Cincinnati's new look revealed

[steveu]

I don't think Cincinnati gave a date when this was going to happen, but Sunday's Enquirer revealed the paper's new look and the changes.

I've been hard on some stuff Cincy's done in the past... but this looks really good in concept. Link below. You can preview the new paper by clicking on the black screen. What do you think?

http://cincinnati.com/blogs/enquirermedia/2012/06/12/issuu/

 

[imjustagirl]

It looks like a weekly business magazine.

 

[wicked]

What IJAG said. Are they going to a tab?

 

[steveu]

It's hard to explain the format. Not quite Berliner, but like a cross between a tab and a magazine. I don't have any investment in it, obviously... just nice to see someone investing in print like that.

 

[Frank_Ridgeway]

I guess this means they are being printed in Columbus now.

I kind of like the idea, but we aren't likely to do it. I asked the publisher about it during a q-and-a. Apparently it is 10 times more expensive to tweak the depth of the page than it is to retrofit to adjust the width of the page. He gave specific figures for doing either, which of course would vary by how many presses your paper uses and how many units each has.

 

[Versatile]

It's hard to explain the format. Not quite Berliner, but like a cross between a tab and a magazine. I don't have any investment in it, obviously... just nice to see someone investing in print like that.

Investing in print? This is entirely a cost-cutting measure. They're saving a ton of newsprint and shrinking the editorial space. Gannett Company continues to use the Cincinnati Enquirer as its lab rat.

 

[steveu]

I don't want to sound like a Gannett mouthpiece here, but I've heard the space isn't shrinking. And it looks more appealing visually than the current Cincy paper does.

And yes, I consider it an investment in print, especially in light of what some other companies are doing. Just my thought. :)

 

[Frank_Ridgeway]

It's usually an investment to cut costs. But Gannett is piggybacking on Columbus' retrofit.

 

[dixiehack]

Thank God. I thought somebody had screwed around with the Reds' uniforms.

 

[SalukiNC]

I'd pick it up ...
1. If I lived there
2. If it was free

 

[JRoyal]

Looking through the prototype, looks like outside of a couple of pages, minimal design skills will be needed. Always good to see a company cutting out a need for a segment of the newsroom (in this case, page designers). And I hate the ads floating in the middle of pages.

 

[reformedhack]

Speaking as a former newspaper guy who has transitioned into magazines, I really like this new format. Granted, you can't get the full sense of what the product will be based on a computer-screen replica, but it looks very inviting to readers. It's absolutely not a newspaper design, but that may not be a bad thing in an era where newspaper readership is dwindling and magazine readership is generally holding steady (and, in many cases, growing) across the board.

At first blush, I like the idea of an NATION IN BRIEF page adjacent to the NATION IN DEPTH page -- news you can read quickly and something you can (sort of) sink your teeth into. I also like the idea that the columnists get a full Page 2 for their ramblings since they can't get on the section front any longer.

There are plenty of things that aren't so great, of course. I don't like the ******* ad configurations, but, hey, that's reality nowadays -- even the broadsheets are doing this. I also have some concerns about the prototype vs. daily reality. The prototype makes good use of cutout images and other magazine-layout treatments ... but I wonder if the design team can keep that up on a daily basis. If not, the product is just going to look like a newspaper stuffed into a magazine format, and that would be bad.

That said, it's been a long time since I've been excited about any kind of newspaper renovation -- especially since there have been lots of bad ones -- but this one intrigues me greatly. I'll be watching with interest.

 

[FileNotFound]

Looking through the prototype, looks like outside of a couple of pages, minimal design skills will be needed. Always good to see a company cutting out a need for a segment of the newsroom (in this case, page designers). And I hate the ads floating in the middle of pages.

I made a pretty good living as a page designer. But if I ran a newspaper in 2012 and was told I could trade all my page designers for reporters and photographers, I'd absolutely do so.

I like the look and the format. Good to see a newspaper taking a chance on something. If I had a choice of a 7-day-a-week magazine/tab/whatever or a 3-day-a-week broadsheet, I'd prefer the former.

 

[SportsDesigner]

Looks to me like a designer doing many sections, hence the templates.
And what font is that? Arial? My god, looks super cheap. You'd be surprised what better typographical choices could do for this.

And FNF wants to eliminate the desk, eh? And still put out a print product someone will pay for?

 

[buckweaver]

Don't really have a comment on the redesign (it looks fine, but redesigns mean nothing anymore).

But, boy, do I despise newspaper "e-editions". Nothing else I choose to read on a computer is formatted like that — whether it's HTML 4/5 or PDF or Kindle/EPUB or something else — and it's very distracting to zoom in/out, turn pages, try to find the sports section, etc. I had the same problem with Sporting News Today back when I was receiving that in my e-mail. Can't imagine anyone else finds "e-editions" to be easy to read. I find it to be an incredible waste of resources.

 

[TGO157]

Don't really have a comment on the redesign (it looks fine, but redesigns mean nothing anymore).

But, boy, do I despise newspaper "e-editions". Nothing else I choose to read on a computer is formatted like that — whether it's HTML 4/5 or PDF or Kindle/EPUB or something else — and it's very distracting to zoom in/out, turn pages, try to find the sports section, etc. I had the same problem with Sporting News Today back when I was receiving that in my e-mail. Can't imagine anyone else finds "e-editions" to be easy to read. I find it to be an incredible waste of resources.

I love using e-editions.

I also love the re-design.

I guess I'm just a big ball of rainbows today.

 

[steveu]

My only thing about e-editions... and I really love using them myself... is I wish someone would say "Look, you can create more content." Instead of replicating your print edition, add extra pages. You don't have the newsprint/space issues online, theoretically, so offer bonus coverage.

 

[TGO157]

My only thing about e-editions... and I really love using them myself... is I wish someone would say "Look, you can create more content." Instead of replicating your print edition, add extra pages. You don't have the newsprint/space issues online, theoretically, so offer bonus coverage.

Not to sidetrack the topic of the thread, but I know my shop wants to do that. They are pushing e-editions hard, and there was talk of doing the weekly football tab as e-edition only.

 

[JRoyal]

Looking through the prototype, looks like outside of a couple of pages, minimal design skills will be needed. Always good to see a company cutting out a need for a segment of the newsroom (in this case, page designers). And I hate the ads floating in the middle of pages.

I made a pretty good living as a page designer. But if I ran a newspaper in 2012 and was told I could trade all my page designers for reporters and photographers, I'd absolutely do so.

You make it sound like Gannett would replace one with the other. I'm thinking the eye would be more on simply eliminating positions, not shuffling them around, unfortunately.

 

[Versatile]

Gannett has design hubs, JRoyal. No layout is done in Cincinnati; it's shipped to Louisville.