to write) also its a decision that’s partly inspired by the rock ‘n’ roll journalism clichés/mythology of the past and how that’s totally been eroded now by instant access and Twitter so we see how real and relatable todays ‘rockstars’ are. To that end I too have been using the internet as a major research tool to inform and add a bit of depth to the interviews I’ve conducted.

I’ve bought a domain that represents this and have got on with designing the site and writing up a few articles already.

I’ll post the URL to the site later in the week when there’s a bit more to see. In the meantime I’ve started talking to friends who might want to participate in writing, taking photos, etc. I used to run a little webzine from when I was 16 until I was 19 called Dirty so I still have some contacts from that as well as Q&A interviews I’ve conducted which could be re-written in to articles. I don’t want the magazine to be too focussed on any one thing—music or otherwise—so I’m keen to get a bit more variety in there.

I’m meeting my friend Andy Holden soon to help him out with setting up an exhibition, his studio is amazing so I’m going to take my camera along. I think they’d look beautiful as spreads in the magazine.

*Or versus, if you really want me to spell it out!