This was a difficult assignment for me because it was less concrete than other weeks. Breaking space and typography are pretty straight forward; creating “tension” is not. For the assignments I decided to focus on different techniques for creating tension that were mentioned in the readings. One is breaking borders (which I did in week 1) so for this layout I tried to accomplish “snuggle & separate.” This is not something I typically do in my layouts but it is a technique that I admire in others. Here’s how it looked before the live critique session:
and here’s how it looks now:
Changes made from the critique:
1) Changed the orientation of the photo so that Molly’s face is looking into the page (duh)
2) This necessitated moving the tag grouping to the other side so that it wasn’t covering up the faces
3) Moved the journaling block up so that the bottom was flush with the bottom of the photo block
4) Tacked down the journaling block with some stitching
5) Made the green in the top cluster more pronounced and the cluster a little bigger in general
Once again small details make a big difference on the layout. The orientation of the photo bugs me just a bit but I think it’s because I know that it was taken facing the other way. Design-wise it works and my eye will adjust. (P.S. Could you just die over the look Molly is giving the camera. Whenever I try to take her picture she barks like I’m trying to steal her soul. For my friend she looked right into it!)
Again the subtle changes.. but what kicked me is you changed the orientation of the photo?? I didn’t know you could do that with a photo. I have changed elements from left to right, but photos I just didn’t know. Is it the same process??
It should be the same process for photos. In PSE I go to Image > Rotate > Flip Layer Horizontal. It’s something I use a lot for elements but hardly ever for photos because I know which direction it was supposed to face.