Twisted Ink

Twisted Ink Magazine

Twisted Ink magazine is a very different magazine. Twisted Ink magazine is actually a step off of the Twisted Ink LTD interdisciplinary creative agency. It started as a fine art/print studio that was founded by John Cann. As the studio started to evolve it started to become a commercial design and print company. This started the full forward push of service advertsing, design, and multimedia company. It was first release date was in 2000 in Norfolk, VA. The magazine is published and sent out whenever they can. The magazine is bi-monthly. This magazine is dedicated to art and culture. They are very supportive of tattoos.

It is so created, beautiful, intense and colorful. It has a lot of different media. There are the normal media of photography, fine arts, and computer media. The one issue that I became very fond of was the number 5 issue. I feel like this issue was very well planned out. The cover page of the magazine is simple but yet different with the photography and the typefaces. There were not many different advertisements to it but they put them on their own separate pages unlike other magazines that put an advertisement the article itself. The articles had their own theme going on with them.

The cover page is something in its own. The photo is of a woman with tattoos that is very innocent look to her. The three different lines of type are all three different type faces. Not one of them is all the same. One is very edgy and the second one is in a flowing cursive and the very last one is blocked lettered. There is not much going on with the cover page but the photo is all that is needed n the cover to make the view want to open the page.

The pages that are the full articles themselves, they are all different. Not one of them has the same background, picture placement, and coloration. The first major article on pages 4-5 is about a model that has tattoos and how she tries to get people to look at people with tattoos with a good eye not a judging eye. But the set up of the page has different angles of straight thick lines. All of them are going in different directions and angles. Even the word blocks are going in different direction. The photograph itself is unique. The mirror under her is giving the illusion that there is two of her. Her eyes on both of “her” attract you to look deeper. With the smaller picture of her there is the computer editing to make the picture look like it is fading into the background. The background is simple white but has blotches of gray involved.

The advertisement pages are quite different compared to their articles. They tend to be boring. They just have the pieces of the logo of the company that is advertising. They are just like the company cards or posters were just copied or pasted on the page. Nothing more those pieces were added. There are boarders around the pieces and maybe a dark image/design.

This Magazine has some relevance content to design students. The magazine has different articles that focus on different parts of arts. The magazine is not only about tattoos. The one article has a clip about an artist that work is graffiti that is legal. They had a short clip about him and how they are supportive of his work. The main focus of his part of the article is his work. They have a whole three pages of his work. Even though tattooing is not really considered graphic design in book but in a way it is like graphic design. You are creating a picture of art for people to see and communicate with others. Sometimes tattoos are not smartly placed on one’s body. There are two articles that talk about the life of the tattoo designers and how they became to where they are now. It can be the same as any designer, in graphic design or not.

This magazine compared to other design magazines is not quite the same but compared to other tattoo magazines it is similar. The other magazines seem intend to viewers that are focused on graphic design only. This magazine seems to go out of the normal realm of graphic design. There are times when it steps in same direction and other times when it goes way beyond the elements of it. When it is compared to other tattoo magazines that are higher quality and better known Twisted is lower to them. They have around the same information and same purpose to the viewer.

If there was a chance after reading this paper/blog and you are thinking about subscribing to the article I want to you to think about these points. Are you looking for a magazine that is mainly about tattoos? If so then I would pick a better known magazine. Are you looking for a magazine that is a medium grade magazine that talks about less known artist but ones that are one the rise to becoming big? Then this magazine is one that you would like. If you don’t mind skipping off pages of articles and not worrying about them on the page of article, then you might like this magazine. I personally love the lower class of this magazine and knowing that they are built from the ground up and not really that old. I love the color, designs, articles, and the types that this magazine has. They are not afraid to go far beyond what they need to get their point across. Making it a good magazine.