Creative Workshop

I've recently purchased a couple more design related books, one of which being Creative Workshop: 80 challenges to sharpen your design skills, by David Sherwin.
As the title suggests, this book is filled with 80 different mini-briefs. I bought this as it would be something for me to get my teeth into and keep my brain ticking over the summer. I'd say the book was well worth the purchase. Each brief is a small challenge, with its own set time-limit and the book also provides ways to take the challenge fruher and really test your design skills.

 There are 7 different sections to the book; Innovation, Interpretation, Foundation, Execution, Materiality, Instruction and Observation. Each section has a range of relating briefs, each challenging in their own way and very interesting. The challenges really encourage you to be individual, think out side the box and approach briefs in different ways, such as including mixed media and steering away from the computer a little.

 As well as providing the briefs, the book also shows examples of how others have tackled the briefs which is of course very helpful and inspiring. As well as this, the book also provides tips on how to tackle new briefs and mind-mapping and how to really find your design potential, as well as a "Designrandomizer". This is a section of the book which has a range of statements which could be said from potential clients. These are to be chosen at random once you finish a brief, to act as potential feedback, these include such statements as "You're just wrong, start over with another concept from your brainstorm" "Use purple as the anchor colour in your design" "Add twenty years to your target audience" "Make things feel more 'edgy'" etc! I thought this book was a pretty good buy, and definitely something to dig out when I'm lacking a bit of creativity, or looking for something to do!

Personal Branding

Personal branding is something I never quite seem to be completely satisfied with, and I am constantly changing or tweaking things. However, I have finally settled, for now, on a particular brand and hopefully this one may stick a little longer that its predecessors! 

Its pretty minimal, which is good for me as theres less to get bored of and want to change, such as particular colour schemes! I quite like the simplistic look and the hint of typography throughout. 

Portfolio Production - Hand in!

Today was my second last ever hand in, Portfolio Production! This consisted of my A3 portfolio, filled with what I feel is my strongest work, as well as a production file and an evaluation of the portfolio its self. 

Thankfully all was done and dusted with time to spare and I am very happy with the outcome of my portfolio. The layout took many attempts to get just right, but I'm finally satisfied! For now anyway. 

I settled with a double page spread for each project, showing the final designs as well as the design in situ. The images in situ really made the portfolio look a lot more professional, as does the little amount of text and overall clean, sleek, layout.

The Point Design - Week 2

I've now finished my two week placement at The Point design! It has been really helpful at giving me a real idea of working within the industry since it was my first ever placement. Although it may have only been for two weeks I have had the chance to learn and improve a whole load of skills and I am very thankful for the experience.

Monday 15th April
Today was spent mainly finishing off my designs for the Valentines POS packs and well as carrying out any cut-outs I was asked to do.

Tuesday and Wednesday I was actually at university interviews so no work was carried out, however I did receive a conditional offer from Salford University!

Thursday 18th April
Back to business today. I began creating some designs for the Christmas edition of the Original Factory Shop's gift ideas catalogue.

Friday 19th April
Today I finalised all work. I put my Christmas ideas into the Quark template and completed all work.

Overall a very informing and inspiring experience of which I recieved some very positive feedback. Also, since I was only able to do 2 weeks I was offered the opportunity to return for a few weeks in summer.

UCAS Experience - Salford University Interview

Today I had my last university interview at the University of Salford. My interview was bright and early at 9AM. We were first all given a short talk about the course and the modules within the course, similarly to my other interviews I had attended. We were also shown a few short videos explaining the course and showing examples of current students' work. This is always a very interesting part of an interview as although I have previously done my research into the particular course, it really helps with helping decide whether I feel it is right for me. There were lots of elements of the course I really liked the sound of, and there is a lot of student and tutor communication. We were also told about a whole range of little events which the students organise, such as 'Speed Dating', where you're given the chance to sit down with a designer in the industry and talk through yourself and your portfolio in a short amount of time, a great way to organise placements and gain contacts within the industry.

After the talk we were then given a tour of the building whilst the tutors looked through our portfolios. Again, this is always important and really helps me decide if it is the right university for me. Once the tour was over each person was called for their interview.

My interview was a little different to what I expected as I had previously spoken to the lecturer who was interviewing me. I had been arranging entering at year 2 or 3 of the course, in order to top up my foundation degree. When I was called in he had actually already made his decision and offered me a place in either year 2 or 3, whichever I felt most comfortable entering at. The lecturer seemed quite keen to see my potential and see how I would cope entering straight into year 3. Although this is a great opportunity for myself,  I personally warmed to year 2 entry, so I would be able to settle into a new city, as well as have a whole extra year getting to know the area and hopefully organising placements and meeting new people.

I decided to firm this offer and now all I have to do is pass my foundation degree!

The Point Design - Week 1

This week was my first week of my first ever work placement at The Point Design. Throughout the week I've actually learned a lot about working within the industry and it has been a really helpful insight and has been a really positive experience overall so far. My weekly tasks have been...

Monday 8th April
Today consisted of getting a feel for the agency in general and settling myself in. I had a brief meeting with Jane, the creative director, where she informed me about their main client The Factory Shop, and introduced me to a brief I would work on throughout my time at the placement. This brief was to design Point of Sale packs (A3 poster, header card, shelf-talker and arm-end) for different holidays throughout the year such as valentines day, christmas, fathers day etc. These were again for their main clients, The Factory Shop.

I was then asked to create some border designs for a mini-catalogue flyer for The Original Factory Shop. I produced a range of flower borders and autumn leaves and sent them to Jane before the end of the day.

Tuesday 9th April
Today I was introduced to a whole new programme, Quark. This is very similar to indesign and I was given a small 'lesson' on each of the different keyboard short cuts to make it easier for me to get to grips with the program. I also learned just how important and convenient it is to know all my short cuts, especially for use within the industry!

I also began work on the POS packs, I was asked to begin creating some designs for Valentines Day.

Wednesday 10th April
Today was spent continuing with my Valentines Day designs. As I was creating my designs Jane was consistently giving me feedback which was very helpful.

I was also asked to do some cut-outs for The Original Factory Shop's catalogue. This involved cutting out product images using a particular process for them  to be later placed in the catalogue.

Thursday 11th April
Today was spent learning how to create shelf-talkers for The Original Factory Shop. It was my first time using Quark properly and I soon got to grips with it due to its many similarities with InDesign. As I was new to this whole process it did take all day, however by the end I was significantly more comfortable with Quark and the particular design process of the shelf-talkers.

Friday 12th April
I was given the chance to contribute with a live brief that The Point had recived this morning from an upcoming fast food restaurant in Newcastle called 'Ninety Nine'. They had asked for their logo to be re-designed to have a modern, stylish, fresh and contemporary feel. I was given a deadline of the end of the day to produce some ideas to put forward. This was an exciting project to work on and I really enjoyed designing the logos.

So far I have enjoyed my week on placement and have already learned a whole new range of skills which I can continue to develop and apply to future projects.

Work Based Learning - Durham Fashion Week

The final design I chose to use was a mixture of all the styles I experimented with. I used a high fashion image and a very stylish logo which I felt met the brief requirements. I added texture and experimented with the levels and effects of the photograph in order to give a slight grungy look to the overall poster, making it stand out and also keeping it in trend. I also cut up the image to create an almost collage-like effect, which also added to the grungy tone, without taking away the high fashion and stylish effect,  I feel the overall poster design is very modern and meets the brief requirements most out of all of my designs. I kept this sleek look throughout the website designs, making the main focus the fashion photography. I also designed two landing pages one male and one female, which again makes the designs more gender neutral, rather than focusing mainly on women. 

During this particular project I learned a lot about time management due to a short time span to complete the work in, As well as this I feel as though I have further improved my design programme skills. In addition, fashion graphics is an area I have yet to complete a brief in therefore I feel as though I have learned a lot about that area in graphic design in particular. 

Portfolio Production - Re-working

In order to make my portfolio look as good as I can make it and really reflect my personal style I wanted to tweak a couple of my old projects just slightly in order to make them look how I want them as looking back I feel some of my work is not as good as it could be. Rather than completely re-doing my old projects that I'm not 100% happy with I just wanted to tweak fonts or colours or other small elements to improve the final designs.

I began with my Ministry of Sound Saturday Sessions posters, which were designed for a D&AD brief last year.

original designs

edited designs

For these I just edited the layout slightly and changed the colours and fonts as I felt the previous designs weren't working. I prefer the newer designs as they seem much neater and 'trendy', compared to the
originals. They also stand out a lot more with the brighter colours.
If I had more time to work with I would probably have a go at completely re-designing these posters and creating a whole new layout. However, I think these small changes have really improved the original designs and I am much happier to put these into my portfolio.

in situ

in situ

Work Based Learning - Durham Fashion Week

The final design I chose for my Durham Fashion Week project was a mixture of all the styles I experimented with. I used a high fashion image and a very stylish logo which I felt met the brief requiirements. I added texture and expermented with the levels and effects of the photograph in order to give a slight grungy look to the overall poster, making it stand out and also keeping it in trend. I also cut up the image to create an almost collage-like effect, which also added to the grungy tone, without taking away the high fashion and stylish effect,  I feel the overall poster design is very modern and meets the brief requirments most out of all of my designs. I kept this sleek look throughout the website designs, making the main focus the fashion photography. I also designed two landing pages one male and one female, which again makes the designs more gender neutral, rather than focusing mainly on women. 

Current Time Plan

In order to try and stay as organised as possible in the run up to my final hand in I've created an overall time plan of everything I need to do and when it needs to be done by.

PPD:  Keeping this blog up to date, as well as creating my creative CV, business cards and a cover letter. As well as this I need to identify opportunities and requirements in future employment, continuing education, competitions and festival submissions.

WBL: Placement work and evaluations, time sheets (typed and formatted), work related presentation (analysis of sector worked in , discuss roles in the agency, dealing with clients, pitching, time sheets etc) and a written skills analysis (knowledge gained about the industry and skills gained.).

Portfolio Production: Putting together and presenting all finalised work from the past two years as well as any successful WBL work (magazine spreads, durham fashion week and placement work). As well as this I need to produce written documentation of tutorials and advice given and an evaluation of my portfolio, analysing each individual project.

Work Based Learning - Magazine Spreads

This was a very open brief. I was asked to design two; double page spreads for a magazine of my choice. I chose to design for a music magazine due to my personal interests; throughout this brief I wanted to really improve my editorial skills within magazine layout design, as this was an aspect of design I am yet to explore. 

I considerably improved my skills within Adobe InDesign, and working with grids and general layout design, which proved very interesting. Both designs have a very abstract and geometric theme and work well with the white space. I edited photography to use throughout my designs in order to add my own personal twist and make the final layouts aesthetically pleasing. This brief improved my skills in all area throughout graphic design, including programme and thinking outside the box.

Portfolio Production

I am now onto my last module for the year which is all about creating the best portfolio I can and preparing for my final show.

I plan on tweaking some of my older designs which are currently in my portfolio so I am completely happy them, then adding whatever is missing.

After looking through my portfolio with my tutors I decided I wanted to do more work on editorial, in particular, magazine spreads. I was given a brief which was to design 2, double page spreads for a magazine of my choice, in which I chose a music magazine.

Alongside this brief I am also keeping my blog up to date and will be taking part in a two-week work placement which will go towards my work based learning module.

As well as my magazine spreads I also want to try and complete another live brief. The current two briefs I am looking into are:

Maha's Classics by Saira

-An independent fashion brand that fuses Pakistan dress, luxurious fabrics and detailed hand embellishments with contempary Western styling.

-Complete branding solution required for business cards, letterheads, websites and brochures.

Deliverables 

-2x logo submissions

- Business Cards

- Letterheads

- Generic flyer

Durham Fashion Week

- 1 week event in October with 18-50 y/o target audience. Range of events throughout the week.

- Design a slick/stylish logo, not too feminine and no pink. Shouldn't look out of place in 'Tatler Fashion Magazine'.

Deliverables

- 2x Durham Fashion Week logo routes

- 1 Web page front design

- 1 A2 promotional poster

Seb Lester Visits

Today we we're given the pleasure of a lecture from the well-known type designer and calligraphic artist, Sebastien Lester. Lester gave us an insight on his life growing up and discussed how he got involved in the industry and how he got to where he is today. 

Lester has worked with a whole range of huge brands such as The Rolling Stones Magazine, Intel, Waitrose, The Daily Telegraph, British Airways, Barclays, H & M, Ariel, The Labour Party, the list goes on and on. 

Lester discussed how as soon as he picked up a pen and began designing his first type he has never lost his passion and any second of the day he has spare he will be working on his projects. A lot of his inspiration came from his personal interests such as BMX'ing and sci-fi, as well as the famous Neville Brody. As well as working on his type design he also began to teach himself motion graphics and animation, in order to give him the ability to bring life into his designs and experiment with moving type. 

HAMBURGE - Typeface used by British Airways

NEO SANS - Extremely popular typeface used throughout many big brands including the Labour Party and Ariel. 

SOHO - Seen throughout GQ branding and the New Scientist.

Iconic design for Penguin Books

More recent calligraphic work

Lester mainly works now on more detailed letter forms and gives them his personal, contemporary twist. 

The talk its self was very inspiring and would have given even those without an interest in design, the urge to sit and experiment with calligraphy and start experimenting in typography.

Typography has more recently become an interest of mine so the talk was extremely informing and inspiring and certainly gave me a lot more motivation. 

UCAS Experience - Applying for BA Hons Graphic Design

I have decided to continue with my degree next year and top it up in order to achieve a BA Hons in Graphic Design.
I recently applied 5 universities in which I would like to attend for this particular course. After doing my research I settled on; Manchester Metropolitan, Sheffield Hallam, Leeds College of Art, Nottingham Trent and York College. I intend on entering at either year 2 or 3 of the course, as the extra year would help me to settle into a new city.

After attending all of my interviews I received all conditional offers, however, when I applied I had mistakenly entered point of entry 1, instead of 2 or 3.
Due to this mistake in my UCAS, I was unable to accept any of my offers as I would have been starting at year 1, instead of year 2 or 3 and I wouldn't be funded.

I then went on to apply through UCAS Extra, with the correct point of entry of year 2 at Salford University. I have been asked to attend an interview on 17th April, so fingers crossed!

I intend to complete my degree in a new city, in order to help me gain a little more experience and also give me the opportunity to visit a different place and hopefully a whole range of design agencies and organise summer placements which could in turn lead to potential career opportunities.

Moleskine Scans

I've recently been increasingly more interested in typography and hand rendered type. I'm planning on developing my previous Baz Lurhmann 'Wear Sunscreen' posters and using hand rendered type with them so I have been doing a little bit of rough practise in my moleskin whenever I've got a spare moment! Here are a couple I've been doing:

Inspiration - Hub

Today I went for a wander around Newcastle's Quayside on a mission to try and locate my placement which I will be starting in 3 weeks time at The Point. On my travels I came across this bike shop/cafe and their branding really caught my eye. I really liked the typography on the side of the building and the slight hand rendered style to the lettering as the lines weren't perfectly straight and it gave a really nice touch. The black and white really stood out, especially against the bland and boring buildings surrounding it. The overall design is really quite simple but works extremely well and gave quite a friendly personality. Unfortunately though, it was shut so I couldn't go in and have a nosey at their interior graphics! 

Wear Sunscreen

This was a self initiated project I am currently working on based on the popular 1999 single by Baz Lurhmann, 'Everybody's Free (To Wear Sunscreen)'. The song is based on an article written by Mary Schmich and features a range of positive, feel good quotes, which anyone can interpret in their own personal way. I love some of the quotes throughout this song and wanted something to put up on my walls featuring these quotes. Typography is something I don't have a lot of experience with and really wanted to explore further, especially throughout this project. It is noticeable that my typography skills are not excellent but I really enjoyed experimenting with a range of different fonts. I would also like to develop these further and create some of my own hand drawn type, which will be a lot trickier but a skill I would really like to develop. 

This is still working progress and I would like to take all of these designs further but so far I am happy with the outcomes. 

I wanted to keep my designs fairly simple, with all of the attention on the quote itself. I did this by using bold, flat colours, with a slight radial gradient to draw the attention inwards. I added some paper textures as this is a technique I personally love using as it always adds that little more to the final design and makes it less boring and flat. I tried to be very selective with my font choices in order to almost reflect the word with the chosen fonts, whilst also making them flow well together. The off-white/beige colour used in the border and fonts again just blend with the central colours better than a plain bold white would and works quite effectively. The more pastel colours give a softer feel and seem to work well together as a poster series. 

In order to take this project further I plan on designing some hand rendered type and digitalising it to make it look a lot more interesting and professional. I have recently become really interested in hand rendered typography and am keen to create my own designs. I think this style would really improve these current designs. 

Personal Branding

I always find it hard to please myself when it comes to my personal branding. Anything I design I always find myself not quite liking and always feel theres something I could change or develop. I've gone through a few different designs in the past and have settled, for the moment anyway, on one particular design, finally! 

Something about this logo wasn't quite right. I really liked the colour, and shape, however it didnt seem quite eye-catching and individual enough. I did like the personal touch of my hand writing, however the design just wasn't 'me' enough, which obviously it should be!

This was a lot more of a sleek design, and has a much more of a corporate feel to it that the previous one. I kept the colour which I liked, and the flow of the letters, however, again, I didn't feel it reflected my personality enough, and almost had quite a boring feel to it, which is not a way I want to represent myself or my designs!  

My current logo is the one above. I went back to the circle shape as I feel this is very versatile and can be put into anything, be it different colours, or textures, etc. I personalised it by creating it solely using the pen tool on illustrator to create a flowing feel with my initials, something which ended up taking way more time than I anticipated! Unlike the others this was produced using illustrator so it is a vector, which is much more suitable for a logo. I went with a different pastel colour just to change it up a bit, but again it could fit with almost anything, but as purple is my own favourite colour it again adds that little bit more personality.