Scan Analysis

Step one in our design process was to analyze scans from Martha Stewart Living magazine. Analysis here explores grid theory, eye path, and color theory. The following shows the Martha Stewart Living image on the left, and the analysis marked-up image to the right.

Setting the Scene

Martha Stewart Living scan with grid lines

Marta Stewart Living scan

Setting the Scene incorporates a candy-cane color palette place setting scheme to describe holiday decorating. Shades of creams and whites, reds, and silver are the palette that the Martha Stewart design team bring to this page.

Although the edges of the photograph itself do incorporate the use of white space to blend with the white negative space of the background, this technique is not used on all sides of the photo, only the top. Like pouring a glass of milk on to a white board with writing, the white space at the top allows the viewer to effortlessly engage with the text because the white space at the top of the photo blends to the white background where the text is located. The photo itself has varying shades of cream colors and white so the effect of the off white photo borders on the remaining three edges is still consistent with the photo itself (having varying shades of cream and white colors.)

The various shades of vanilla-ivory colored candles are the focal point of the top half of this photo. The large round plate with red bells, (like a bull’s eye) mark the center of the bottom half.

Two knives and a fork ask the reader to follow the eye to the candles. More specifically the eye follows the path of the fork (on the bottom left) to the candles placed on the top half of this photo back down to the knives on the right side of this photograph. The spoon protruding from the sugar bowl guides the reader to follow the path that is comparable to an arc shape leaving the ground on the left and returning on the right.

Alternatively the eye may start in the upper left corner as an access point and either looks down at the fork or across to the other candles. A gaze starting at the upper left corner is typical and expected in most Western cultures. Either way of eye entrance to this picture the photograph is designed as an arc, especially for the reader who takes the time to look at the photograph carefully. Otherwise the reader may just exit at the top of the photo to the text, which is almost seamless in color to the white background as mentioned above.

Undeniable is the grid structure in this photograph. Red horizontal lines on the white tablecloth, and vertically placed silverware as well as a vertically folded napkin placed to represent vertical grid lines. The photograph is split horizontally in the center by dessert silverware placed on the horizontal stripes of the tablecloth. Vertically a space is left between the candles, which roughly aligns with the name on the place setting as well as the red bells that happen to be in the center of octagonal plates marking an invisible vertical centerline. The edges of the plates add drama because not only do they reinforce the vertical horizontal grid structure, they also show diagonal lines, which just happen to be deliberately continued by the placement of the candles.

The heading font is black, and the subtitle is in red, the article itself is in a dark font that has a subtle hint of a green which was intended to compliment the red colors in the photograph and creates cohesion and integration, not to mention holiday colors are typically red and green.

Icons in this photo such as Christmas bells, candles, candy canes, sugar, and dessert are all matching the holiday theme of the text of this article. Typically in restaurant the plates and dessert silverware would not be stacked up like this. A guest would receive these items for each course. However in this staged scene, the design team wants to give the impression of a full meal being served including dessert all in one image, which is common during the holidays as families converge.

jWenu

Martha Stewart Living scan with eye path

Marta Stewart Living scan

JWenu. This page design has a dichotomy of starting points for the eye; the candidates for starting points are the woman’s face or the large colorful plate to her left that has items from the gourmet buffet.

Normally, the face would be the richest source of information that the eye would be drawn toward. Still true in this case but Martha Stewart’s design team seems to acknowledge the power of a face to draw their reader’s gaze by making the photograph of the face not only smaller than the buffet plate but also black and white. The colorful plate of food is three to four times larger. This article is about the food and one could argue that the reason the design team chose to make the plate large and colorful and the woman smaller and in black and white is to create tension between the face and the plate, and to offset the power of the human face on this page.

Regardless of any tension between the two photos the general path that the eye follows starts with the face. The viewer looks at what the face is looking at, then the path the eye might take is to glance over or read the menu below the colorful buffet plate. From the menu the observer is likely to look at the potato cakes and then back up to the oysters on the half shell. The pattern described is counterclockwise.

In the other case, where the eye is more drawn to the colorful plate with gourmet buffet items as a starting point, the eye is likely to follow the pattern to a horizontal right slope. That sequence would be buffet plate, woman, oysters on the half shell, and potato cakes last. This is a clockwise pattern.

The power of the photographs seems to almost dwarf the column blocks of text in the upper right hand corner that is describing the food in the pictures. However, the text for the buffet menu itself is different in that it incorporates colors from the pictures in its heading. The menu text is center justified, giving the buffet menu items a more stand out look than the other more block column style text in the upper right hand corner. The menu text is a mix of italics with serifs and a smaller size capital letters in a lighter colored font resulting in an effect that is reminiscent of title and subtitle on a book cover. The end result is that each menu item has a primary and secondary component illustrated by differing fonts and use of color saturation of those fonts.

The iconography in this page matches the theme of the article about the jWenu buffet. The story is very explicit leaving no question about what this page is about, a gourmet buffet.

The page acknowledges a grid structure. A vertical line could be drawn down the center. The left half could be split into two halves (plate, menu) and the right side can be split into three sections (block text, woman/oysters, and potato cakes.

The color scheme of the image is based around shades of brown, complimented by natural colors contributed by a blueberry, lemon, and light green cabbage. Each colored image consistently has a shade of brown complemented by white or off-white. The whites are provided by crème fraiche on the golden-brown potato cakes, the white inside of the oyster shells on a brown plate, and the white pattern on the edges of the large brown plate with buffet items.

Wine & Spirits

Martha Stewart Living scan - color theory

Marta Stewart Living scan

Wine & Spirits features a roasted-pineapple hot buttered rum recipe. The page is mostly text but does feature a yellow pineapple color that has a brown tinge to them, as one would expect from a pineapple that has been roasted. The image also features a silver fork that has been tinted to be different whites and silvers. One could assume the obvious change of color and opacity of the fork could be an effort to not distract the viewer from the lighter warm color of the pineapple.

The Land O' Lakes butter ad on this page also features a yellow color scheme as well. It is probably not a coincidence that the color scheme for Land O’Lakes is similar to the Roasted-Pineapple Hot Buttered Rum recipe.

The Land O’ Lakes ad seems to draw from different theories of color harmony. The ad includes a shade of yellow as the primary color, and other warm colors such as red acting as two thirds of a triadic color scheme. The ad also has green, which is an analogous color to yellow, harmonically speaking.

The grid structure is more or less divided into thirds vertically. Not counting the ad, the table that the plate with the hot buttered rum and pineapple is the only horizontal representation other than the text itself.

The text is black on white background but interesting is the use of green text to accent Martha Stewart online information. The green text is analogous to the yellow pineapple as these colors sit next to each other on the color wheel.

The path that the eye follows in the recipe portion of this page is to first look at the cup then to look at the line that the fork makes as it pierces the pineapple creating two horizontal slopes perhaps to contrast the otherwise mostly horizontal grid structure of the cup itself and the plate it sits on. Additionally, the cup itself and plate create more diagonal lines.

The iconography is explicit and accurate. All text and images tell the story of hot buttered rum and pineapple. In the case of the butter ad, the cookies represent a product of the butter; which is consistent in story telling and iconography as well.