End of Module Evaluation

Collaborative Form

OUGD301 Bibleography

Competition Brief - Sound Bites

Evaluation

I found this brief particularly difficult as I found out last minute that the competition brief we had to do, had to be a current, after being told otherwise. So I looked at a few on the ISTD briefs and found 'sound bites' we was very similar to my 'Doing my nut in' brief. It gave me the opportunity to produce the promotional material for my books, which I didn't have time for. Using the content of the 'Doing my nut in' brief, I created a visual concept for explaining sound visually. I loved the process of listening and trying to explain the sound through typography, it was something I hadn't done before. Considering the amount of time I had to do this brief, I was proud to have come up with such a strong concept and a suitable amount of work to cover 3 boards. This became strongly a concept and research driven brief, which I don't think I've done before. Ideally I'd like to re-do / spend more time on this brief and take it into FMP, to explore my concept further and how I can push it.

Typosgraphe

Evaluation

Working in a collaborations has been harder and more rewarding than I initially thought. Choosing a partner who had skills I wanted to improve worked to my benefit, I feel my type and layout skills have some what improved, and my communication skills - Having to email places to possibly hold the event, and networking to involve people to submit work. Creating an event at first was quite scary, but because I had a partner, we were able to push through and actually organise it between us, for the new year. We managed to organise our time very well, there were times were we hadn't touched the brief or spoke a out it for at least 2 week at the beginning so we decided on weekly weekend meetings in which we would decided what we'd do for the week ahead. These became more often during uni days, we'd organise day were we would go down to screen print together, or print. We would write a set f tasks, and between us, decided who'd be doing what, according to skill set. It was really good working with Sarah, she was very pro-active and did a lot of work which had been a problem with past collaboratives, I would certainly work with her again.

Things I would do differently would consist of writing the brief together, at several points we had different ideas and changed the brief, but communication was lost as these ideas weren't written down, which resulted in me being confused about what we should be doing at several points. This I can say was really the only issue we had, it been a successful collaboration in my eyes, and I look forward to the event in January.

Doing my nut in

Evaluation

This brief had a personal connection with me due to my birth origins and nature. I was able to relate myself within content, and grasp a better understanding. I have live in 12 different houses in 5 big cities so have a broad range of knowledge about dialect and accent, so was able to use this in communicating speech well. 

I had always wanted to write a brief which had a focus on type and content as I knew it was a skill of mine which needed improving, so it was best it was about something I was interested in and could produce imagery alongside - In this case the book covers. Toward the end of the brief, I was getting compliments about my type and layout which I never thought would happened!

Because I had a personal interest in the content of the book, it meant I enjoyed the brief, which resulted, I feel, in it being completing in good time, and to a high standard. Originally this was meant to take just a 2 weeks to complete as I was going to mock up products, but I really wanted to see and feel the products - I was able to do this due to good time management. Alongside other brief I found any 'spare time' to go to book binding workshops, to find out how best to approach it. It took 6 hours to glue, cut and bind all the books, as I hadn't produced anything like this before. Its certainly a skill I want to improve further and take into FMP. A problem I did have was after producing some high quality books, I found it difficult to photograph to retain the quality, but after the workshop I managed to obtain some good photographs for the boards. 

SOmething I would do differently next time, would be to focus on both sides of the brief, image and type, and for them to be as good as one another. I feel the covers could have been so much stronger if I had explored printing processes within it. I'm that bothered about it, I intend on taking this brief into FMP as a second, or special edition and improving on the designs.

Overall I have learnt a lot within this brief, my time management skills saved my sanity, book binding isn't as simple as it seems but now I know how, and my type skills although still not brilliant, I'm getting there.

Casa Mia

Evaluation

This brief was originally driven by another - a Tigerprint design a day brief. I've always been interested in hand rendered type so wanted to do a 'Type a day' project to obtain my own hand rendered typography resource. Rather than do this on the side, I wanted to incorporate it into a brief. This is when I came up with the idea of producing descriptives, this then gave me the idea of use a Menu for content. I happened to go for a meal in Casa Mia, firstly trying to book a table online: I found their webite very hard to use and aesthetically awful, it was overloaded with information and a christmas colour palette.

I really enjoyed writing for this brief, as it was some what real. A restaurant I had personally come across, experienced it bad design, created and thought up a concept and put it into play. Because I was genuinly passionate and interested I felt the brief came along a lot quicker, the amount of work I produced was something which would have taken me double the time last year. With the passion I had for this brief, I was driven to explore new processes which would compliment my hand rendered design elements. This included embossing, laminating, screen printing and exploring stock choices I hadn't otherwise used before. This brief alone has taught me so much, that your final products look so much better when you put the time and effort in, it really pays off. A few problems did arise when trying to screen print - the time I estimated it would take, ended up doubling. This was due to me not remembering how to screen print - so I needed help, which I couldn't get some days. This problem also occurred with new skills I wanted to learn, but on a positive note, I now know how to, and this will help me in the FMP. Another thing I've learnt within this brief is to consider the use of the products - my menus needed to be easy to read by customers, so my hand rendered type needed to be legible. This also to the staff, they needed to be able to quickly differentiate the menus, so I screen printed a single word on each a bold, gold colour. This brief become very much consumer and worked led.

Overall I'm really happy with the final results, I've met the brief and had fun doing it. Its been frustrating and challenging at times, but because I had managed my time in a 10 week chart, and left time for mistake, I was able to meet the deadline well in advance. I would love to potentially propose the idea to Casa Mia in the near future.

Accessorize

Evaluation

I really liked this brief, I felt it worked to my strength of illustration the most, it was a brief I considering fun and would go to it when I'd had enough of another. Retail graphics is something of interest to me, to potentially take forward as a focus when looking for a job. I really enjoyed creating the illustrations; the challenge came trying to make them into a square formatted pattern, I had lots of issues making it a swatch and it not fitting products quite right. Next time I think I need to contact some people within surface pattern to see what techniques and software they use to work with their content. 

Relating the designs to the products Accessorize sold meant their was a lot of primary and secondary research - i had to list potential items I could draw, which related to each season. I really pushed myself by overall creating 4 different designs, 2 per season. I'm really happy with the final outcome and products, and the way I've been able to photograph the 3D objects; they've come out a lot better that originally expected, this I feel has been down to my crafting skills too, I made sure of no errors, nothing that the camera could pick up on. Another skill I've improved alongside photography is the ability to mock up, in the initial first first stages of other briefs, I was really bad at making it look realistic, but within this brief I've managed to create a range of vector images of shop fronts and interiors to apply my designs to.

Competition Brief - App Giff

So after speaking to Phil about how i was struggling to create a range for my competition brief he suggested I made an app, which I'd already designed the still visuals but he suggested I made a working giff. I'd never created one before so after following a few tutorials I tried making one within Photoshop but found it quite difficult. I came across an online giff maker, which I didn't think would work too well but I tried it anyway and i'm quite happy with the result, It communicates how the app works.

www.picasion.com

The app has been designed to add more depth to the publication, the app can be accessed by scanning the bar code of the purchased book, each app will only be accessible once the book is purchased. It has two levels to teach you more so how to pronounce and understand. On one hand it works as a translator, so a recording can be made for it to tell you what someone is saying. Or you can physically type what you want to say in that accent, and it will give you the phonics and words and how to pronounce it.

There is also the option of whether its a word or phrase you want to translate, and whether you want to hear it, or see it in writing. 

The below giff is the 'read it' option, which you type what you want translated, and it gives a written translation back.

The below giff shows the hear it option being used, the phrase wanted is types in, it then translates and shows the infographic I had produced within the posters, alongside an audio.

create an animated gif

Competition Brief - Final product shots

Casa Mia - Final product shots

Notes for future boards

Layout:

Text at bottom

Headers maximum 15pt - Ideal 12pt
Text maximum 11pt Leading 15pt - Ideal 8pt text - 11pt Leading 

Brief title:

20pt

Subheading:

15pt

Stock:

Thin Paper, rather than card

Photographs:

Only use high quality photography

Information:

Note print specifications
Type face
Point size
Kerning etc
Colour swatches

OUGD301 Updated boards - Response to crit

Doing my nut in

Casa Mia

Accessorize

Final Crit - Boards

It was stated that within my blogs I should produce more documents in scrib and Issuu format, but otherwise annotation is good. The organisation of the blogs needed to be improved with less labels.

The content of the boards was good but some images were blurred, but most of high quality. Not so much text is needed, images speak for themselves. The layout is good, but bullet points for some areas would be good.

Increase the leading of the text, and use different weights for body and titles. Avoid outlines around images.

Shop mock ups look good. Could use more evaluation within blog posts. Good visual development. Organise blog by clearer labels. 

Boards - Website images would look better on a mac screen. Increase the leading and number the boards.

A lot of development just remember to annotate; annotation could be better. 

For boards try and create a type hierarchy 

Some photos blurry

Number boards

 

Overall a lot of compliments were made about each of my products I had created, the quality. was a main point which was good.

Casa Mia menus - lamination is naff, try using a waterproof stock

OUGD301 - Board designs so far

Doing my nut in



Casa Mia

Accessorize

Accessorize - Final Products

I am really happy with how well the final outcomes have come out, the colour palette especially works better than I expected. To begin with I thought this brief would be quite a small one, with not many products produced but its become bigger with time, I've wanted to physically create packaging rather than my initial want to mock it up. The illustration quality has surprised me, its a skill I believe I have improved through this and other briefs but I think it works so well here due to my choice of application. I had never done any form of pattern design previous to this brief but its certainly something i'm now interested in and would like to take into next year. 

Posters designed to incorporate products among relating illustrations.

Range of packaging designed. Initially I want just going to create the boxes roughly and take some photographs but I paid a lot more attention to the craft and quality; using ribbon too, to finish off the product. 

I am really happy with the photography quality, photography as a skill is something I'm sure I have improved on, and put more effort into. For instance, taking the time to hire out a camera.

Competition Board plan

1 - Brief, content, small image of Books - Posters
2 - Extra Promotional Material - Audio CD, Book Mark, Retail Graphics
3 - Digital Media - Apps, Ipad, i phone, website?

Competition Brief - Book Marks

I wanted to design a range of book marks which could be used alongside the pocket size books, in order to keep your place, which makes it easier to quickly find something you may be looking for when out and about. There is a design for each book.

Competition Brief - Audio Cds

So I decided a great idea would be to produce a design for a proposed audio CD which would accompany the books, the idea would be for it to help you understand how to say and pronounce the words and phrases within the book. This would work in the same way as the posters, using the info graphics to help visually understand how to say / pronounce the regional dialect. The visuals would work alongside the audio, for your pronunciations to be more accurate, and understandable. The design for the audio CD case is consistent with the posters, for it to be recognisable as part of the product range.

Competition Brief - Further Poster design Development

So I wanted to try and tie the designs more with the books I had created by producing graidents for the sound waves which matched the coat or arms colour palette. Once I had produced these, I really wasn't happy with the result, It was too inconsistant with colour, and I preferred the original designs.

So I retained the watercolour produced gradient, but improved the format and layout of the posters, including the crest to make it more recognisable as being part of my books:

Typosgraphe - Submissions

So finally the submissions are flying in, we are getting physical items from a range of courses within the uni. We wanted to push for further submissions so were updating our Facebook page with any promotional work we're doing, alongside submissions so far.

Competition Brief - Poster Design - Communication

So I got some feedback from a peer as I was really struggling with communicating my posters. he suggested making it clear that the quote related to the info graphic, by positioning text in line with peaks a troughs. I thought I would keep the quote as it were to be legible, but to add letters so readers automatically have to say it out loud to understand what it says. I'm really happy with the result but I need to make it clearer (i feel) that it relates back to my books by containing the icons seen on the spines.

Competition Brief - Poster Design and Experimentation

Some Initial Experimentation, I wanted to try manipulating type to represent how its meant to sound. With a few experiments, visually it wasn't great and didn't work well alongside my graphs, it would take a lot of explanation alongside for it to be understandable. So I decided to simply write the quote underneath the chart, with a small amount of info graphic information.

To start with I wanted to manipulate:

The Posters I eventually produced:

Competition Brief - Using gradients

I wanted to use colours too which would represent the idea of pitch and sound. It is recognisable that red is of a high pitch, orange medium and blue very low. I decided to create a gradient, this I firstly created on illustrator but found it too harsh, so I decided to paint one with watercolour to apply as a swatch.

The swatch didn't fit the shapes as I originally wanted them, but instead have create a strange but wonderful array of colours. As a set, the graphs work together representing the levels of pitch.

I tried with a line swatch but wasn't too keen on the result

I then tried to revert the colours, this too I feel works well with the swatch but I fear it looks too much like a silhouette of a city scape.

The gradient created on illustrator - it doesn't represent the colours transition as smooth as I wanted and achieved through watercolour paints.

The gradient I created

I used this directly on drawings. I intend on cutting and working with these at a later date.

Competition Brief - Creating Visual accent graphs

One of the main ideas I had for the brief, was to try and analyse the accents through sound, pitch levels, volume etc to create a sound wave image for each accent and phrase. I listened for particular groups of letters and words within each Recording from the BBC Sounds library 'accents and dialect' which were found in my chosen regional phrases. For each I analysed how I would visually interpret the phrases, alongside a graph which represents how to pronounce the phrases more efficiently. 

The charts I drew for each location and regional phrase.

I then drew the charts onto InDesign using columns and a baseline grid to create a level of consistency between each.