Thursday 26 February 2009

Tasty Marketing - Presentation

Today after the portfolio lecture I had the presentation of my logo’s to ‘Tasty Marketing’. As the Managing Director only had about half an hour for the presentations and as there were only three of us presenting we decided to all go in together.

 

I was surprised at how laid back it was, as I had never done this before I was unsure of what to expect beforehand and this was a very informal meeting. We took it in turns to present our work and it was more of a discussion what elements worked etc.

 

I was very pleased with the feedback mine got, as it was very positive:

 

-       Liked the overall concept of joining the two middle letters as they could be pushed and used as bullet points etc.

-       She was very happy with the logo I did which had a ‘bite’ taken out of it – said it was something that her team didn’t think about.

 

After the presentation she took our work away and said her next steps were to go back to her own design team and present what we had shown to her. As she liked elements of everyone’s ideas and wants to combine them, rather than just picking one.

 

I found this very helpful as I received very positive feed back and as it was my first meeting with a client, my first attempt of logo design and being restricted by a brief for a client I felt that I had gained a lot of things from one short brief. 

Wednesday 25 February 2009

Live Brief Development - Tasty Marketing

 

Over the past few days I have been working on the ‘Tasty Marketing’ brief and I have organized to attend the presentation to the director of ‘Tasty Marketing and Matt Desmier. I am very pleased with the logos I have got together (above), as this was my first attempt of creating an identity through a logo.

 

It is something that I have enjoyed designing and I have also enjoyed the restraints of a brief, which has already been laid out. I have only designed the logos as I would rather present one strong piece, than a couple of alright bits of work. 

 

I stared of by exploring fun friendly typefaces, although I found that they started looking a bit childish and unprofessional – although they want the appearance of being a fun, marketing team the logo should also show that they are serious as well.

 

After this I went with an easy to read typeface and created a fun/ friendly logo by adapting the overall look. I am very happy with the progression of these logos and I am looking forward to present the best logos tomorrow and also getting some feedback. 

Portfolio Lecture

To day I came in to go to a lecture from the ex-creative director from marketing matters based around portfolios. Luckily I got there nice and early because it was so popular that they had to turn students awa!y This talk was extremely helpful and demonstrated: what to include in my portfolio, how best to present myself and how to get a interview etc. These are some key pointers I took:

5 main rules for a good portfolio:

1)   Only include work that you are 100% happy with – even if it means taking less work!

2)   Don’t show anyone else’s work but your own.  – Group work is fine but make sure you tell the interviewer that you did it in a group.

3)   Memorize at least two things about each peace of work.

4)   Include about 8-10 peaces of work – (don’t struggle to make 8 if your not 100% happy don’t include it)

5)   Demonstrate thinking and show your development to the final solution.

 

Another thing about the portfolio: start with your favourite work, then the work that is alright put in the middle and finish with your best.

 

Remember your not the finished article so don’t try be someone your not.

Research into the company Find out who there top clients are, ask questions to show that you know a bit about the business already.

Criticism – learn how to ‘take it’ its not personal! Try find out what they don’t like and why.

Be aware that you are young, eager to learn. directors also like that you are cheap.

Turn up early.

Have a good attitude – show you are interested in design

Show your hungry for the job.

Monday 23 February 2009

Learning support - Essay


I booked another session quite early in this unit just to go over the best ways to structure my essay and get it stared. I found this quite reassuring, we also went over some software which can help my with structuring the essay.

After this we started making targets and break down where to go next. I now have a list of things to do and this has helped me with my time management in the past so I will do the same for my professional project and lay out when I should work on Anna’s and when I should work on my professional project.  

Friday 20 February 2009

Screen Based Communication 2 Results

Today I received my results for screen-based communication project, I got 56. I was very pleased that I had received over 50 as this means that I am starting to get back on track. 

 

I found the feedback I received to be very helpful and the only negative thing on there was that the image size was a bit small. I wanted to create an easy to navigate site, which reflected me as a designer, and I felt that I met the goals I set my self. I felt that I worked a lot better throughout this brief and my time management was spot on.

 

I am still however a bit concerned that due to my first results I would probably still only be averaging fewer than 50. I am reassured that the main grade that contributes to my final mark would be taken from my professional project. I therefore need to make sure I approach this unit in the same way I did for the screen based one. I will however apply myself as much as possibly to professional project as will need to bring my overall average up in order to progress onto the second year. I would be extremely disappointed if I end this year with fewer than 50! I will therefore really push myself on the professional project and also on Anna’s essay in order to insure I will get onto the BA Graphics.

Hand in - Learning Agreement

Today I was the hand in for my learning agreement for my professional project, I was pleased to know that if we need to go back and add to it later we can. I feel that after I have carried out a bit more research I will be able to add more to the synopsis of study. Bellow is my current synopsis of study:

Synopsis of Study

For my professional project I will be designing a typographic display for an exhibition that demonstrates the major historical development within the typographical industry starting from the1880’s. This should clearly show the progression and the evolution of typography. I will be concentrating on European and American contributions to typography development. I will also design the print based information and promotional material available at the exhibition. This would include: tickets, banners, brochures/booklets, etc. I felt that this would be a good project as there are currently no typography design exhibitions in London and no permanent places which focus on typography other than the Type museum which, from what I can gather from their, website has more of a museum approach than a gallery approach (which would be where my exhibition would be based). The reason for adopting a gallery approach is because it is likely to appeal more than a museum approach would, to the designers (due to the other content that would be in the exhibition) who are the main target audience.

I will produce a timeline for a wall display that informs the viewer and graphically demonstrates an understanding of the development through typography from the 1880s. This will be on show at a typography exhibition. I will show my research and development through a series of sketchbooks. The promotional material will obviously have to reflect the exhibition, which will be aimed at students/ designers who have an interest in typography and would therefore be in the gallery and could find out more about the basic historical development. However, the main purpose of the exhibition will be educational rather than a more commercial approach.

 

I will achieve this by carrying out research into the evolution of typography paying particular attention to major events/technology’s/designers; starting from the pantographic punch cutter (1884). I will try getting some information from the ‘Type Museum’, London, although it is currently closed for public access. From a recent visit to the Tate modern (London), I have since been looking a similar outcome, which is a time line reflecting the major ‘Fine art’ developments, designed by Sara Fanelli.

This will give me the opportunity to expand my typography knowledge, and allow me to approach and present the final designs in an informative manner. This will come together to strengthen my portfolio within a discipline I am very interested in, which will undoubtedly help me get onto future courses and a job within the industry.

Live Brief - Tasty Marketing

After I had handed in my learning agreement I had an opportunity to start a live brief for the rest of the day. I was thinking about attempting this ‘Tasty Marketing’ brief a while ago but never got round to it. Although the deadline is a few days away I think that it would be good practice for me to attempt this small brief (in the industry I will not have the luxury of a long deadline).

 

The brief is quite poorly written, but it’s basically asking for a logo and possible ways of incorporating the new style e.g letterheads etc. It also said that we can do as much or as little as I wanted, due to the tight deadline I would rather present a few variations of logos, which I am happy with, than including letterheads or web designs to a poorer standard.

 

This brief would be another piece I could include in my portfolio, which would demonstrate creating a logo design on a tight deadline, for a client.  

 

Tasty Marketing wants to get across their fun/ friendly and personalized way of dealing with their own clients.

 

So today I started drawing up ideas and possible ways of reflecting their fun/ friendly/personalized style. 

Thursday 19 February 2009

Learning support - learning agreement

Today I had my session with learning support, it was the first time I had been before and I found it extremely helpful. I met with Brian Long and he helped me go over what I had already got and also adjust the structure so that it read better. After this session I had fulfilled the word count requirement, but I think that I will be able to add more to the synopsis of study once I have continued with the research.

Tuesday 17 February 2009

Learning Agreement - development

Over the past few days I have been trying to finalize my learning agreement for my professional project. I am happy with how it is going although I think that I will book an appointment with learning support to go over my synopsis of study. I have started it but I am finding it hard to meet the word count requirement.

Aims of appointment:

-       Clarity and structure.

-       Other areas I should include in order to be more specific of what I wish to gain from this unit.

-       Make sure what I've got is ok. 

Monday 16 February 2009

London Trip

Today was the rescheduled London Trip; my original plan was to use this trip to help with inspiration for me to decide on what I will do for my professional project. Due to the trip being rescheduled and I now have an idea of what it is I am doing. I therefore started planning how I will use the trip to benefit and progress my project.

After some research into what was on and where I went back onto the ‘Type Museum’s website where I found something I had previously overlooked: ITS CURRENTLY CLOSED TO THE PUBLIC! I was so frustrated when I found this out as the museum would have been a huge help to my project. Therefore I used the trip as research into Exhibitions. My main goal was to go to as many places as possible and collect primary research on exhibition in the form of Photos of the exhibition (where possible) and how they publicize it, booklets, flyers, banners etc. I started off at the Tate Britain then the Design Museum, Tate Modern, LCC – basically to as many places as possible!

While looking around at the Tate Modern I spent some time looking at something, which I normally pass by – Sara Fanelli’s timeline of twentieth century art. – This was something I hadn’t planed on researching although it will be a massive help I want to achieve something similar to go into the exhibition I am designing the material for.

Another helpful thing that the Tate had was a really interesting exhibition – Rodchenko & Popova. It cost about £12 but I received a larger booklet with this – it showed me that I shouldn’t restrict myself to designing cheaper things, which would be given away.

I found this trip a lot more beneficial than I thought I would be (after finding out that the Type Museum was shut). I will later email the Museum to find out when it will open and also if they could send my any info. 

Professional Project - development

Over the past few days I have been trying to develop a decent idea to undertake for my professional project. I went back over the work I did with Dan, which was to help come up with an idea. I have now come to the conclusion that I want to use Typography quite heavily and also I want to expand my typographical knowledge.

 

One of the ways I could do this would be to design the material for a Typographical exhibition in a gallery. This would also allow me to undertake another discipline, which I thoroughly enjoyed on the course, which was the logo and identity work for the live brief.

 

I will now go onto researching into other exhibitions surrounding typography, and then onto other areas of relevance before the presentation on Thursday.  

Research Seminar

This session was on advanced research methods. Some of the session was just on recapping on how we start researching: listing key words then taking them onto the computer/ library database. I found the stuff about the databases available in the library as I was previously un aware of this. After the session I started to apply some of these methods and got a list of books to get out when they have been returned.  

Friday 13 February 2009

13.02.09

We started to day off by splitting into seminar groups, I was very pleased with how we were split up, as the groups were categorised so the people in them had something in common. We just went over our idea briefly and showed what research we had already carried out and what we should do next.

I found this seminar very helpful as it brought something quite fundamental to my project up:

If I base my exhibition around other designers work or a specific style, then the promotional work would have to reflect this and it could end up with me just replicating other peoples approach to design.  One way around this that I thought could be more interesting was to create something to be in the exhibition and then design the promotional work around that.  

Approaching this project in that way: basing it more around the development of typography and creating something like a clearly designed timeline would allow me to do more research and then present the information in my own style!

For the rest of the day I continued collecting researching/ reading.  

Thursday 12 February 2009

12.02.09

Today we had to present our idea for the project. I had made a small slide show (mainly to remind me of what to include) as we were restricted to one minute.  This started off well but after the first few the presentations started to get longer! In the end we spent almost the whole day on them, although this was quite frustrating, as I had planed to carry on researching my idea I was aware that it was probably more beneficial to each person as they were getting more advise and feedback.

 

The feedback I received was quite helpful and reassuring – the main pointers were:

Could the exhibition be a permanent one? – as there are currently not any in London.

Possibly base this more around the historical side of type development – look at informative graphics.

Try get to as many exhibitions In London next week.

           

As I had about half an hour left before the end of the day I decided to research into the places I could go around London to make the day as beneficial as possible for me.

Monday 9 February 2009

Introduction -Contemporary Visual Context

Today was the first seminar with Anna, we were given the brief and then spoke about our initial ideas for an essay. My first thoughts are to base mine around the affects the digital revolution had on typography. Anna seemed to think that this would be a good easy to do it on; she did mention that one of the markers has a very high degree on typography!

I am going to try develop this into a working title and carry out some basic research and then next week we will have the advanced research skills session to help research into my chosen area.  

Friday 6 February 2009

Friday 06.02.09

Ahhh today was quite frustrating. My aim was to get a solid idea under way and take advantage of the tutors in…. after a very helpful presentation from Mike Ryan- showed us how his students started off this last year. One of them was very helpful as yesterday I briefly spoke to Mike Ryan about another idea which was to design stuff for a typography exhibition, and one of the presentations he showed was for a graphic design exhibition. Not long after he had finished the university was closed due to a sudden downpour of snow! But having seen the presentations I was confident that this would be a good idea to pursue. I think that I should narrow the typography exhibition down so it is not quite so broad.

I will there for  spend the next few days researching into possible ‘categories’ of type I could base the exhibition around.