Zine Fair

The zine fair was an extraordinary success we raised a grand total of £70 and had a fantastic day! Thank you to everyone who supported us and bought a copy of the zine!

Many people enjoying the atmosphere of the fair.

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Here is Stalker's section of the table, complete with magnifying glasses, stickers, a rationale, and of course the zines! Eyes lead customers from the door to our stall.

Here I am manning the stall :)

Here a young girl enjoys the free merchandise (great advertising for us too)!

Here the team enjoy the great response the zine received!

Thanks again for a fantastic day!

Sofie x

Amelias Magazine Lecture

Today we had Amelia from Amelia's Magazine give us a talk about what she does and the magazine she creates.

The website:

"Amelia’s Magazine was printed biannually for 5 years from 2004-2009 across 10 issues, many of which are now collectors’ items sought after by creatives across the world. Amelia’s Magazine online is now the place to come for exclusive articles on the best underground creative projects in the worlds of art, fashion, music, illustration, photography, craft and design. Amelia’s Magazine is updated daily in four sections: art, fashion, music and earth."

She was really inspirational and I loved the fact that every issue of her magazine had a different interactive covers including one that was scratch and sniff!

She set open briefs for illustrations to include in her work and when we pitched our idea to her she suggested open briefs may work well for us too. So watch this space!

Abbie xxx

Teal Triggs Lecture

Teal Triggs, the author of the book 'Fanzines' came in to talk to us. She was really great in giving us an understanding of the history behind zines.

Her lecture was entitled 'FanZines-a DIY Revolution?'

Lecture Highlights

- Frederick Wortham commented in 1973 that Zines were "a special form of communication."

- Stephen Duncombe commented in 1997 that Zines were "little publications filled with rantings of high weirdness and exploding with chaotic design."

A zine is a way of testing out your ideas rather than having constraints by publishers - it allows for an individual voice!

Teal showed us some really lovely examples of Fanzines throughout the talk, here are a few examples:

• NEW WORLDS FAN-ZINE 1939 - cover by Harry Turner

•   SPACE TIMES ZINE 1950s

•  THE SUBURBAN PRESS



The fanzine phenomenon was really popular throughout the 1970's Punk era. Suburban Press created by Jamie Reid was a radical political punk zine of the time. The ransom-note look he used with the Sex Pistols graphics came from this magazine which some may say defines the punk DIY look.



•  SNIFFIN' GLUE





One of the most acclaimed and influential Punk zines 'Sniffin Glue' was produced by Mark Perry. The publication reflected the DIY aspect of Punk with the headlines being written in black marker pen and layout having no real order



It was really great getting to understand the history of Zines and how they have developed through the years. I thought it was a recent phenomena but apparently Zines have been around for ever!

Abbie xxx

Fever Zine Lecture

Today we had Alex Zamora from Fever Zine http://www.feverzine.co.uk/ give us a lecture on the nature of Zines.

About Fever Zine

Independent magazines and zines are a growth market and a recently successful example of this has been Fever Zine. Fever Zine is a popular quarterly zine based in London.

Its contents focus mainly on music, art, DIY culture, trends and e-culture, with fashion, music videos and other zines also featuring heavily. The zine was created and is edited, by British music and arts journalist Alex Zamora with design by Simon Whybray.

According to its MySpace profile the publication is available at a variety of cultural hotspots in London such as the Institute of Contemporary Arts, as well as around the United Kingdom, however it is mainly distributed through the Internet.

The Lecture Highlights

- WIRED - we were told of how Wired Magazine linked up with Adobe to create an app for the Iphone.

•content designed specifically for the touch screen experience

•easy navigation methods, including an innovative zoomed-out "Browse Mode"

•the ability to browse image slideshows

•embedded 360 degree object viewers

•support for video and audio content

•the ability to rotate content using device accelerometer functionality

In addition, with this digital magazine concept, advertisers have new possibilities for displaying ad content. Advertisers can develop rich-media magazine "inserts" to provide expanded information to customers directly within the magazine experience — without directing the reader’s attention away to a Web site. Publishers can also offer expanded ad formats that include animation and embedded video. Finally, as is the case with most digital advertising, this new magazine concept opens the possibility for more precise advertising performance metrics beyond the comparatively crude audience measurement/ad engagement techniques in use today.

- FLICK THROUGH ZINE VIDEOS

People are starting to promote their Zines through flick through videos. They video themselves opening each page of the Zine so the viewer can get an idea of whats inside.

This is an example below:

Overall this lecture was really useful as we can consider how to make our website interesting and how to promote our Zine possibly through a flick through video.

Abbie xxx

FreeStyle Magazine

I have started reading and collecting FreeStyle Magazine. I absolutely love it and feel I can draw inspiration from here to our Zine we are creating.

In a sense, FreeStyle is so creative in its layout and form that it could almost be a Zine.

To start it comes in a different frisbee each issue designed by someone well known in the creative industry-the example I will show below is of one created by Paul Smith. The issue is also of a rounded shape so that it fits into the frisbee - something quirky I feel.

The particualar issue I am showing below features a contents in a weird numbered form to produce larger numbers and the editors letter and contributions is beautifully illustrated!

So from this magazine there is loads of inspiration. From the actual shape, the added extra of the frisbee, the images, the way the contents is layed out in a visual way and the fact it is designed by creatives for the creative industry.

Abbie xxx

Current Zines on Sale

After the lecture the other day on ther zine introduction...we decided to investigate the other zines out there to see if we could gain inpiration from them. There were so many we couldn't fit them all in one post!

IT'S NICE THAT

"It’s Nice That is a tri-annually published arts and culture magazine. Including in-depth interviews and articles focussing on, and written by, practitioners from all over the world, It’s Nice That publishes original content in a format that gives the work the respect it deserves. The magazine is available online at itsnicethat.com, as well as from numerous international stockists."

I liked the way it was presented in a book type format so it looks professional and sleek...

I also liked how on the website the information about the Zine was split into 'launch', 'work', 'interviews' etc so it ave you a great deal of information without spoiling the actual content!

STACK MAGAZINES

"Stack is a unique service that brings together the best independent English language magazines from around the world and delivers them direct to your home. Beautifully made and offering an intelligent, alternative view of films, music, art and whatever else crosses their pages, they guarantee a fresh perspective on the world. Every Stack delivery is a surprise – you never know what you’re going to get next, but you do know that it will be an excellent independent magazine that you probably wouldn’t otherwise have found."

Although it isn't a Zine i really love the sweet branded package they deliver content in:

NIEVES

"Nieves is an independent publishing house based in Zurich, Switzerland. Founded in 2001, Nieves' focus is on publishing Artists' Books and Zines."

I love their little logo as it is in keeping with the low-fi zine format.

ZINESWAP

The fact you can swap zines is really cool. We are loving this!

Abbie and Sofie xxx

Brighton Zine Fest

Yesterday I went to the Brighton Zine Fest at Hanover Community Centre in Brighton (near the seafront!!!!)

I wanted to go to find out about what other people are doing with their Zines, how they make them, what they look like and the content. In brief, I wanted to emmerse myself into the culture.

This is what the website says about the fair:

Below features a list of Stall holders:

I picked up a few great examples of zines I was inspired by and I will document these below...

LADIES FIRST ZINE

- This was by far my favorite zine of the fair. It has been created by the illustrator Sarah Clark and features an illustrated feminist story.

-The fornt and back covers are made of brown felt and have been screen printed with a translucent glue to add an extra texture and image to them. (VERY CLEVER)

- The paper is of an organic feel, very textured and she had folded A4 sheets into A5 and sewn them together with the felt as the binding. A cute and neat way of producing something unique!

ELECTRIC BABY ZINE

- This zine caught my eye due to the bright colours and quirky deisgn on the front. 

- I loved how inside there was a cartoon of how the makes of the zine screen-printed it.

-There is also a mirror at the back that they have added on through reflective paper and I just like the change in medium. 

DEADTIME STORIES ZINE

This one had some weird content but I liked the added extra of a badge at the front and it also had some cool layouts of pages.

GISSA JOB ZINE

-An amazing use of current objects/media to create a zine. This comic zine uses a job centre application form to write and vandalise on their comic story of a guy trying to find a job!

-A MUST READ!!!

-I also love how it comes in a little wallet too!

Hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed going,

Abbie xxx