Reformatting an unchanged historical doc-Crit. Pls?

Rhonda

Senior Member
This is for my online Advanced Typography class which I am working on an assignment. The assignment is to take a known historical document, that everyone knows how it looks, and basically "redesign" it. Some of the example documents we could choose from are ones like the US Constitution. Or Charters, proclamations, etc. I selected the Magna Carta of 1215.

In Illustrator, Ive gotten the formatting of the actual text body already there plus a background texture.(created in Ps) Also included some meaningful pictures. But part of the grading will be on just "how different" it is from the original document. So, currently, to make it different Ive put a majority of the text in a pentagon shape. And in the pdf, thats really as far as Ive gotten but now Im really not sure what next to do with it. Such as I am not certain of the font, and thought of changing it to a blackletter typeface but to keep it different, I used a very decorative font.(Herculanum)

So what I am requesting here is either critique of what I have or suggestions to do anything else with this which ever you want to offer with my thanks :eek:
 

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I like where you have used the copy within a shape to create dimension to the page, what made you choose a hexagon shape? Have you thought instead of a shape you could use a letter to put the copy within, like the hexagon outline like you have done above?
I do like the type you have chosen.
 
Thank you HGC for the reply:)

Honestly I just picked that shape randomly for the different "look" than the original, I don't really know what significance the hexagon could have to the Magna Carta:D I could try the text in a letter shape but wouldn't it have to be a huge shape to fit in a bunch of text and still be readable? Well I'll be thinking of that and try to work on it tonight.
 
Well I was considering your suggestion at work then it hit me. Something i could try is to format the text to fit not letters but numbers, and maybe in 1215. HGC's suggestion was what spurred that idea. Thanks again!:)
 
Here is what I have ended up making in case anyone wanted to see :eek: I could not think of meaningful way to use letters as an area for text. However on the tip, I thought about using numbers, specifically 1215 since thats the year it was penned, though I know it was amended a lot in the generations that followed.

It may be hard to see on the small picture but I can never seem to get text to wrap in odd shapes very well no matter how I align, arrange and size the typeface.
 

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