Author Archives: DLangley

‘Job Well Done’ ideas

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Thoughts for a ‘well done on finishing your report/thesis/dissertation’ greetings card, based on quotes and sayings:

  • It always seems impossible until it is done. Nelson Mandela
  • You did it!
  • She believed she could, so she did!
  • The pride in finishing a marathon is much greater than all the pain endured during the marathon
  • The hard part about writing a novel is finishing it. Hemmingway
  • A job well done stays well done forever
  • Facing challenges with strength, determination, and confidence is what matters, and you have done it! Congratulations
  • People forget how fast you did a job – but they remember how well you did it
  • Put on your positive pants!
  • You did great
  • Pat on the back! The final full stop!

These suggest different sentiments that the card could convey visually; the effort, the celebration, a journey, attention to detail and so on. It is also possible that one of the designs could be just typography which is something I hadn’t thought about before.

Research Point: Critiquing my work

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Design Council Double Diamon model two red diamonds showing product design process

Research Point (Page 44, OCA Graphic Design): Critiquing my work

How do you approach being self-critical? What issues does it raise? Do you have friends, family, colleagues or a group who will critique your work for you?

Thinking about critiquing my own work is not as simple as it might appear. There is obviously a process of decision-making and editing that occurs without which I would never be able to select a final design, but surfacing what at first appears to be an intuitive and not necessarily conscious process is not easy. Inevitably it raises aesthetic concerns about beauty, ugliness, and so on, my first response to the question of how I critique my work is ‘I know it when I see it’ and ‘it’s the version I like’. A response that I accept may be less than helpful and doesn’t necessarily give me, let alone anyone else, an insight into my design process.

Design Council Double Diamon model two red diamonds showing product design process

Design Council ‘Double Diamond’ model

In researching ways to describe the process I came across the Design Council’s “Double Diamond” four step model:

  • Discover
  • Define
  • Develop
  • Deliver

Although this seems to apply more to physical product design I thought the iterative process of diverging and converging seemed familiar, indeed it is very like a model I developed for my own research process in terms of my organisational studies. I find this awareness a useful part of my own reflective practice because it helps give me a sense of when I might be opening out (idea generating) and when I need to focus down (problem definition and solving). In getting to understand this process I can start to recognise times when I have moved through the process and narrowed things down too quickly or when I am spending too long idea generating. Sometimes this is when it is useful to bring in external feedback, as I may not always spot for myself how something might be developed further or focused down more.

After a bit of research there seems to be some common areas of advice around how to review your design work:

  1. Make sure you are answering and working to the brief: as a freelance consultant I am very familiar with working to a brief and also recognising that the contracting process can be iterative as a project develops
  2. Consider current trends: this to me needs to balance of what is ‘on trend’ and what is gimmicky or trying too hard. You don’t want a design that looks very dated or out of touch or lacking in ideas. Equally, it seems to me to reflect back to the brief – is the client looking for something timeless, fresh, traditional, contemporary and so on
  3. Try different perspectives: upside down, monochrome, stripped back to outline and so on
  4. Slow down and step back: this is something familiar to me from my work writing, I need to have time to review and edit (although this is not always within my control)
  5. Remember design theory: colour, composition, typography, balance and so on
  6. Make a storyboard: tell the story of the design. I have a preference to lay different ideas out on the floor or put them on the wall so I can physically see and live with them for a while
  7. Emotional attachment: there is another element that doesn’t seem to get mentioned very much, which for me is important and that is about emotional engagement with your ideas. I know there are ideas I become wedded to and all the rational analysis in the world makes it hard to shift from that idea

I think there are some basic questions that I follow that echo the process in the course workbook, they are not necessarily always in awareness and that is something to be developed further:

  • Have I answered the brief?
  • Is the design usable (I might add beautiful, funny, happy etc., if it’s appropriate to the brief)?
  • Do I like the concept at a glance?
  • Is the design trendy?
  • What is the message or idea? Does it communicate what I am intending?
  • Am I emotionally engaged (if so to what degree)?

I like the point made by Design Shack –

“Good design answers questions. It often answers them before users have a chance to even ask them.”

Interestingly, it is often the approach I take in my consultancy work too – my self-reflection stems from asking ‘what question am I trying to answer?’

In terms of wider feedback I have family and friends who are often willing to share their opinions. I also make use of two of the OCA Facebook fora (Photography Level 1 and Visual Communications). I haven’t shared anything through OCA Discuss yet, partly a usability issue because of accessing the site on occasion, and I think partly because of a need to build my confidence in a new field first.

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Assignment Two Development

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I started thinking about assignment two ahead of time in late August; I thought it would be a good idea to give myself time for things to percolate. I also started talking to friends and families about what they thought were gaps in the greeting card market. This made me think about some of our recent life events and what sort of cards might have been appropriate. This led to a long list and I started doing some thumbnail sketches of the different themes:

  • Your first harvest (I had not long pulled up my first lettuce of the season)
  • Summer solstice
  • Your first kitten
  • Congratulations on eating your greens
  • Well done for getting active
  • Not checking your e-mails all weekend!
  • Baking your first cake
  • Your new pushbike
  • Finishing that report
  • Congratulations on your new pet snake
  • Congratulations on your first tattoo

Over the weeks that followed I gradually narrowed the list – partly by those that interested me and partly by those that were genuinely gaps in the market. Summer solstice and kittens seem to be well catered for and there are lots of generic ‘well done’ type cards.

The ones that immediately attracted me were:

  • Harvest
  • Greens
  • Baking
  • Snake
  • Tattoo

I started collecting and pinning different ideas, thinking about relevant markets and making some more thumbnail sketches.

 

Greetings cards

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Having talked to various friends and families to develop some ideas I also thought I would find out a bit more about the greetings card market generally. This helped in terms of understanding the brief and refining my approach to the cards.  According to the Greetings Card Association the UK greetings card market was worth £1.5 billion in 2015 (up by 5% on 2014).

The statistics are fascinating and not necessarily what you might assume given the digital alternatives:

  • Everyday cards increased by 60.1 million on 2014
  • Birthday cards £564 million (up 10.4%)
  • Relations and occasions cards £586.4 million ((up by 17%)
  • Christmas cards are 12% of total card sales
  • 85% of all cards are bought by women
  • the market includes 1,000 publishers, and there are 400 members of the GCA (350 are micro/small businesses)
  • £50 million was raised for good causes from charity card sales

Greeting cards are divided into a number of categories:

  • Spring season
    • Valentines
    • Mother’s Day/ Father’s Day
    • Easter
  • Everyday
  • Ages – Birthday specific
  • Everyday – congratulations, Engagement, New Home, New Job, Get Well etc.
  • Relations – specific family members
  • Christmas: Singles or counter, and Boxes or multiples
  • Wedding Anniversaries

I also discovered there is something called the Henries Awards for Greeting cards and they use slightly different categories:

  • Cute
  • Contemporary Trend
  • Wholesale
  • Traditional words – sentimental
  • Contemporary words – sentimental

This additional research helped me think more about the possible markets for my proposed cards and who their buyers might be.

Finding the essence: examples of minimalist design

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A square with a circle inside and intersecting lines to each corner
A square with a circle inside and intersecting lines to each corner

The Krasnopolski Grid

Is there any better symbol for MacGyver than a bent paperclip? …the entire collection is worth a look…

Jonathon Hoefler, Hoefler &Co

 

I find Albert Exergian’s film posters an inspiring collection, I love their bold simplicity and the way they seem to distil the film to its essence. Reflecting on my response to them I am conscious that they work on the basis of shared cultural references. You need to know the film or show (or at least have heard about it) for the symbols to work effectively. I must admit there are a couple I don’t get because I don’t know the work they refer to. Adding lots of information would probably make little difference as I still wouldn’t know the references.

That said I like the fact that I have to work at these as viewer. It also makes me think about what I might do as a similar exercise. I think it is significant that this was a self-initiated project but that it generally seems to be referred to as an ‘iconic’ set of designs. In researching Exergian I came across two other designers whose work is also minimalist in approach. – Outmane Amahau and Michal Krasnopolski.

Krasnopolski developed his film posters based on using the constraint of a grid system; I am really taken by the creativity that imposing these restrictions has engendered. The target audience is the movie enthusiast so again they work based on the view that the viewer is likely to know the cultural references.

Amahau’s posters take different art movements as their subject matter.

The series was born from my observation… When I imagine an art movement, in my mind I see a minimalist form taken from a famous work. For example, when I think of Surrealism, the first image that comes to my mind is a melting clock. Huffington Post, 2012

Of the three I think Amahau includes more detail, which is perhaps due to the complexity of the subject matter and trying to sum up an entire artistic movement in a single image.  I think I might have pulled back some of his images further – perhaps just the eyes and mouth for ‘The Scream’ for example.

What is engaging my interest in all of this work is how you take the essence of something – an object or a movement – and communicate it. Not dissimilar to the earlier ‘more or less information’ exercise for GD1. I am interested in how imposing constraints and forcing yourself to pare something right back to the essentials requires problem solving skills and inspires creativity.

 

 

 

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Point of Sale feedback

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Love fruit poster with fruit heart in the middle

I am slightly conscious of working in my own bubble recently and although I have been getting feedback from friends and family it felt like I was at a point where I needed something more. I decided that with the point of sale exercise I would go to some of my fellow students and ask for their views.

I am not as confident in the graphic design field as I am with my photography so this was quite a big step. I felt comfortable approaching the Facebook Visual Communications group, partly because it is more visual platform and partly because I still seem to have tech gremlins logging into the OCA fora for some reason.

That aside I got some very generous responses and I am grateful to everyone that replied. Opinions naturally varied and some people preferred the backlit fruit whereas others liked the puppet warped fruit. Comments included:

…It reminds me of a stained glass window and I think would definitely work well from a distance. Using lots of different fruits too makes it versatile…

…this feels like 2 totally separate posters (the landscape version of sliced fruits) and not as coherent as the first image.

I like this, fresh and simple.

…it’s my favourite but I feel like the fruit blends into the background a bit. Perhaps a green or blue background would be punchier?

I really like the photographed fruit but the Heart + ‘Fruit’ in the middle is not as interesting to look at… I’d rather fill my eyes with all those translucent shapes! Why the typewriter font? Is there a reason for choosing it?

It was obviously great that people responded positively to the ideas but what was interesting was the questions that were raised:

  • The colour of the backgrounds
  • The choice of typeface
  • Whether there should be gap in the centre of the sliced fruit
  • The red heart being distracting

All the points were useful insights because they were not necessarily the things I had seen and/or they were a good test of whether I had made conscious choices about what I put where. Taking on the comments I played a little with the backgrounds, and the typeface and heart on the sliced fruit version. Thanks to Charlotte for suggesting what now seems obvious about combining the two ideas (if I were to rework it again I’d use a backlit orange slice too)! In the end my preference is still with the single fruit & veg on a white background but other people did seem to prefer the backlit versions.

While the process was a little nerve-wracking I’m glad I did it and it has given me confidence to ask for feedback again. It was particularly useful in highlighting the value of different iterations of a design and a good test of how willing I was to let go of some of the aspects of what I had produced. The exercise also highlighted the challenge of managing the seemingly infinite variety of solutions – colour, composition, typography etc.!

 

Exercise: Point of Sale display

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Exercise (pg.52 Graphic Design One): Your local greengrocer has asked you to produce a point of sale display to go above the fruit and vegetables in their shop. They want the display to be seen from the street through the shop window to attract passing shoppers to increase trade.

You can use photographs, illustrations or a combination to develop two images – one of fruit and one of vegetables. The posters will be seen from a distance and mainly in people’s peripheral vision so the visuals need to be clear and dynamic. Ask others for feedback.

The brief

The elements I took from the brief are:

  • Attractive
  • Seen from a distance
  • A call to action
  • Clear and dynamic
  • Format is open

Researching and developing ideas

I have worked on this exercise over a number of weeks; collecting images, looking at POS displays in the shops and making thumbnail sketches. While this was helpful there was also a moment where the ideas felt almost limitless – from bowls of fruit, saucepans of steaming vegetables, to piles of individual fruit or fruit/veg shaped layouts.

I decided that I would go for backlit slices of fruit, as they are both colourful and intriguing, they show the structures of the fruit and vegetables in a way that I thought might be unfamiliar and would encourage curiosity. I wanted to try something that was less obvious. I also wanted an approach that could showcase some of the variety of what might be available to buy.

Visualising ideas

Lots of slicing later I took a range of photographs that I thought my work using a lightbox to provide even backlighting. Having worked on the visual approach I then focused on the text, this posed a new dilemma, as arguably the right visuals might be able to stand without any text. Given the brief I decided I would add some text but it needed to be simple, easily recognisable and work at a distance.

I worked on a range of approaches:

  • Alliteration – Fabulous fruit, Various vegetables, Virtuous vegetables, Feel Fabulous, Feeling Fruity! …
  • Health benefits – 5 a day – ‘Don’t forget your five a day,’ ‘Fruit five ways,’ ‘Have you had your 5 today?’
  • Puns – ‘Take your pick,’ ‘Pick me! ’ ‘Peas on Earth,’ etc. I liked the idea of some fruit/veg related jokes which might appeal to children and encourage them to want fruit/veg but I wasn’t sure they would be easily seen from outside the shop
  • Simple recipes – illustrations of some quick and easy recipes, like Grilled Pink Grapefruit with honey, or a quick green smoothie

In working through the different approaches I thought some were too complicated. I wanted the display to focus on a positive message about eating fruit and veg, reminding me of the various ‘I heart…’ slogans, which I then discovered was created by Milton Glaser for the ‘I love NY’ campaign. This kept it very simple and I decided to use it for the text although I thought I would leave out the ‘I’ and make it a more general statement.

I played with placement of the text and having got some feedback I decided I preferred the version with the slogan to the right hand side, with some white space around it. I created these versions in Photoshop because I could mock them up quickly. If I were to develop them further I would use Illustrator to create a smooth vector version.

At this point I thought I had finished, but then! I decided to try and go for a font close to Glaser’s original so found ‘Another Typewriter’, which I really liked with the visuals.

But then…! I looked again at some of my earlier sketches that were based on an idea to make the fruit/veg in the shape of hearts. I had sketched there being four types on a poster but when I placed the orange slice I decided to go for one – given that the poster needs to be seen from a distance. Some puppet warp later and I had two new versions which I felt worked better than the other posters.

I liked their simplicity and I felt they worked with the brief to attract buyers into the shop. Although I have kept the text to single words there is space to add logos or other information if needed.

Critique

I found the process of working and reworking my ideas to be invaluable. This helps keep me open to different ideas and not become too wedded to an initial idea or solution. It also reinforced for me the value of mocking up early ideas however crude.

In all honesty I was a little disappointed with the first posters, as they didn’t have quite the crispness or clarity I was looking for. Although I like the effect of the backlit fruit and veg I think in the end it was too busy and complicated (I also forgot to include the celery which has irritated me ever since!).

I did keep to the ‘love’ notion as it gave me the simplicity I thought the design needed and was easily seen at a distance. It is also in keeping with advice around enjoying fruit and veg, and encouraging more balanced diets.

The final design choice might be regarded as too simplistic but in looking at fruit & veg points of sales in local supermarkets there is a tendency towards pictures of the fruit/veg with very simple slogans. Few have logos or wider information.

 

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Exercise: Too much or not enough information

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Exercise (p.46 Graphic Design One): Look around locally and identify an upcoming event. Design two posters to promote it. Make the first poster full of details and descriptions about the event; include all the details you think your audience might need.

For the second poster apply Occam’s Razor to pare back the information to a bare minimum – be extreme: how little information can you get away with and how few words can you use?

Which design works best? What is the key information you need to include?

The brief: From the above information I took the focus as being –

  • The audience
  • Communication – devising the right messages to promote the event
  • Determining the optimal information

Researching & developing ideas:

I wasn’t really looking forward to this exercise, as I know my own preference is for less information presented in an attractive and eye-catching form. It made it feel like a bit of an effort to go through the activity but I also knew I might be surprised and should keep an open mind. Walking through the local town (which I will keep anonymous so as not to offend the event organisers!) I came across a poster that caught my eye because it was the antithesis of my view of an effective event poster.

It was promoting a forthcoming fireworks night and apart from a few symbols (based on the organiser’s logo) it had thirty lines of text, which ranged from the title through to the fact that photographs would be taken of the event. I was amazed about how text heavy it was and it made me think it looked like something that had probably evolved via a committee. Anyway, I thought it was a prime opportunity for me to see what I would do for a similar event.

I did some online research and given that it was nearly bonfire night also looked locally at other event posters. I then worked on a number of thumbnails and experimented with layouts.

Visualising ideas:

It seemed obvious but I wanted to include really attractive fireworks, which made me think that for at least part of the poster the background would be very dark or black. I also wanted to promote the notion of it being a spectator event so some sense of people attending needed to be included.

I found some suitable stock photos and using Photoshop started to experiment with layouts. For the more detailed poster I decided to go landscape because I thought it might be easier to include more text. I used a shot of three large bright coloured fireworks because I though it might work roughly around the rule of thirds. I then used shaded panels and reversed out text for the written information. I used an orange tint to the text because white looked too harsh and I thought it echoed the fireworks and the orange of a bonfire.

In the meantime I had been researching poster design and had started a new Pinterest board to collect ideas. A few things had started emerging based notionally on a Swiss style and this informed the second design, which was pared back. I decided on what I thought was the key information: title; date; venue; opening times; prices; website and sponsor.

I liked the idea of using circles to echo the shape of the fireworks, like a ‘sneak peak’ on the action. I then decided to use dark and light to bring out the fireworks and the text. Feedback from family suggested they preferred the less text version it was also noticeable that they were looking at the visuals first and then looking at the text. Something needed to attract their attention before they moved on to worrying about the information the poster included.

I had downloaded some fireworks brushes for Photoshop and decided to play with them. I kept the circle element of the second design and just ‘painted’ in some fireworks. I pulled out a colour from the fireworks for the background and decided on a simple san serif typeface. I was concerned it was a bit too simple and obvious but this was the poster that everyone then seemed to prefer. Occam’s Razor in action! The feedback suggested it was bright, colourful, eye catching and easy to read.

Critiquing:

In terms of the brief I think the final poster probably fits the requirements best it is easy to see from a distance and in my opinion has the key information. It does rely on a potential audience having access to the Internet to check ticket prices or additional information, which may be a weakness. The event offered tickets in advance and tickets on the gate and I thought there wasn’t an easy half way point, if I started adding more information it would grow and grow.

My personal preference is the second version because it feels a little more stylish. This highlighted for me the importance of working to the brief problem solving and attending to the client. It is clear that my personal taste may not be the best solution for the client. In the end I decided what was probably needed was something easily seen, attractive and identifiable from a distance.

I don’t think the full information version worked very well, which may be a combination of design and content. It feels fussy and cluttered and I think the design is not well balanced. I could have worked on it more but I’m not sure where I would have gone with it because it just felt like it included too much as a promotional poster (even though it was slightly pared back from the original I saw!).

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Exercise: Visualising your ideas

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Two white sheets of paper folded for leaflets

Exercise (p.41 Graphic Design One): You have been asked to design a leaflet for an organisation, inviting people to volunteer for a task. In addition to a title the information has been broken down into four chunks each of about 120 words. You will also need to leave space for contact and address details.

Working with a sheet of A4 paper or larger if you prefer, and ignoring the actual words and subheadings, explore the different formats for leaflets that are possible. Consider and experiment with options for final size and types of paper. In your learning log describe how you found turning ideas into visuals. Did you discover anything unexpected?

This was an exercise that was more layered than I had originally imagined.  I began with a single sheet of A4 paper and simply folded it in a number of different ways. When I had folded as many I could think of I did a bit of online research and found a number of diagrams of different folds and their names.

Following the folding I started to think about layout given the information in the brief – space for a title, four chunks of information and contact details. Initially I just started to sketch them roughly but found I was then thinking about placement and what might make the leaflet attractive. I started to think about the visuals and again did some online research.  I found I was thinking more about what sort of leaflet I would design and the notion of a hand or hands came to mind. When I did an image search for volunteering it seems that ‘helping hands’ is one of the most common visualisations! I often find my first ideas are the most obvious so wasn’t too worried that this was the case; I guess I have to start somewhere.

I noticed I had been thinking of the information in blocks, but then started to play with how the text might have different layouts. How a leaflet can be made appealing, and the importance of the cover. I became particularly conscious of the contact details, assuming that this needed to be some sort of tear off strip that could be removed and handed in. This made the layout take on a new dimension as it meant the contacts section would need to be removed leaving the important information on the leaflet intact.

What emerged from this exercise was a series of problems to be solved, not all of which were immediately obvious at the outset. Working with the physical folding helped me ‘see’ what was needed as I developed my thinking.

 

 

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Brighton Photo Biennial 2016: a sense of space

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I am determined to capture some of my thoughts about my experiences of an OCA study visit quickly for a change! Often the spirit is willing but my attention span is weak and too much time elapses between the experience and the reflections. It is also important to record my reflections quickly because yesterday was very much an aesthetic day; a multi sensory, multi-modal experience, and I recognise a need to record that while it is still fresh.

This weekend, alongside 38 other OCA photography students, I was at the Brighton Photo Biennial 2016. On the first day I went to four exhibitions – ‘Reimagine’ and ‘Into the Outside: The Story so Far’ at the University of Brighton Galleries (Grand Parade), ‘The Dandy Lion Project’ at University of Brighton Galleries (Edward Street), and ‘Kick over the Statues’ by Ewen Spencer at Fabrica.

I will pick up on the exhibitions themselves more in later posts but for now what is sitting with me is more about seeing the work in situ and thinking about the physical context of the exhibitions, something that connects my interest in both photography and design/graphic design. I may struggle to describe this because it was an embodied experience and I sense my learning involves tacit knowledge primarily. (Polanyi, 1967)

What struck me forcefully was the quality of the energy in the space at Fabrica. It was markedly different to the other venues. This may in part have been influenced by the subject matter and the fact it included a great dance beat. But it was buzzing and seemed like people were really paying attention to the photographs. This is not intended as a criticism of the other shows; they each had their own personality. I write about it now because I think it surfaced something important for me in terms of how I go about developing my own work and the relationship I want it to have with possible audiences.

The ‘Kick Over the Statues’ prints are large (deliberately billboard style), beautiful, arresting and in some cases haunting. There is music playing, the lighting is subdued apart from bright spots over the photographs and there are projected images from Spencer’s own archive spanning years of youth/music subcultures.

What I noticed was peopled engaging with the work in a way I don’t think I saw in the other exhibitions that were more traditionally ‘white box.’ People were talking about their experiences of their own youth subcultures. They were discussing lighting, composition, walking up close, standing back, and observing each other observing the works. Children were being encouraged to dance and there was chatter, and a lot of smiles. It was OK to be noisy.

The exhibition was busy and alive, an experience I will remember.

References and citations:

Polanyi, M. (1967). The Tacit Dimension. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd.

 

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