Magazine Design & Layout & Branding
NAUTA
Young Mariners Of New Zealand
Nauta is a magazine about an Organisation called Young Mariners, I grew up in Mariners and now volunteer for them as an assistant unit leader for my unit, Tauranga. I created the magazine as a way for the families of the girls who attend, to see what activities and learning the girls do when attending a Mariners session. The magazine is also a good way for leaders and volunteers to see what activities other units do during our terms so that we can discover new ideas for our term plans each year.
Nauta is also a good learning tool for the girls as they are encouraged to write articles for the magazine about their experiences each term. The back page also features an activities section, where the girls can further develop their theory knowledge ready to put it into practice in our summer terms. Nauta as a whole provides families, volunteers and newcomers with the history of Young Mariners, and how our organisation has grown, as well as information about what we do, and how young girls can build their on-water skills and confidence.
Process
The name Nauta is the word Mariner is Latin. Finding a name for this magazine was a challenge but a good way to start off a branding process. The logo ideation process started with sketching a series of thumbnails.
The logo thumbnails were continued onto a second page, and I experimented with compositions and different name combinations.
I user tested the previous thumbnails, and from there created a series of digital thumbnails, with the finalised name.
This was my second to last logo iteration. The logo featured sail inspired shaped letters, Nauta in morse code along the bottom and then a smaller Nauta to the left for readability purposes.
I then put together the branding I had into a stylescape. Proxima Nova was the chosen font, as it was simple and clear. The colour palette was inspired by maritime navigation colours and Young Mariners uniform colours.
Our brief required us to have sixteen pages, with a four-page article, and this included the front and back covers. I started designing the physical magazine, by planning out what each page was going to feature that wasn’t already allocated to the article or covers. Mariners have eight units, one page per unit, plus the introduction page, and the activities page, I had filled up the remaining pages. Each unit page had their unit history, an overview of their term activities and what they thought of our recent National Regatta, as well as some images.
Process
I referred back to case studies for the layout of the pages, however, I wasn’t able to fully execute the column layout on the unit pages, as I had a lot of content but not a lot of space. I used a secondary colour palette for the unit pages as each unit has an allocated colour, so they can be recognised. I think if I were to redo this magazine I would adjust the layout so that there is more white space and visual hierarchy, as this design can be very busy in places. I would adjust the colours as some of them clash with the background and can make the text hard to read. This magazine was something a little out of my comfort zone, but I enjoyed the work, and if given the opportunity again I would take it.
Final Outcome
