Newspaper ad

Our next project is to make a black and white news paper ad for our school newspaper the “Collegio”. The first, obvious step was to figure out our dimensions, news paper measurements works differently than just a design you make and print. Instead of measuring width by inches you measure it by columns and just about every newspaper has different sizes for their columns. So that means if you have a 2x4” ad (.5" margin, and .125" bleed), its two columns by four inches. Not two inches by four inches.  These are the numbers we got for the Collegio newspaper.


1 column = 1.83
2 column= 3.79
3 column= 5.75
4 column= 7.71
5 column= 9.67
6 column= 11.63

We were given a budget of $197. Since running a color ad in the Collegio costs $200 by itself, we are forced to do a black and white ad. The other requirement was to figure out a demographic to sell to. Since the Collegio is only delivered within Pittsburg, it has to be a local business. I decided to do my ad for a fictional pizza shoppe called “Samurai Dog Pizza”. My last step was to figure out how big I wanted to make the ad. So, my teachers were right. All that “useless” math I thought I didn’t need. Well, I need it now. Here are the numbers and formulas I (and the rest of the class) came up with.

z columns (width)  by  z inches (height) = P

P  x  $4.00 = Cost

So since I decided on a 3 by 4” ad, this should be the cost of running it.

3 columns x 4 inches = 12

12 x $4.00 = $48.00

$197.00 - $48.00 = $149 that are left over.

With $149.00 left over, I could run my ad for three more issues of the Collegio. 

TL;DR (Too long, didn’t read): A 3 x 4” advertisement with a four issue run would cost $48 per week, and with a budget of $197 dollars you can run your ad for four issues and grab yourself some lunch for doing a job well done.


*Note: all the images were made by me, font sources are given a bit later.


My target audience was anyone really. I guess the picture and name of the pizza shoppe would appeal to younger people. But there's nothing really saying that only "20-somethings" are allowed to eat there. The call is action is your atypical "call now" but the coupons add extra incentive to come into the restaurant.

There are the sketches I drew, the different mascot and logo ideas along with a couple basic layouts I could do, I tried to stay within the 'Asian Pizza" theme. I (obviously) went with the samurai dog, and I used the japanese frame as part of the logo. So both pictures can be eye-catching and recognizable.


Since we had to have one element be hand drawn and turned into a bitmap, I had to retrace then ink-over my samurai dog. Here's what it looked like after I scanned it. Keep in mind, since I wanted to have the highest picture quality possible I had to scan the image at 600 dpi. That way I could resize it however I want for future use and it wont look all pixelated.

This is the inked version fresh from the scanner. As you can tell its a little rough and I sketched a bit too close to the eyes. Since I'm working in photoshop to convert it to a bitmap I can touch it up a little bit and it looks better after conversion. Thank goodness for the clone tool.

This is what it looked like touched up. I used the clone brush to add a bit more white space where it was needed. Used the paint brush to make some lines darker so they were more pronounced after the conversion. Sharpies can only do so much.

Finally, this is the bitmap that will go into the advertisement. In my on-screen critique version (which will be the next picture) I used a vector from the scanned picture so that's why it looks different.

This is my first draft, the classed like it for the most part. The biggest suggestions were to try it with a vertical spread as opposed to horizontal, and make the coupons have a dashed line, to imply (cut here). The font from the logo and phone number is called "Karate" and its from dafont.com, the one with the address and date/time is called Herulanum and its from urbanfonts.com.

This is the final version. I decided to go with the vertical look and dashed lines. I think my classmates were right in that it looks better. And I don't have to worry about people cutting up my art to get to the coupon. Since I went with a different layout that means a different ad size which means more math. Which breaks down like this;

The new image is 2 columns by 5.75 inches (3.79" x 5.75").

z columns (width)  by  z inches (height) = P

P  x  $4.00 = Cost

So since I decided on a 2 x 5.75” ad, this should be the cost of running it.

2 columns x 5.75 inches = 11.50 column inches

11.50 x $4.00 = $46.00

$197.00 - $46.00 = $151 that are left over.


$184 dollars spend with $13 bucks left over.


So I can still run the ad for four issues, and buy lunch AND dinner. Awesome.


The last thing I need is a printed proof to see how it looks in person. This project wasn't bad at all. Since I'm taking a class that is purely newspaper layouts, that helped me a bit more than I thought it would. I like knowing I have the ability to take my drawing and put it into a document without having the task of vectoring. I prefer a vector because I don't think I'm a good artist but if my skills improve I might use this technique more.