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Charles Apple: The Visual Side of Journalism

 

‘Alternative story forms’ archive

Number of comments in parentheses

May 18: Today’s very best Facebook IPO front page is also the funniest (1)

A number of papers ran cute front pages today advancing the public stock offering by Facebook. We saw plenty of “like” thumbs-ups, thumbs-downs, Facebook app icons and pictures of founder Mark Zuckerberg. In addition, the faux Facebook wall or timeline is in danger becoming a bit of a design cliché. Despite this, reporter Jeff Harrington and A1 designer Jennifer Dickens [...]

April 19: This fun ASF on allergies is nothing to sneeze at

For many of us here in the U.S., allergy season is well underway. And there’s no better way to tell readers what’s making them sneeze — and how — than an Alternative Story Form. If that ASF can run on page one — which was the case today with the 28,900-circulation Advocate of Victoria, Texas — then it’s even more [...]

Feb. 13: When an Alternative Story Form speaks louder than prose (1)

Paula Buckner, assistant news and delivery editor for the Rockford Register Star wrote overnight: Just thought I’d pass along the Nation & World page we have for Monday’s edition, which took the AP story by Martin Crutsinger and chopped it up into something more palatable, rather than running the straight prose. I mean, I’m tired of budget stories, and I [...]

Feb. 2: Inside the special Super Bowl section wrapped around today’s Indianapolis Star (2)

Earlier today, we took a look at great Super Bowl advance pages from Luke Knox of the Boston Globe. Now it’s time to check out a bit of the 24-page special section wrapping today’s Indianapolis Star. Director of digital and visuals Scott Goldman tells us: Design director Phil Mahoney gets the kudos for the cover design and most of the [...]

Nov. 17, 2011: Detroit Free Press celebrates a Cy Young award with another commemorative poster

This commemorative poster treatment inserted into the sports section of today’s Detroit Free Press. The topic, obviously: The Tigers’ Justin Verlander winning this year’s American League Cy Young award. Features: A huge photo of Verlander by Robert Hanashiro of USA Today. A nice sequence of Verlander’s motion by Freep staffer Diane Weiss. A look at the 34 regular-season games in [...]

May 30, 2011: Today’s notable Memorial Day presentations

Sunday, we took at look at ten outstanding Memorial Day presentations. Today, we’ll look at 16 more, published on Memorial Day itself. — POST-STAR Glens Falls, N.Y. Circulation: 25,705 While not quite as stunning as Sunday’s Cleveland Plain Dealer portrait of the Medal of Honor, this centerpiece shows us some of the military’s most distinguished decorations. The presentation is labeled [...]

May 29, 2011: Ten cool Sunday front-page visuals

My daily sweep through the Newseum produced more than just a handful of weather front pages and Memorial Day front pages. I also spotted a number of visuals I thought worthy of bringing to your attention. Other than what I’m posting elsewhere today, here are ten unusually cool Sunday front pages from around the country. — ARIZONA REPUBLIC Phoenix, Ariz. [...]

May 27, 2011: Blagojevich trial on page one: Stripped, good, better and brilliant (5)

The story in Chicago this week: Former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich has finally begun testifying in his own defense at his retrial on corruption charges. The story wasn’t even the centerpiece for today’s Chicago Tribune. That spot was taken by the Bulls’ swan dive out of the NBA playoffs. However, the Blagojevich story was stripped across the top of A1 [...]

May 13, 2011: Wait — is that Meg Lavey-Heaton and Ryan Huddle? Writing in Afrikaans? (3)

You’re accustomed to seeing my stuff appear in Afrikaans in South African newspapers (here and here and here, f’instance). But Meg Lavey-Heaton, of the Harrisburg, Pa., Patriot-News? And Ryan Huddle of the Boston Globe? Writing in Afrikaans? Yes, indeed. Two of my very favorite ontwerpers. Here’s how it came to pass… Johann Maarman — a friend from die Burger, the [...]

May 10, 2011: Inside the Lexington Herald-Leader’s Kentucky Derby special sections (1)

Design director Brian Simms of the Lexington (Ky.) Herald-Leader writes today: Every year the greatest two minutes in sports is a big deal in Kentucky and this year was no different. We produced two 16-page sections – one a preview (Saturday) and one a recap (Sunday). They both wrapped the normal front page. Brian graciously sent along a number of [...]

April 27, 2011: Chicago’s Field Museum creates comic book biography of entomologist (1)

A former colleague of mine — Cathy Clabby, who spent 13 years at the Raleigh, N.C. News & Observer – is now associate editor of American Scientist magazine. Cathy wrote a story for American Scientist‘s May/June issue about a comic book. Not a comic book about a super-hero like, say, Ant-Man. Rather, one about a female scientist. Who studies ants. [...]

April 15, 2011: A look at the Boston Globe’s homage to vinyl (1)

Saturday is Record Store Day — a day to celebrate independent music outlets and especially old-fashioned vinyl records. Martin Gee — features design supervisor of the Boston Globe — designed this really cool front of the Globe‘s daily tabloid features section to commemorate the event. Note the list of stories part of the package as tracks on the album label [...]

April 13, 2011: I’ve officially lived too long: Hot Wheels come to life

There were lots of cool front pages published out there in newspaper land today. However, nothing gave me quite the adrenalin rush that this one did today. Here’s today’s Indianapolis Star, circulation 182,933: That’s a stunt planned soon at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. About an hour before this year’s Indy 500, some joker will hop into a pickup truck and [...]

March 14, 2011: Four outstanding Bracket Monday presentations (5)

It’s easy for me to forget — here in Johannesburg, an ocean away from home — that today was Bracket Monday: The day newspapers covered the NCAA men’s basketball tournament seedings and the tip-off for March Madness. I put out the call for interesting Bracket Monday pages. Only three papers responded — plus, I received one additional nomination — but [...]

March 6, 2011: San Antonio completes its live coverage of the fall of the Alamo (2)

Sorry this is so late. I received the pages overnight Saturday. But then I was in transit today from Cape Town back to Johannesburg. — So, do you remember the San Antonio Express-News‘ 175th anniversary memorial of the Siege of the Alamo? We talked about it a week-and-a-half ago. The idea was to recreate the entire siege with original reporting [...]

March 5, 2011: Las Vegas Sun uses novel ‘graphic novel’ approach on A1 today

According to Las Vegas Sun editor, Tom Gorman — writing on the SND Region 2 Facebook page today — it was managing editor Michael Squires who uttered the words “graphic novel!” at the news meeting. And so the Sun went with a full-page cartoon biography of Las Vegas’ famous NASCAR-racing Busch brothers — Kurt and Kyle — on today’s front [...]

Dec. 4, 2010: A fun first-person graphic for the business page (4)

There’s something very interesting on the back page of today’s Sake24, the business section inserted into the Saturday Afrikaans-language dailies here in South Africa: Die Burger in Cape Town, Volksblad in Bloemfontein and Beeld here in Johannesburg. Or, at least, I hope it’s interesting. It’s a first-person alternative storyform graphic in which I write about my experiences dealing with South [...]

Nov. 6, 2010: Another cool college football page by Idaho’s Tony Briggmin

Anybody who’s ever attended one of my slideshows over the past three or four years has heard be wax poetic over Tony Briggmin. I show a lot of pages he designed from the Bellingham (Wash.) Herald. Less than two months ago, Tony moved from Washington to Boise Idaho, where he is now assistant sports editor for production for the Idaho [...]