The Charlotte Observer - May 2008
Two major focuses on this page: the Wachovia Championship promo across the top and the 100 Votes story in the centerpiece spot. The proportions of the two work perfectly together, plus I added just a little extra white space around the 100 Votes story to set it apart from the rest of the page. Another challenge with this page was double, triple checking all the names and mug shots, which were, indeed, all correct.
The Charlotte Observer - August 2008
The cover story was a roundup of free summer events happening around Charlotte for the weekend. Instead of using dull file art from a play or festival, I had fun using simple silhouettes and a fun, fresh color palette.
The Charlotte Observer - February 2008
In 2008, I was chosen to work on the Observer’s investigative project, “The Cruelest Cuts” – a six-part series that exposed the plights of poultry workers. It was a challenging project because of the large amount of people involved from start to finish. At any given time I was dealing with dozens of different opinions and personalities. It was a classic give and take situation and required a lot of patience and compromise. There was also constant change from day to day and hour to hour. One small change would often have a domino effect on the entire series causing major adjustments to design. The series won numerous awards and was a Pulitzer finalist.
The Charlotte Observer - August 2008
A fun, active page to look at, and to design. All it took was some stock art of grass and blue sky – pepper that with some cute puppies, and you’ve got a perfect layout about a new uptown dog park.
The Charlotte Observer - July 2007
A fun story and design that ran right before “The Simpsons Movie” hit theaters. You simply can’t miss Bart’s yellow, iconic head peeking out from the page.
The Charlotte Observer - February 2007
I had such a great time working with the reporter on this layout. I had him describe the focal point of his story in detail so I could better get an idea of how to illustrate this story. In the end, the reporter was so busy working on the story that I helped him track down the “big numbers” that became the flowers. The next day he said he had gotten dozens of comments about the creative design on his story.