The Brookings register. [volume] (Brookings, Brookings County, S.D.) 1903-1971, 1919-07-10
NEWSPAPER AND MAGAZINE ART
BY Hubert MATHEWS.

BY Hubert MATHEWS.
(The following thesis submitted by
Hubert Mathews for his college cred
its at the State College, is very
concise review of the work of maya
zine and newspaper art. Through the
courtesy of Prof G. A. Starring, the
Register is permitted to publish it
for the benefit OF our readers.)
In the make up of a large newspa-
per, and in the dressing up OF all
magazines, the artist plays an i'm
portant though often an unnoticed
part.
I shall consider the newspaper first,
and the magazine work, which is a
higher form OF art, later
On local assignments an artist Is
often sent out with the reporter and
photographer. In the court room
where il is impossible TO use camera
an artist can often catch an interest
ing situation. During the preliminary
hearing OF the yellow Kid" in Chi
cago, at which | was present on as
signment, sketch was the only pos
sible means of getting an impress
sion OF the proceedings.
Another phase OF assignment work
is that of diagrammatic sketching. A
murder case which occurred while |
was working on the Tribune was ex-
planned in this way. The various
clues, the position Of the body, and
ell other data. were represented by
a diagrammatic sketch
The foregoing instances practically
cover the artists part in newsgather-
ing.
In the office, where staff of from
fifteen to twenty artists is maintained,
the important art work is done. There
are usually about two illustrators, two
comic men, two retouchcrs, one man
for the rotogravure section, and the
rest layout men. The illustrator
works for the Sunday section entirely.
Srecia! articles. cover designs. let
tered headings. and the stories OF the
fiction section, require the illustrators
ticles in the Tribune, for instance, re-
quire illustrations. The cover must
be artistically laid out and lettered for
the magazine section. The headings
for different departments, for stories,
and FOR special features are lettered
by hand to relieve the stiffness of
type page where possi' e. The stories
must be measured and any extra
snace filed with an illustration or
decoration.
The comic men, aside from the reg
ular cartoonists who 90 daily car
toon or strip" illustrate Ring Lard
ner's articles, and make comics for
odd purposes. such as '1S more shop
ping days until Christmas" and so
forth.
The retouchers' force retouch the pho
tographs so that they will reproduce
clearly with the coa-ce screen and
poor paper. Their wotk Is very Inn
portant for but few photographs can
be reproduced, clearly without re-
touching, in new, paper work.
The rotogravure man, makes up the
dummies for the Sunday pictorial Sec
tion. the photos must Be copied by
the photographers, reduced or en-
larged to the required size and pasted
on dummy page,
Then the set up captions are pasted
in their places, headings lettered on
tracing paper, decorations and bor-
ders drawn and the whole sent to the
roto printer for blueprint proof,
which is corrected and returned. A
finer screen is used in the roto and
so much retouching is not necessary.
The layout men handle the daily
rush work and often the entire force
will be required to cover an edition.
The daily editions are run to dead
lines" All work must be cleared mp
by certain time, to allow the en-
gravers to get out the cuts.
The photos are cut out in attrac-
tive designs. pasted down, decorations
added and captions lettered. The re-
touchers look them over, the city desk
approves them, and they are sent to
the engraver.