Digital Publication Covers
Though many people consider daily newspapers a dying medium — and, to be honest, many publications indeed are no longer being printed for distribution to 7-Elevens and driveways — newspapers still play a major role in American journalism. Especially those still-printed newspapers that serve as the primary source of local news in smaller communities. As do electronic facsimiles of newspapers that provide the familiar look and feel of print via digital platforms.
Photojournalist and painter Tim Frank has assembled teams of artists, typographers and page designers for essentially every major media organization in the United States and, in doing so, has elevated the visuals on Page One and interior section covers from rudimentary layouts to legitimate designs. His current teams are affiliated with Advance Local Media, known in New Jersey for The Star-Ledger, The Times (of Trenton) and nj.com, among others. Here’s a sampling of their work, which reflects a consistency of style and quality emblematic of Frank’s leadership.
Someone somewhere saw this illustration of airborne pathogens with their pickaxes and their all-too-gleeful swaggers, and they started singing, “Heigh-ho, heigh-ho; It’s off to work we go.” The cuteness of the illustration attracts the reader; the seriousness of the topic — deadly disease — locks the reader into the article. The whimsy of the artwork makes the topic palatable. By contrast, an image of a coronavirus …
… would have been a major turnoff for most people, especially at the height of the pandemic, when the news was bleak and getting bleaker by the day. The heigh-ho germs and viruses helped to sell a tough topic.
Advance Local Media’s covers — a multitude of them, produced on tight deadlines daily and often reflective of breaking news — run the gamut from politics and government through entertainment and sports. It’s clear from the designs and content that nothing is an accident.
This page, with its nine humorous vignettes, tells a complete story about the back-to-school experience. Anyone who peeks at this for more than a minute or two will understand everything that everyone involved — students, parents, teachers, neighbors — needs to know without turning the page to any written words.
This Academy Awards preview challenges the ill-informed to recognize the contenders for the Oscar, though movie buffs would have no trouble knowing who these folks are. (I didn’t; well, not all of them.) The consistency of the style and the energy serve to hook in the readers, and I would expect the accompanying article(s) to have high readership.
About Tim Frank
Tim Frank is an artist and photographer who, lured by the collaborative possibilities and large canvas of newspapers, fell in love with journalism. His team develops and executes the print strategy for 34 publications in New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan and Oregon.
Bio information distilled from various online sources. All images sourced from http://timothyfrank.com/advance and published in print or digital platforms from 2020 through 2025.
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