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Section 0101
Heavilon 227
T-Th, 10:30 -11:45 a.m.
Dr. David Blakesley
Office: Heavilon 302c
Hours: T-Th, 9:30 - 10:30 a.m. and by appt.
Ph: 765.494.3772
Fax: 765.494.3780
blakesle@purdue.edu

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Project Overview

In this project, you'll work with a partner to create two kinds of documents, one short and one more involved, for a real client at Purdue or in the community.

Short document = Flyer, Poster or Banner, Ad, or CD Label/Stamp
Long document = Brochure, CD Booklet/Insert, Newsletter, Company Guide

Each of the documents will be for the same client and the process will involve (again) finding tangible solutions for reproduction and dissemination of the documents. As part of your work, I'd also like you and your partner to prepare a short overview of one software or Web-based solution that can help others when designing and publishing these kinds of documents. Possible clients include the PW Program, the Center for Digital Publishing, WPA: Writing Program Administration, The Writing Instructor, the PW Club, or a client that your team selects after consultation. Software used will include Pagemaker (or InDesign), Photoshop, Acrobat, Fireworks, Dreamweaver, Microsoft Word, and Web-based solutions. (Collaborative; 20% of course grade; Due: Thursday, October 16.)

Prompt

Work in three-person teams to prepare a set of sales and marketing documents (see deliverables) for a real client. Possible clients include the PW Program, the Center for Digital Publishing, WPA: Writing Program Administration, The Writing Instructor, the PW Club, or a client that your team selects after consultation. (For each of these clients, see me for contact information and details about what type of document might be needed.) It's possible that more than one team can work with the same client, but the documents produced would need to be different. You may use Templates to help with more advanced media design (such as in Pagemaker or InDesign) but you should not rely on any specific visual or format decisions contained within such templates.

Project Goals

An important set of documents for any organization are those routine sales and promotional documents that represent its products, organizational mission, or special events. For most clients, the rhetorical aim is to convey professionalism while also representing its mission and style. With that in mind,the goals for this project are closely related to overall course goals, with emphasis on these in particular:

• Learn strategies for planning, writing, and revising the content and design of documents that you can flexibly apply to future writing and publishing challenges
• Improve your management of the digital tools that are often used in the workplace and publishing industry
• Learn the principles of effective design and how to use them in creative and liberating ways, as well as when to be conservative
• Develop a critical eye for design
• Learn what computers can do design- and publishing-wise and how to make them do it
• Learn effective strategies for working with clients, including knowledge elicitation and design consultation

Deliverables

All final drafts of deliverables are due when the project is due, but there are intermediate deadlines that you will need to meet if you want to benefit from peer feedback and class discussion. Looking Good in Print will serve as your major reference source for the deliverables, but you're also strongly encouraged to review samples from Robin Williams' Design Workshop and other samples brought to class. All deliverables should be saved in their program-specific format (e.g., TIF, DOC) so that you can continue to revise them as needed. You will turn in only the printed and PDF versions of all the deliverables at the end. You should make every effort to make sure that the printed versions are proof quality and in color (if relevant).

For each of the deliverables, you'll take notes on printing solutions and include them on a "Protocol Sheet" that you'll submit as a summary for the client of options for publishing each of the deliverables (see below for details on that step).

1. Flyer, Poster or Banner, Ad, or CD Label/Stamp

Draft and design one of these documents for the client that can be used to promote the organization or its products. Before you decide what particular document is needed, you will need to discuss your project with the client in an interview. (Be sure to review the Ethical Guidelines for Interviewing (Word format) and to follow them.)

Notes

Flyer: The flyer would help the client announce a special event, product-release, or other one-time event. Such flyers are typically posted to a Website and on public displays. Sometimes they're distributed at conferences or other events where people interact. They might also serve as promotional material that is mailed to customers.

Poster or Banner: These are more permanent documents that are used at special events (such as conferences, workshops, or poster sessions) or at physical locations (the place of business, for instance. They usually need to be more permanent in nature and capable of re-use over time, as well as easily transportable.  To give you an example, Parlor Press had a company poster produced by BigPosters.com (view the PDF sample of a banner or a PDF sample of a book cover from Parlor Press)

Ad: Depending on client needs, this ad may be for a newspaper, magazine, conference program, or other venue where it's critical that the client represent its product in informative and eye-appealing ways, all according to specs provided by the ad publisher. Find out if your client wants to place an ad before you choose this media.

CD Label/Stamp: Your client may have information (such as an ebook, an archival collection of documents, or music) that it wants to distribute on CD (or DVD). CDs need to be "stamped," either using a labeling kit or professionally by a reproduction company (for an example of the latter, see Oasis CD Manufacturing)

• Technologies: Word, Pagemaker or InDesign, Acrobat, Photoshop, Fireworks
• Format: Turn in both an optimized PDF version and the version as produced in the native software.
• Important Date: Your team should have a draft of this deliverable ready for review and discussion on Thursday, October 2.

2. Brochure, CD Booklet/Insert, Newsletter, Company Guide

Draft and desing one of these documents for the client. This document will involve more writing and research, and it should complement the media (in style, form, or purpose) of deliverable 1 (if you produce a CD label, you should produce a CD Booklet/Insert with detailed information). After discussing client needs, you'll develop a template and the actual document for the client. (The template will allow the client to insert alternative or updated information.)

Notes

Brochure: A brochure may come in a variety of sizes, depending on printing specs, client needs and budget, and scope of coverage. Choose a brochure that will best suit the client and the content that the client wants to express. Be sure also to request prepared information from the client and to solicit any needed information to fill out the brochure. There should be a well-designed cover in addition to inside text.

CD Booklet/Insert: These are usually inserted in the jewell cases or other packaging for the CD (or DVD) and provide the consumer with more specific information about the product (what the CD contains, how to play or read it, technology requirements, and so on. It must be carefully designed to match the stamped CD. (For music, inserts usually include artwork, lyrics, and other information about the artists.) There are some templates at Oasis CD Manufacturing that you might review.

Newsletter: Newsletters are short overviews of recent news of an organization, sometimes running as much as 10 pages, often in an easily reproduceable form (8.5x11, for example). Newsletters typically function like small newspapers and in addition to stories, offer visual material and organizational information.

Company Guide: A company guide provides an overiview of the company for its clients, employees, or even prospective investors. (Usually, a company guide won't try to accomplish all three goals in the same document.)  The nature of the information offered will vary according to audience and purpose (if employees, the guide may be more factual, with less emphasis on "selling" the company than you'd see if the guide were for investors). Design complexity also will change according to intended audience. Sometimes company guides take the form of a "Year-End Report."

• Technologies: Word, Pagemaker or InDesign, Acrobat, Photoshop, Fireworks
• Format: Turn in both an optimized PDF version and the version as produced in the native software.
• Important Date: Your team should have a draft of this deliverable ready for review and discussion on Tuesday, October 7.

3. Protocol Sheet

You should also prepare a one-page Protocol Sheet that includes, where applicable, important information about how to print each of the deliverables, media to use, contact information, recommended commercial sources, and other specs. You should have short entries for each of the deliverables. Here are some answers to include.  (For an example of why you might need a protocol sheet, see this sample "Poster Order Form," which was used to order a small poster for a Parlor Press book.)

1. What's the best method for printing it? (Color laser? Color Inkjet? Black laser? Or? At a printing press? Is it optimized for RGB or CMYK Printing?) The important point here is that you need to think about how it will print when you design it because it will make a difference.

2. What kind of paper (incl. info about label or type of envelope) is it meant to be printed on?

3. Contact Information: If there's any information about the process of reproducing the deliverable that you need to provide to help someone else work with it, you should provide it. (Some students worked with client organizations who need this information.)

4. Commercial Sources: If the deliverable has been designed (for example) for printing at an offset press (business cards, for example) or ought to be, who is it? Or is there anything people who want to produce this material needs to know? Can you have it produced at (for example) Boiler Copy? Vista Printing? Purdue Printing Services? Somewhere in town?

5. Other Specs: These can include "Program Used to Produce the Deliverable" (prior to its conversion to Acrobat), size and format (e.g., TIFF) of any important graphics, image resolution (normally, for printing, this should be 300 dpi), image size, file size, etc.

The overall purpose of this document is to provide information that will outlive your own memory of what was involved in producing these document. Later on, you will forget the details of how you produced these deliverable and what needs to be done with them, so the Protocol Sheet helps provide a legacy for them. The reality in professional publishing is that most work gets passed on to others, so you need to develop good practices of sharing this kind of information, which are like the "Design Notes" that get embedded in good HTML.

Collaborative work is a required component of the course and a common mode of interaction in professional and publishing life. You and your project team members will be responsible for updating one another and me about assignment development and progress. In addition, you also are responsible for negotiating together all aspects of your work, including planning, drafting, revising, file managing, and scheduling of assignments. Each group member needs to complete a Collaborative Evaluation Form and place it (privately) in the turn-in folder. Your responses on this form will be taken into account when I assign you an individual grade for this project. (To earn credit for this project, you must complete this form.) The principles of collaboration I encourage students to follow are contained in the brochure, Group Work and Collaborative Writing <http://www-honors.ucdavis.edu/vohs/index.html>.

In addition to applying the design criteria discussed in class and in Looking Good in Print, I'll look to see that you have developed a consistent theme across your deliverables, that your content is accurate, and that all of your documents are professional-looking and well-suited to client needs.

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