@5minquotes was a project I started in order to get myself to design something everyday even if it was very simple and only for 5 minutes. I know how important typography and colors are especially in designing for screens, so I asked myself what I could do to improve my skills in these areas. I decided that I would come up with a quote that I would turn into an Instagram post or story everyday. I liked the fact that there would immediately be some restrictions due to the size and dimension constraints of Instagram. I also set a time limit of 5 minutes for the whole design from start to finish in order to quickly come up with creative layouts & solutions.
1. 5 minute limit for design
2. Only 2 colors
3. Only 1 font
I liked how these quotes would reflect not only my personality but also as a sort of time capsule as to what was going on in the zeitgeist around that time. I have quotes from writers such as Pynchon, David Foster Wallace, even Shakespeare; rap lyrics from the 80s, 90s, 00s and 2010s; quotes about environmental and social justice issues; and alot of stupid jokes as well. The goal was to either make someone smile or think about something for a few seconds.
After coming up with the quote, I would set a timer for 5 minutes. I already had the layout setup in Sketch (a web design application) and would copy and paste the quote. I wanted this to be mostly typesetting, so I didn't get too crazy with any graphic elements on 95% of the posts. There were a few I did, but due to the 5 minute restriction, most posts were standard align-left, align-center, or align-right. The next step would be choosing the font. I try to use different fonts for each post, but due to volume of output there is some inevitable repetition. After selecting the font and alignment, the next step would be font size followed by line spacing. (Designer nerds, don't go crazy on me for the lack of kerning, I was using Sketch and only had 5 minutes) The last step would be deciding on colors and finally sending the file to my phone and posting the design.
This project was up to 15k followers within a year. I was organically and systematically growing the account through new content everyday so it was pretty successful. However my account got banned in July of 2020 due to getting spammed by a few hundred bot accounts. I am currently in talks with Instagram to try to get it back, but I have started a new account which you can follow here.