In a rich, intense and full of examples conference, Javier Errea, director of the Malofiej awards, presented his view on what should be the future of newspapers after all what he had learned in this 15 years of the Spanish based competition.
A brilliant journalist, as he was introduced by Jim Grimwade, defines himself not as a designer, but as a reporter and an editor that designs news stories. This perspective has helped him to see infographics beyond its esthetics, and to be able to see in them as a platform for powerful narratives. Here I present some of his ideas.
Newspapers got in love with graphics years ago, even before the use of computers. The first news graphic was published in 1702 in "The Daily Courant", when obviously nobody used Illustrator or InDesign. Today, not using computers is still an excellent choice.
Editors love this "toy", but they don't know much about graphics. They want them big and prettier than their competitors without knowing exactly what they are asking for. Today, paper is more expensive, and is harder to publish as many as used to be.
Sadly, media designers are treated as lower rank professionals: they feel less important and abandoned. Underneath this, there is an enormous fear.
After these fifteen years, big media art departments have grown and today they are consolidated. However, in smaller media companies the situation is quite different: only one or two professionals have the responsibility to create all the graphics, illustrations and even layout!
After fifteen years, we still have the same problems:
First: Size matters. Seems that we haven't learned anything. Is common to see newspapers that don't know how to fill the graphic pages, what leads to a mediocre product. For example, publish a full-page map of Pamplona is not enough.
Second: Too much text. Graphics have the sin of having excessive text. The usual solution is just to erase and erase. A better alternative is being able to exploit the language of the graphics beyond what we do now.
Third: Chaos. Is common to see graphics that are chaotic and where is hard to find a clear reading path. A good solution is the one that John Grimwade introduced sometime ago: the red line that helps readers to guide thru the graphics.
Fourth: Lack of design formats. Usually solved following the motto "less is more".
Fifth: Filling up the holes. Is common to see pages that have a very low information density. Solution: We should save our limited resources and focus in the graphics we really want to create.
Sixth: Rigor is not enough. We tend to believe that creating prettier graphics is better than making them better quality. We make mistakes, and we throw away all the hard work.
Seventh: Software independence. We limit ourselves to much based on the software constrains. Sometimes is better to turn off the computer and explore different resources. For example, Clarin's Jaime Cerda used markers in front of photographs.
Eight: We don't add value to the news story. We create graphics that simply repeat what is in the text without having any new elements that will add novel information. This ruins our credibility, and makes it much difficult to convince that our work is worth to be published. We must not depend on assignments. We need to have an active role, get out to the streets to report, and to be autonomous.
Ninth: Many things inside. Is dangerous trying to fit everything in one graphic. Is better to focus on one idea and separate the information in several capsules. We have been telling ourselves that we must follow the work from New York Times, Clarín (Argentina) and El Correo (Spain). These newspapers have won numerous awards in the past. The New York Times creates graphics with tremendous documentation and graphic simplification.
We should not reinvent the wheel. Is wise to go back to the classics for clues. See the ideas behind the work of Time magazine in the forties or Fortune at the beginning of the last century. They do that themselves. They copy themselves, and copying is good.
Many art departments have been able to get control of some newspaper pages, but this has been more a power and control issue. Because we tend to feel inferior, we think that by controlling a few pages, we will feel better. These pages are useless if we use them just to fill them up every day.
Visual packages
Everything we have critique over the years, now turns to be something that could give us some clues to have our readers back. New generations prefer graphics that use a multiplicity of languages. This is true for adults and kids. For example, this Spanish magazine for kids is chaotic, completely fragmented, and is against all the rules we have protected. These are visual packages, and they look like more like travel guides rather than news graphics.
Research has shown that readers spend a higher amount of time on newspapers graphics than news stories. There are newspapers, like the San Luis Obispo, that are taking this new path to have their readers back.
Seems like a contradiction, but a contradiction that works. Doesn't matter if those are graphics or not. It matters if it works for our readers. They seem to be half way between comics and infographics.
To infodesigned newspapers
For Javier Errea, in the future, newspapers should present each news topic in the most appropriate way, what the story asks for. There should not be a fixed genre or just one possible language to use. Everything should depend on the story. Boundaries will disappear, even for frontpages.
We should apply new languages. Some newspapers are experimenting with these kinds of elements on their frontpages, but we should go beyond. Sadly, there is too much resistance from newspapers to move on. Why not have in newspapers the flexibility we have with magazines?
We are approaching a hybrid genre. The Davos forum explained as a comic? A page full of paint brushes to celebrate Spanish painter Tapies on his anniversary. A photography collage to represent the growing of AIDS? Why not?
Javier Errea thinks that we should stop doing the so-called Art Direction. Graphics and design is the same. Visuals and text is the same. We don't need designers, graphic artist or writers. There will not be frontiers. We Hill have hybrid genres and people: infodesigners.
In the redesign of Portugal's Expresso, a new graphics format was created: Panels, a blend of different elements. These are prototypes of the new design that will be launched next Saturday.
Readers seem to be much comfortable with chaotic designs. They like this blending and is what they are demanding. Here is our opportunity.
Juan Velasco
He explained that he has two records: the most graphics a day and the less graphics a day; the first one at El Mundo and the second at the NGM.
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