Former Sunday Times design editor introduces us to his world

By Dorothy Lambert

The former associate design editor for the Sunday Times, Peter Baistow, introduced magazine students to his world of electronic diets.

His family have worked in the print industry for four generations - long enough he says wryly, to think that if they cut themselves they might find it was ink running through their veins rather than blood.

He got straight to the point and addressed his themes of pictures on the page and how to put them together.

He produced a picture of Camilla Parker-Bowles in a packed congregation at the Royal wedding, retrospectively the only guest to be dressed up without a smile amongst the happy throng. A diligent picture editor had noticed and circled the image for future use.

Peter warned: “Pictures can tell any tale you want, so be careful.”

Electronic diet

When Kate Winslet appeared in photographs looking uncharacteristically slim, it was not Kate, but the picture editors who had done the toning up with their own electronic diet of graphics.

Peter presented his front page from the Sunday Times magazine designed in just 36 hours after the unexpected death of the Princess of Wales. When portraying faces there is a choice of using one big image or a lot of similar ones.

Peter chose rows and rows of different passport-sized images of the Princess of Wales taking the readers back with her on her very eventful and royal journey through the lens.

Occasionally it will be the editor who selects a picture. When news of Marilyn Monroe’s lonely death emerged, it was the then editor of the Sunday Times Andrew Neil who made the decision to depict her using a natural facial image. When questioned about intrusive paparazzi he was adamant that it was acceptable when aiming to inform or expose an injustice.

The afternoon was not over. Peter had some fun in store for the students. He had created a workshop where they had the opportunity to design a double page spread based on a selection of cuttings from ‘Culture’ magazine.

The subject was George Clooney discussing the release of his latest film Michael Clayton. That’s when the students discovered the secret of ‘lampposts’ and ‘letterboxes’.

Lampposts are pictures which are stretched vertically and narrowed and letterboxes are pictures which are stretched horizontally and narrowed to accommodate advertisements.

These are not appreciated by photographers as cropping images too much can leave pictures distorted and without their sense of space and place.

Peter left the students with some advice. As multi-tasking was becoming more important he urged them to take their own pictures and use them with their stories.

His closing words: "The future is varied."

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