Archived Posts by Matt Mansfield
Day 1: The wrap
Saturday, February 7th, 2009
We’ve finished the first day of The Best of Newspaper Design™ judging here in Syracuse. The judges have given a little more than 500 awards, making their way through more than 5,000 entries so far. The top 10 winners in the competition so far, ranked in no particular order are Zaman, Excelsior, The National Post,
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The 30th Edition: Introducing the judges
Saturday, February 7th, 2009
The 27 judges for the general competition of The Best of Newspaper Design™ have been announced by Dennis Varney of the Lexington Herald-Leader, the coordinator for the judging. Here’s a listing of the judges, by teams and categories. From left, Diego Zúñiga García-Falces, Santiago Carlos Ayulo, Gun Råberg-Kjellerstrand, Epha Riche, Jonathon Berlin NEWS Santiago Carlos
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Day 1: Judges arrive, and work officially begins
Saturday, February 7th, 2009
The Society for News Design’s 30th Annual Best of Newspaper Design™ judging has just gotten under way at Syracuse University. We’re coming to you live from Drumlins Country Club, the site for all the action. The first day involves judges getting their instructions from Dennis Varney, the 30th Edition coordinator. Varney will break the judges
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Competition coverage starts soon from Syracuse
Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009
We’re about to get started with wall-to-wall coverage of the Society’s Best of Newspaper Design™ Creative Competition, which recognizes work published in 2008. This year’s special categories include the financial crisis, elections around the world (and specifically the U.S. presidential campaign that resulted in the historic rise of Barack Obama), and the Summer Olympics from
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No. 1: End of the boom — and the innovation ahead
Wednesday, December 31st, 2008
After more than a decade of increasing concerns and warnings about the impending doom of print journalism, 2008 turned out to be the year the sky actually was falling in on American newspapers. Looking back on the year in an article in The Toronto Star, Ryan Bigge wrote, “Newspapers struggled to disprove media guru Jeff
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No. 2: Layoffs, buyouts change the face of design
Tuesday, December 30th, 2008
There’s no getting around it: 2008 was the year of the layoff. The forecast was already grim for U.S. newspapers. We all know the story of sliding circulation, increased competition online and the rapid reduction in revenue. Then, when the economy tanked, it suddenly got worse for news organizations. The method of choice for handling
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No. 5: Print news design thrives around the world
Saturday, December 27th, 2008
2008 in Review: The news was bad for struggling papers in the United States and Canada, but the global view on print was markedly different. In fact, newspapers are thriving around the world.
No. 7: The Obama effect – A big event moves papers
Thursday, December 25th, 2008
No.7: The Obama effect – A big event moves papers. Yesterday we looked at how new skills are emerging as newsrooms evolve. A victory – for print It’s Christmas, so we thought it was appropriate to take a moment to cherish a big present the American press got this year: The election of Barack Obama.
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No. 8: New skills emerge as newsrooms evolve
Wednesday, December 24th, 2008
If you’re not seeing how to move beyond print, you’re already behind The days of living the rest of your journalistic career as a print page designer are nearing an end – and that’s a good thing. As the revolution in media radically changes how people experience news and information, the way the people formerly
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No. 10: Is the best design really outside the U.S.?
Monday, December 22nd, 2008
Each year we take the last few days of December to look back on the news design year that was. It’s been a crazy time for our craft and the industry, so take the trek with us over the next 10 days as we recount the biggest moments in a year filled with extraordinary change.
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Detroit’s big news as seen from a key design insider
Tuesday, December 16th, 2008
UPDATED: More questions answered in the third section. It’s official: The Detroit Free Press and The Detroit News, will become the first major U.S. newspapers to curtail seven-day home delivery. The news was announced by the Detroit Media Partnership, the agency controlling the interests of both the Gannett and Media News papers, at a press
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Founder Richard Curtis retiring from USA Today
Thursday, December 11th, 2008
Design legend Richard Curtis will leave daily journalism at the end of the year. In a memo to staffers today, Curtis announced he will retire this month as Managing Editor, Graphics & Photography at USA Today, which he helped found in 1982. “Retirement is something I’ve contemplated for over a year, and while it has
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Chicago papers come out strong on news of arrest
Tuesday, December 9th, 2008
Both the Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Sun-Times published Extra editions on Tuesday after Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich was arrested in the early morning hours by FBI agents for what’s being called a “staggering” level of corruption involving pay-to-play politics. The Tribune has been tracking the story for days, even weeks and months if you
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Do you remember? Please help us as we review 2008
Monday, December 1st, 2008
There’s still a month left in 2008, but we’re already starting to wonder what we’ll collectively remember as the biggest moments in news design this year. We have our own ideas, of course. And, as we did last year, we will write about those in a post closer to the end of December. But what
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SND joins effort to save NewsPageDesigner.com
Sunday, November 16th, 2008
The good folks at The Sun Journal, after six years of amazing help, have been forced to pull support for NewsPageDesigner.com because of their own financial issues.
Was there no innovation in Obama election pages?
Friday, November 14th, 2008
Alan Jacobson over at Brass Tacks Design has an interesting essay today that posits this point: News design needs to evolve. In an essay (headlined “Designers should heed these lessons from Obama”) that runs next to the recently relaunched Best Front Design, Jacobson speaks smartly about what he saw as an ordinary approach in too much of the design of too many newspapers on Nov. 5, the day after the election.
