Vegan Pantry: A Digital Publication
Vegan Pantry is an informative digital publication that seeks to instruct readers on how to thrive on a plant-based diet. In creating this publication, I wanted this to be an engaging guide for readers to learn from and refer back to when cooking vegan dishes. I wanted my audience to come away with a better understanding and a more open mind about the possibilities of eating a plant-based diet.
The Process
I started out by perusing through my favorite cookbooks and websites that I’ve found instructive for cooking vegan food, and I researched similar online publications such as VegNews and Thug Kitchen.
The next step was figuring out what I wanted each vertical to have. I created a rough outline for my publication and made sketches for each vertical. My vision was to have articles about alternatives to dairy products like milk and cheese and to have recipes associated with those articles. I also wanted to assist readers who are new to veganism or plant-based cooking with how to stock their kitchen with ingredients found in most vegan dishes.
The initial drawings helped me visualize how I wanted the verticals to look and which interactions I wanted to provide.
From the sketches I created the verticals with InDesign and Mag+. I tested the articles multiple times to make sure the interactions worked properly. I’d add and subtract pages, and experimented with different interactive options. Most of my articles changed with each iteration. My original idea was to use bright colors, but I decided on a more subtle color palette.
This is what I was using in my original designs.
I decided on this color theme so that the photos I used would stand out. Since this is a publication revolving around food, I wanted the photographs of food to grab the reader’s attention and not the color of the text or background.
Some of my original designs didn’t work with the final product. For example, I wanted to include a section on how to make oat milk with a video tutorial, but it didn’t fit in with the other articles. If I were to create another publication for Vegan Pantry, I’d find a way to include this kind of theme into it.
Creating an interactive digital publication has provided me with an opportunity to hone my InDesign skills and learn a new skill with Mag+. It was a steep learning curve. I ran into numerous small issues while designing this publication which resulted in a lot of scrapped and re-designed pages. However, since I had to redo and relearn many aspects of the software (and how to manipulate it to do what I want), my confidence in using it has skyrocketed. I was very new to InDesign before completing this publication, and I surprised myself with the skills I learned.
I’ve always been passionate about cooking, especially vegan cooking. I’d love to build on this idea in the future, whether in designing more publications or creating an app for it.
Erin Hancock is a student in the Digital Media program at Utah Valley University, Orem Utah, studying Web & App Development. The following article relates to digital publication project in the DGM 2270 Course and representative of the skills learned.
