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ZINE PROJECT: IN THE NAME

xingyu zhong
Feb 7, 2018
4 min read

The first project of Brand Design 4 in Spring semester is a zine project. Actually, I didn't know what a zine was when I heard that we were going to made one in this project. So, the first class was actually a little confusing to me. I was kinda thinking in my mind that a zine was a poster or a magazine.

Then I went to google "zine" after the first class. It turned out that I really hadn't seen any zine in my life! It was not because of the English understanding problem this time. "Zine" really was a new thing to me. According to my understanding, a zine is kinda like a mini magazine but usually published by an individual to express whatever the person wants.

Even though Dan kept asking us who we are and what we want others think we are when we were conceiving the idea of our zine, I could only think of what might be an interesting thing to be seen in a zine, for me, also for others. Instead of shouting out to the world about what I believe in, I am more interested in learning in my zine and sharing what I learned with my audience. So, that was how "In the Name" came up in my mind. I was watching a Chinese drama about the Three Kingdoms period. It showed many Chinese characters that I didn't know, most of which are in people's names. ( I found the character in my name was a character of a clever person in that history as well! ) I started wondering what those character means, how those people were, and what storys they had. In Chinese culture, when parents name their child, they would think about the meaning of the character and how the people who was named with it were because the name represents how the parents want their child to be. Just like my name, my parents want me to be happy and talented like Xun Yu in the Three Kingdoms period.

I think a zine about Chinese characters in names would educate people about that knowledge. It would also be an interesting thing to learn for no matter Chinese people or foreign people.

The zine was named "In the Name" because it would be talking about one charater and one person who has it in the name in each issue. There would be the meaning, the person and the story, all in the name. I also want to cause people wonder "what is in the name" when they see the title. Here are some sketches and cover trys in the first round.

During the second class, I got some feedback. first, Dan suggested me to put the letters of "IN THE NAME" in a grid, make more space between the each letter. Next, the class suggest me to find some see through paper in stores to be used as the cover paper after they heard that I was going to make the pages under the cover with whole page of calligraphies, so that the cover could be see throught a little bit with those calligraghies. So, I made some changes to the cover and went to find papers for my zine after class. Here is the first version of my zine:

I printed the first version of my zine on the see through paper and cardpaper that I found in the store, and brought it to the class for more feedback. It turned out much better than I thought. They all liked the paper I chose as the cover, and thought the design was beautiful. Some said they felt like they were actually learning something from it, wanted to know more characters, or even wanted to learn Chinese. I still got some refinement suggestions from Dan. He suggested adding a little explanation of the zine and also some adjustment of the space between "THE" and "NAME" in the cover. I was also thinking about adding some explanation because people might not know how Chinese name works and what it is about. So, here comes my final version zine. I added a little explanation words in the preface and some more content as well. I also adjusted the cover as Dan said. Besides, I made the Chinese type in the text a bigger size because my mom was having a little trouble to read it.

I printed 25 zine out in the end because the store didn't have any more the cover paper I wanted. I handed out 10 and got some feedbacks from these strangers and my parents. They all thought it is beautiful and well put together. Some people noticed the special cover paper and loved it. Some people said it was interesting to learn something from it. Some people said even though they didn't know Chinese, they just like how the calligraphy looked. Most people got excited when they saw the zine and said they would show it to their friends because they thought their friends would love to read it. Here are some photos of the audience.