Javier Errea, the visual journalist who designed award-winning Lisbon newspaper ‘i’ (Lisbon) will be keynote speaker at the first joint WAN-Ifra/SND news design conference in South Asia next month.

The event to address challenges of designing for multiple formats is being held in New Delhi by WAN-IFRA and the Society for News Design from January 23-24.

Focus sessions will cover Newspaper Design and Redesign, Information Graphics and Designing for the Online/Tablets.

With the role of the newspaper designer changing and with increasing consumption of news on internet, mobile and tablets, a change in mindset and new ways to present news design that appeals to the regular and the new age readers are called for.    

Among ‘best practice’ speakers from around the world are Adonis Durado (Times of Oman), Abel Robinson (MINT from HT Media), Deepak Harichandan (Times of India), Douglas Okasaki (Gulf News), German newspaper designer Hans Peter Janisch, Sukriti Gupta (MMI Online from Jagran Prakashan) and Tyson Evans (New York Times Interactive News Desk).

Steve Dorsey, president of SND, says the organisation is very excited about the collaboration with WAN-Ifra, “especially because of the very talented selection of speakers and the venue.

“It's an exciting time for newspapers in India and South Asia right now and we're pleased to be involved with this special training effort and look forward to future projects and engagement in the region moving forward," he says.

Conference chairperson Hans Peter Janisch – a former international director of SND – says he is confident that the event will be a “not to be missed” one for all visual journalists and editors.

“This region has a vibrant and growing news publishing industry with a lot of talent. Events like these will act as a bridge between the latest global news design trends and the regional design
sensibilities”, says Magdoom Mohamed, managing director of WAN-IFRA South Asia.

The conference will be followed by a workshop on the second day, where the participants will analyse their products and have the opportunity to work on the design under the guidance of the trainer. The workshop will give the participants a critique on their typography, visual storytelling, use of colour and newspaper and story structuring. It will also help to correct practical problems in the daily workflow of the design desk.