design portfolio
"the spotlight" - vienna international school independent student magazine

Position: Chief Layout Editor Timeframe: August 2004 - June 2006 Location: Vienna, Austria Key technologies: Adobe InDesign, Illustrator and Photoshop

I was recruited to work as the layout editor for the Vienna International School’s independent student magazine, The Spotlight, at the end of grade 9 without any significant prior experience in publishing and layout design. The faculty advisor who recruited me recognized, however, my technical capabilities, my ability to learn quickly and independently and my hard working nature. I took on the job and, after brief training from the previous layout editor, I spent a good part of the summer holidays teaching myself and trying out some basics of layout design. As part of this, I also independently taught myself how to use Adobe InDesign and Illustrator (I had already previously worked with Photoshop), software packages which I make use of now on a very regular basis.

The Spotlight represented a number of firsts for me, including working on a project where I learnt by doing, a skill that is very much fostered and encouraged within the Olin College curriculum. I would learn something new about the software I was using or about the design approaches I was taking when working on each of the magazine’s editions, which were distributed approximately four times a year. I also learnt how to work on a project involving a number of different stakeholders, including students, teachers, staff and parents (collectively, our audience), content providers, printing companies and school administration. Finally, this was one of the first major projects I was involved in where I had to work long nights to meet the deadlines and get the job done (a skill I would learn to master in the following years!)

I worked as part of a core team of three, along with the Editor in Chief and magazine’s faculty advisor. We established a consistent workflow, where we would collect articles from various different entities in the school, which were then copy-edited and passed on to me to do the layout. When the prototype layout was complete, the faculty advisor and I would spend approximately one week doing final edits to ensure a high quality final product.

Unfortunately, I cannot provide any samples of The Spotlight online due to copyright limitations involving the Vienna International School.

Related Images: