This collections includes two hypothetical examples showcasing the effect of color and typography on the overall message and feel of a design.

The Technology Weekly magazine issue is a special edition featuring Facebook. The cover is splashed in a rich blue tone with the Facebook logo prominently displayed on a phone that is being held in someone’s hand. The blue of the background is meant to support and heighten the effect of the blue of the Facebook logo. The phone is placed slightly off center to the lower right to balance the typography of the magazine and article titles. The background of the cover features a series of images of people representing the connections we make via social media. The image is overlaid on the blue background with lowered opacity. This is all accentuated with a graphic that gives an electric or magic type of effect emanating from the phone.

The articles featured are all fun, positive, intriguing topics around Facebook and social media usage. The text is a mix of serif and sans serif fonts depending on the article topic. The more serious article about the founder of Facebook is set in a serif font while the more fun topics around getting connected to friends and rankings of algorithms are set sans serif fonts. Some of the text is highlighted yellow for contrast and brightness. Text is aligned left or right to frame the main image of the Facebook logo. 

The Parenting magazine cover uses the same imagery that was used in the Technology Weekly magazine cover. However, with a different color palette and different choices of text, the positive feeling of the Technology Weekly cover has been transformed to a message of warning and caution.

In this design, the gold background is overlaid with an image of people in tiles to represent the connections we make through social media. On top of that is an image of a hand holding a phone with the Facebook logo prominently displayed. In this design, the social media images are visible through the phone showing the pervasiveness of social media. The logo was changed to a brilliant red that gives a harsh contrast to the gold background. These colors are the opposite of the soft blue and white that we would normally associate with the Facebook brand. Yellow and red colors are commonly used to represent warning, danger or caution. Finally, the same glow of light that looks almost magical on the Technology Weekly cover has been erased and warped to resemble glowing embers on this cover.

There is a mix of serif and sans serif fonts on the cover but there is more of an emphasis on capitalized letters to highlight the seriousness of the message. Some words have been highlighted in yellow and others in red, again to support the message of the dangers of social media. The text was placed around the image of the phone to ensure that the red Facebook logo remains the first image in the hierarchy of the design.

These designs were created with images found on Pixabay that were altered in Adobe Photoshop and then assembled into the final piece in Adobe InDesign.