I was introduced to this exercise by lector John Paulin at ITU. The goal of this exercise is to draw out the essential elements of a design you’re working on, this is done by cognitive process of transferring information from a particular source (in this case your design, the source) to another particular subject (the target).

The idea is that through this process of transferring information you will naturally and subconsciously emphasize the elements that are most central to the subject, thus clarifying your essentials for future development.

So, how does it work practice? We were to take our blog design, and imagine how it would be designed if it were a magazine cover instead. A magazine cover has a rather limited space in which it needs to represent the entirety of the magazines content. Therefore it is essential which elements you want to lay emphasis whilst still give a broad enough representation of the entire content to capture the interest of as many viewers as possible.

This is how my magazine cover turned out. I wanted to create something simple and aesthetic that would capture the viewers eye, but still communicate a message. I found that these are the most important parameters I want to work with in regards to the design of my blog.

I spent around 10-15 minutes on this exercise, as i felt the real epiphany arised from the immediate process and introduction rather than the attention to details. This is however definitely a technique that I hope to use in the future, what I took from this exercise is the ability to become conscious of your subconscious priorities.