Printing Laboratories Practices: The i.E. Magazine Case Study

Abstract

Successive technological advances and the overwhelming presence of digital tools in our daily lives necessarily have an impact on design practice, and there is a growing preference for immediate and ephemeral communication channels, instead of manual and traditional craft practices. This paper aims to address issues related to independent publishing and explore traditional production techniques in a workshop context, namely through the extracurricular project—i.E Magazine—that students of the Degree in Design and Graphic Arts Technology at the Polytechnic Institute of Tomar have developed to contribute to exploration and learning outside of the classroom and to encourage the use of equipment and materials provided by the printing laboratories at this institution. i.E. Magazine is owned, edited, designed and produced by students and acts as a platform for exploring the polytechnic laboratories at Tomar and as a way to express their ideas, without committing to a specific training, agenda or problem in the context of the classroom. In each edition of the magazine, the students are responsible for the choice of content, the writing or external solicitation of articles, the production of images and illustrations, the design and layout, the choice of materials, and final production. In recent editions, the students or alumni of the Design Degree or Master of Editorial Design have even designed unique type fonts to use in their projects.