13/11 - John's set of Tasks

My chosen areas of practice as of now

• Type
• Packaging
• Editorial

My main strengths as of now

• Illustration - Vector based
• Typography
• Idea generation & organisation

My identified weaknesses as of now

• Finishing
• Photography / Photoshop
• Presentation skills

A set of main goals for the year

• Produce a brief to a professional standard
• Start to network with current professionals
• Improve Photoshop skills

3 wishes for the year

• Complete CS Mastery
• All of my chosen design studios contact me to come in and intern
• Lifetime supply of Bakery 164 goods

6 Tasks

Task 1 :  Identify 5 companies/studios which you consider potentially synergetic to you personally.
Write a short explanatory paragraph and reasons for each.

http://www.studiomikmik.co.uk/index.html

What grabbed my attention with Studio Mik Mik was the bright and vibrant execution of briefs, I would't say that I was particularly good at executing tasteful, minimalist design, I prefer energy, interaction and getting the audience engaged when I go about solving briefs. The website also appears to be friendly and they have a focus on eco design, which I am interested in.

http://www.p-and-w.com/

I found this company whilst searching for Packaging Design I liked for a previous task, the packaging that I found was this:



I think that this carton is designed really well, It communicates the exotic and fresh flavours of the juice,  it stands out from other cartons that just feature images of the fruits used in the juice and it looks affordable. Further research into the company and I thought that their website was a really good interactive experience and they have a varied and interesting client list and take on a range of design specialisms.

http://www.designbridge.com/

Design bridge looks like a much bigger design machine than the previous two companies but the clients and execution of the briefs featured on their website look very interesting and exciting. They take on a lot of packaging and branding work which is something I am really looking forward to getting stuck into and haven't done to a good standard yet.

http://site.laboca.co.uk/

I found La Boca after a PPP session in Level 4, they have an incredibly varied array of work and aren't afraid to be experimental with the work they produce, it would be very interesting to work with people that aren't afraid to try new things and don't try to follow trends. They use a general style but, by no means stick to this if the brief needs otherwise.

http://www.theconsult.com/

The Consult are one of my favourite studios out of this list, I think that their creative solutions to briefs is spot on. I think that there is a great amount of personality and friendliness in the work that they produce. They are local to Leeds which would be very useful for experience purposes and they appeal to me more than the bigger ad-based companies.

http://www.bigfish.co.uk/index.php

This company have done some of the best packaging, I think, around at the moment such as Clipper tea and Dorset Cereals, they also do lots of branding design and I think that working there would give me the opportunity to solve an exciting range of problems and improve my design and ideas for solutions.

 At the moment I would say that http://www.theconsult.com/ would be my top choice because they do a wide variety of work which suits me as I am unsure of what my strengths are or what I would be comfortable specialising in. I feel comfortable when I look at the work they produce as I think that it looks professional but I could produce something of similar quality, whereas with some of the bigger agencies seeing really technical, digital work is very daunting and I feel that I would get lost and be under skilled to produce work worthy of their clients demands. The work, I feel, has a very friendly, personal and hands on approach which is something I always want to push whenever I design.

The fact that they are a local agency as well makes me think that they would have the time for interns whereas, stereotypically, I think that a London agency may be too busy to give time to students, although I am probably making an incorrect generalisation.

The location and work they are producing are big factors that are making me lean towards this company, but also the range of briefs and friendly aesthetics and 'feel' of the website is very appealing to me.

8 Methods I could utilise to contact them:

• Poster/ creative product in the post
• Series of letters that are clearly labelled (1 of 3) that combine to deliver a complete message
• Go in in person and ask for a look around
• Phone
• Creative letter that they would have to open
• The focus of their work is branding and editorial, so I could send work that utilises these practices to communicate who I am, what I want and how they can help.
• An attention grabbing email designed to inform and entertain.
• Post a box that has the details I want to deliver printed on the inside of the box so they have to disassemble the net to read the information.

Lecture 1: Sectors & Industry

UK Economy

•7th Largest in the world

•3rd Largest in Europe

•One of the most globalised countries

•London is the largest financial centre equal with New York

Largest industries – aerospace, pharmaceuticals, North Sea oil and gas

http://www.designcouncil.org.uk/Documents/Documents/Publications/Business%20of%20Design_Design_Council.pdf

Industry Sectors

http://geography.about.com/od/urbaneconomicgeography/a/sectorseconomy.htm

Primary Sector

• Products from the earth
• mining 
• farming
• forestry

The Primary Sector of the economy is based on extracting produce from the Earth, it also covers the production of raw material and basic food. The packaging of the materials made in this sector are also associated with it.

Secondary Sector

• Manufacturers of products using materials from primary sector
• Smelting etc
• Chemical Engineering
• Breweries
• Construction

The Secondary Sector is based on manufacturing, processing and constructing finished goods.

Tertiary Sector

• Service
• Transportation
• Distribution
• Restaurants
• Retail
• healthcare
• Banking

This is the service industry is the sector that members of the general public will interact and deal with.

Quaternary Sector

• Intellect
• Government
• Research

The Quaternary sector hosts intellectual professions such as Government, Research and Education.

Why is this Important?

"Dividing an economy into different sectors with defined similarities allows for more in-depth analysis of the economy as a whole. Any economy can be divided into sectors, such as the economy of a particular city, or the global economy."

The Service Industries

The service industry is concerned with retail, distribution, food and transport. The service industry can be divided into 3 further sections:

• Public Sector
• Private Sector
• Third Sector

Public Sector

The public sector provides services that are free at the point of delivery such as health care, street lighting, these services often benefit the whole society rather than a specific group of people.

Private Sector

Private sector covers all 'for- profit' businesses, this is the sector that contains the majority of jobs in the UK. The services may benefit the market but the primary goal is to get profit.

Third Sector

This covers all not-for-profit or charity organisations.

The Creative Industry

The creative industry covers a vast range of professions such as: advertising, craft, fashion, film, software development, publishing, TV, music, etc.

“Design is the thread that connects ideas and discovery to people and markets”

The Business of Design 

The Design Council 2005

These can be split down into: 

•Communication Design
•Product and Industrial design
•Interior and Exhibition Design
•Fashion and Textile Design
•Digital and Multimedia Design
•Service Design

50% of all designers in the UK work in Communication Design.

5x products and where they lie in Industry...

http://www.thedieline.com/blog/2012/9/6/before-after-friendship-dairies.html

Food Packaging

Original design:

Rebrand:

This product and packaging has been designed for retail sale in the Tertiary Sector, like  all companies that sell products for profit this is part of the Private Sector. It is work by Partners + Napier for the client Friendship dairies. The actual product could be linked to the secondary sector as it is manufactured from a product made in the primary sector, but the packaging design is intended for sale in the Tertiary Sector to be viewed and purchased by the public from the shelves of stores.
I think that this is a definite improvement from the previous design which looked dated and unappealing, I like the use of solid, vibrant colour which looks appetising and healthy at the same time. However I think that the form of packaging confused the communication a bit as I thought this was yoghurt but it seems to be some sort of cheese in a tub, which I haven't seen before. But, overall this is a strong brand with consistent aesthetics throughout the range.

Tourist Posters

At the National Railway Museum in York there is a room full of old screen printed or hand painted tourist posters advertising various seaside resorts. This product is part of the Tertiary Sector, linking to tourism, leisure, entertainment and transportation. The main reason for the posters is to increase tourism and bring money into the local economies which class these as Private Sector material.

I think these posters work really well, the illustration paints Britain in a very positive and optimistic light  which isn't seen as much today. Also, the poster with the teepees wouldn't look too out of place today.

Free News Website:




I think that this would be part of the Quaternary sector as it is publishing news, research and generally intellectual material. It shares some aspects of Public and Private sector as the information is free and available to everybody but the profit for the Guardian comes from the advertising and newspaper sales, and the public need to pay for internet access. This website will cover a vast amount of information and material, it is well designed and the layout and aesthetics are very well suited to the information that it is communicating.

I would place this in the Tertiary sector as it is designed to generate tourism, recreation and entertainment, it would be part of the public sector because it is free at the point of delivery but the public will be paying for the maintenance of the grounds through tax. The client is probably the Council of the City of Westminster who needed some wayfinding graphics to help the visitors of the park. The design looks suitable, usable and accessible to everybody that would be interested, the map is clear and colourful, the point size of the type ay be a little bit small for some users with limited vision.

http://www.nhs.uk/change4life/Pages/change-for-life.aspx

Again, this would be part of the Tertiary sector as it is concerned with healthcare and the health of the nation, unlike the previous examples this would be part of the Third Sector because it is a non-for-profit well being campaign directed by the NHS designed to get people living a bit healthier and considering what they are eating and how much exercise they are doing. 

This is a good idea and design that would appeal mainly to families and mainly adults, so they can educate themselves and their children in living a healthier life.

Study Task 3 - What is Industrial Experience?

Industrial Experience

• What is Industrial experience?
• What can you learn from industrial experience?
• What form/format could industrial experience take?
• What areas of industry are you interested in?
• What are your concerns about industrial experience?

What is Industrial Experience?

1. Experiencing how Graphic Design works outside of education.
2. Getting a feel for the pace and turnaround time of briefs.
3. Seeing what roles are available in a working studio.
4. Making links with studios/ designers in the industry.
5. Speaking to existing professionals and finding out more about the industry.

What can you learn from Industrial Experience?

1. Ways of working that make your design practice more effective and suitable to a work environment
2. How to communicate clearly with other members of a design studio
3. How to speed up your design process to keep up with the turn around time of client led briefs.
4. The structure of jobs within a studio/ design environment.
5. How to deal with clients.

What form/ format could industrial experience take?

1. Placement in a design studio for a week
2. Long term internship in a studio
3. Visiting freelance designers/ studios and asking relevant and helpful questions- making connections with the industry.
4. Visiting printers an understanding the process of printing
5. Attending lectures from designers, networking with other people in the industry

What areas of industry are you interested in?

1. Design studios with a focus on branding
2. Print processes- lithography, rotogravure, digital etc.
3. Screen printing and how and when it can be used in industrial print
4. Communicating with clients effectively and coming across like I know what I'm talking about
5. What the main differences are between being part of a studio and working freelance

What are your concerns about industrial experience?

1. Not being given any work and it not being a valuable use of time
2. Not being able to understand a task they ask me to do
3. Coming across shy and socially awkward
4. Not leaving a good impression
5. Realising my work is no where near a suitable standard

Studio Workshop 4/10/12

These are the 10 pieces of design we chose that represented as wide a variety as possible of types of graphic design:

Questions

1. Who is the client?
2. Who is the intended audience?
3. What is it's function?
4. What is the budget?
5. Where is it from?
6. Who is the designer/studio?

1. This is personal work that 'Steady Co.' have for sale on their website so the Client is themselves.
2. People interested in type and letterpress, like minded people, generally creative people.
3. The function is simply to spread a message, inspire people and something to collect/ give as a gift.
4. The budget will be very low as the designer is producing the work themselves so will just need to pay for ink and stock.
5. Northeast Minneapolis, Minnesota U.S.A.
6. Steady Co print shop

1. Ikea
2. Ikea customers, adults
3. Its function is to contain fish and communicate its contents clearly and quickly
4. The budget for this will be relatively big as it will have been mass produced.
5. Stockholm, Sweden
6. Stockholm design lab

Flaming Lips stage visuals

1. The Flaming Lips
2.  The concert audience, fans of the Flaming Lips
3. To enhance the audio-aesthetic experience of the gig.
4. The whole stage visuals will have a medium to high budget as they have so much going on onstage and the visuals will have to be at least an hours worth of material.
5. -
6. Unknown

Restaurant branding

1. Saloon restaurant and bar
2. An older/ sophisticated audience that don't mind spending a bit of extra money for a 'classy' experience.
3. It's function is to give saloon an identity and make it clear to potential customers what kind of establishment it is.
4. We thought that this budget would have been medium because if you compare it to the budget that a big fast food chain might have for a similar sort of rebrand it would be a low budget but for a single bar they probably paid a fair amount of money for a job as good as this.
5. Boston
6. OAT Creative

1. Personal Project
2. Fans of craft/ creative people
3. To amaze and inspire
4. Relatively low budget, just cost of material needed
5. Michigan
6. AJ Fosik

A collection of zines 

1. Catalogue
2. Zine collectors. 16-25 year olds interested in the subject matter, designers
3. To amuse and collect
4. Cheap big batch riso printing
5. Leeds
6. Catalogue

 Foam Printing

1. IFA Consumer Electronics
2. The product was exhibited at an event in germany, which showcased new electronic equipment
3. To advertise the capabilities of the company to the attendees of the event. The function of foam printing could be advertising
4. High budget for the design, development and production of the new way of printing
5. Berlin
6. Unknown

USA Today rebrand

1. USA Today
2. Newspaper readers,
3. To communicate the information more clearly, to give the paper a fresh look
4. High Budget
5. USA
6. Wolf Olins

Animation

1. Self led project- posted to cartoon and animation blogs - Cartoon Brew
2. Animation lovers & animation students
3. Personal work to showcase his style and skills and to earn recognition within animation and design communities
4. low budget- basic animation with no need to outsource any additional help
5. Canada
6. Kyle Mowart

T Shirt illustration & design

1. Personal Illustration
2. Threadless customers
3. To impress and create a personal identity
4. low budget
5. New York
6. JeremyVille.com

Study Task 1 - Why am I Here?

Identify and explain 5 reasons why you chose to study on this programme.

1. I chose this course because it has a great reputation and the work that the students are producing was the work that I wanted to be able to do. It is hard work but it gets good results.
2. To be in and around like minded people that are dedicated to design, the small course size helps with tis because it makes it easy to speak to and get to know everybody.
3. This programme has the right people and recourses to give me a chance at making a career in graphic design.
4. LCA stood out from the rest as it is a dedicated art college and being around other people in the creative industries in the first year has been helpful and interesting and will hopefully throw up some collaborative opportunities this year.
5. The programme also offers great recourses which are available due to its small size, improving my digital and screen printing skills has been very good and I'm looking forward to learning more and pushing them further

Identify and explain 5 things that you want to learn during your time on the programme.

1. This year I am looking forward to learning more about web based design and the basics of making a website as I think that this will improve my chances of employability as it is something that every aspiring business/ client will be interested in.
2. Motion graphics and animation is something I need to get stuck into because at the moment I have little/ no idea how to go about making my graphics move and I am interested in finding out more.
3. I would also like to learn what makes a successful brand and if a logo that has no relation to the company ever works and if it does, then how does it work.
4. I want to further my knowledge of all Creative Suite software to speed up my design process and to know straight away what programme would best work for the desired outcome etc.
5. I think an encyclopaedic knowledge of typefaces is an essential tool for a designer, I would like to be able to know just by looking at a font: what other fonts would compliment it; what context would that font work best in and to have some idea of the name of it.

Identify and explain 5 skills that you think are your strengths.

1. My illustrator skills are getting much better (but still have a long way to go) mainly due to using it more or less all the time, I am beginning to get unfamiliar with photoshop and find it difficult to use which is something I am going to have to learn more about.
2. I manage to keep, somewhat, on top of the workload. This year I am going to put more time and effort into each task and focus on keeping my blog organised and neat which is something that got a bit messy towards to end of last year.
3. Mind maps and design sheets have always served me well, they help to make sense of a subject and force me to think of more ideas and possibilities before settling on one.
4. I am getting better at using colours in my work, the first year has taught me to keep it simple and to use a small colour palette, this has helped to make my work look more professional and clear.
5. I enjoy doing the work and find it interesting which helps a lot with keeping up with the course and maintaining commitment and drive.

Identify and explain 5 things that you want to improve.

1. My choice of appropriate and effective typeface to improve the standard of my work.
2. The finish of my product is something I want to improve because at the moment I don't have any work that I feel is 'finished' to an amazing standard, it's always on average stock and doesn't look the best it can.
3. I am comfortable in group crits and small presentations but I want to improve my verbal communication with anyone that I don't know very well and presentation skills in front of 10+ people.
4. Asking for help from available tutors is something I would like to do more of, especially the help that's available in the Mac Suite as I am often struggling to find the way of doing something or an other on an Adobe programme.
5. The organisation and 'flow' of my blog could do with being improved to a more understandable standard with clear labels and navigation tabs, this will help anyone that is unfamiliar with the work on there and will also help me locate any work that I am struggling to find by scrolling through.

Identify and explain 5 ways that you will evaluate your progress.

1. Test it on somebody that is unfamiliar with the brief and context of the products and see if it communicates the correct message to them well.
2. Refer back to initial research that is on your blog and see if it works as well or better than any existing products of a similar nature.
3. Refer back to the start of your blog to these questions and see if any of the questions in this study task have been fulfilled!
4. Get together with some peers and have a small group crit to gain some constructive criticism to improve the work.
5. Maintain a growing understanding of what it is about the design that I like and ask myself if my work shares the same points.

Identify 5 questions that you want to find the answer to.

1. How do you remove multiple objects from a photo, using photoshop, without leaving any blurring or obvious editing marks?
2. What typefaces are best suited/ most commonly used for which purposes?
3. How many people are involved in projects undertaken by design companies?
4. If there is work done by a team of designers what roles does each person have?
5. Is it worth while learning any basic coding skills for web based design?

Identify and explain 5 things that inspire you.

• Cats in boxes

• People being good

• Music- this one always manages to get me back to being productive!

• Tumblr Feeds

• Good Weather!

Identify 10 examples of design that illustrate your fields of creative interest.

Original and creative packaging

Really nice type based packaging and branding



Minimal colours and effective illustration





Screen printed gradients

Posters & spreading optimism

Making a statement

Fun t-shirt designs

Simplicity & Typography that works perfectly together

Simplicity and good content

Branding and packaging