DESIGN PRACTICE. INTERIM EVALUATION.

#1 I actually couldn't find my blog post for this brief, so either I labeled it wrong or I actually forgot to blog it, which is quite surpassing because before the module hand-in I  checked my blog post, well that's one thing to go back to. Found it.

Problem: create a set or series of letterforms of the word 'condense'.

Key considerations: What is 'condense' and how can I visualise it in a letterform.

Research: now when I look back, I think I was only able to find one blog post for the research, on the other hand it was only the start of the year and I didn't really know much about the whole design process.

Initial ideas:  I think I experimented more with the visuals  rather than spending more time on the research and I think I was quite glad about the outcome then. Now - not too sure. If I would revisit that brief I think I can make it better. 

I think I approached this brief quite systematically by accident because I did not know what 'condense' means so I started looking at the definition and even after that I had to see some visuals to understand what it was. So I think because I'm not a native english speaker I had to approach this brief systematically, which is quite good (I think).

BRIEF

Produce a set, series or sequence of ten visual variations of a letterform (ten A’s for example)  that explore and communicate your interpretation of the word that you have selected from the  randomisers. All designs will be based on existing letterforms and designed to a 15cm x 15cm format. There is a limited colour palette of black and white. #2 My pair was Chris and I really enjoyed  working with him. The only think i didn't really get was  why did we have to trace the alphabet? I still don't really know why.  Problem: Create an alphabet for Chris that would suit his personality.  Key consideration: What is going to be my concept and how to create an alphabet based on a  persons characteristics.   Research activities: an interview with Chris Secondary research: I look at quite a lot of hand rendered type-faces because I thought  hand-rendered alphabet will suit Chris more than a digital one.  Breath of ideas:  I still remember that after a weeks worth of work I had to go back to the phase one and re-think the whole concept, because after a crit I realised that the alphabet didn't  represent Chris at all. So I basically re-done the whole alphabet in a weeks time.   Breath of visuals: I think for this brief i did quite a lot of visual investigation, I had full sketch-book ( I  still wasn't used to design sheets)  Stimulated approach mixed with a systematic approach.  BRIEF Design a typeface for a full alphabet and glyphs (a to z, !, ?, @, £, :, .) that represents the personality/character of your partner. You will discover their personality/character through a  series of set questions. Using your newfound appreciation of the anatomy of typographic forms and the wealth of research that you have already gathered, focus on the manipulation of existing letterforms in order to solve this problem. There is a limited colour palette of black ink. #3 I think the most important think throughout this brief  was that I was introduced to illustrator  and actually challenged myself to create quite and exiting alphabet compared to my knowledge  of illustrator then. I think I did every single letter separately and the way I did the lines took me  ages so I practiced on my patients as well.  Problem: create an alphabet using one letter from the previous brief 1.  Key considerations: Which letterform is most suited to digitalise.   Research: I think the research was more exploring illustrator features and looking at different  tutorials. Practical Research: illustrator workshops Visual investigation: Not as much, because the brief only required to choose on letter out of ten and digitise a whole alphabet based upon one letter.  BRIEF Produce an alphabet based on one of the letterforms you created from the Alphabet Soup,  Visual Thinking brief. You are restricted to using black and one colour and it is to be produced in CMYK (cyan, magenta, yellow, key). Although you are restricted to one colour you experiment with opacity and half tones. You should use your research and experience to date as well as your studio based visual  investigations as a starting point. You will use Abobe Illustrator as a tool for visual  investigation. #4 This was the first brief that I actually re-done and re-visited the whole brief because I wasn't very happy  about the final outcome. My proverb was "Every cloud has a silver lining" and again i approached this brief systematically because I had no clue what a proverb is and what is it supposed to mean.   Problem: Three posters. One only image, the other only text and the third one image and text. Find a context  for the pro-verb.  Key considerations: What does the proverb mean, can it be translated into image or text. Which works the best? Research activities: I spend way too much time thinking about the concept and the outcome that I didn't leave much time for the actual designs. ( I feel that I have been doing this mistake ever since, that's one think  re-consider). I think for this brief I event looked at some books about clouds, which I think was really lazy, I  should have just wen outside and stared at the sky for a while and maybe taken some pictures.  Breath of initial ideas: When I look back now to my blog, it seems that I was stuck, because I didn't have many  ideas for the final pieces but was already creating designs which only got me more confused. I'm really glad that I revisited the brief.  Breath of visual investigation: wide enough. BRIEF Produce designs for a set of three high impact posters that deliver a personal identified  message derived from your given proverb.  #5 Stimulated approach mixed with Systematic approach. I think this brief was basically driven by the research in a way it had to be because we had to be aware of our audience and even become the audience in order to full-fill the brief.  Problem: Create a mail-shot to mechanics and use the proverb in the final design.  Key considerations: What is it going to be? Folding? The design? Colours scheme? Is it going to communicate to the right audience? Is the message clear enough?  Research activities: It was quite fun because we had to come in one day dressed as our occupations or bring a tool or a think that would represent them. I was a mechanic. So it was a different approach to the brief where You actually have to get into the shoes of the audience. Breath of initial ideas: Quite a range of ideas, after the first brief  had to make some changes. The crits really help to re-think and make a decision is it the right path that you are going to choose, is it clear to other people. Visual investigation: Not as glad with the visual investigation, think that if I would re-visit this brief I would experiment more with the folding possibilities and maybe re-consider the concept and the initial idea.  BRIEF You have developed a message/opinion in response to the previous brief. Produce a mail shot that distributes, disseminates and reinforces your message to an  appropriate list of recipients. Your resolution should fit within the envelope provided* and  be accompanied by a visually appropriate mailing list. You should consider the relation  ship between the outside/inside of the envelope and its contents. #6 This brief was different because we worked in groups, so it required a lot of collaboration and patience. Working with other people is still a challenge to me. But I was glad with the final outcome that we did. This brief also explained what is Design process. I think when I understand the process more now I don't feel as sad when I need to re-visit or re-do some design decisions or even when I need to  go back to the research state from design development. Systematic approach because You need thet kind of approach when You're in a group. Problem: 'How to..." decide on the topic in a group. Key considerations: How to collect primary and secondary  quantitative and qualitative research. How to solve the problem and have clear instructions on how to prepare a meal without wasting time and money. Who is the audience? Why do they need to know? What will the audience respond to? Research activities: Primary and secondary, we did a survey that helped us quite a lot. I think  in the future I should do more primary research, it's an interesting way to get to know your  audience and secondary research might be repetitive but primary the one that You collected is  unique and only you can have access to it.  Breath of initial ideas: At the beginning we had quite a lot of discussions. I think the hardest part was on deciding a topic which everybody would like. The other hard think working in a group is planing, in order to not waste time all of us ad to plan everything and include other people into the plan as well.  Visual investigation: The visuals that I did we're not used but I did to quit a bit of experimentation.  Though I realised I'm quite good at preparing for print double sided cards which all of them had different fronts and backs, so it was quite hard to arrange.  BRIEF As a group of students you are to identify a problem from your individual research and  provide an answer to it. You must resolve the How To…in an engaging and interesting way. #7 This brief was more about the research and how the research influences the outcome. This brief contained two parts. Part 1: research (throughout christmas holidays), Part 2: actual design development.  I did learn several of things throughout this brief, one of them was that if I want to get stuff done, I cannot go back home. <---- a note for the third year me. I also learned that if You start by doing the research and not focusing about the final designs - you can end up with quite amazing things. 'Process is more important than outcome.' - Bruce Mau. I think Stimulated approach and systematic approach was combined in order to finalise my outcome and make decisions.  Problem: What can I produce out of the research I collected. Who is my audience? What is the best format?  Key considerations: Had a lot of research in which I had to choose the key points in order to summerise it or find a key subject and the problem that I need to be solving.  Research activities: various: library, talking to people, doing online research, looking for inspiration outside college, looking at packaging of different products also looking at various print possibilities. I think I learned that You cannot 'fake' the research, because the only think You'll find out by doing the research after the final outcome is done, that you could have done way better.  Breath of initial ideas: I think because this brief was focused on the research and the outcome was supposed to come from the research, I wasn't afraid to dig deep or come back and re-evaluate the decisions I made earlier and maybe change them. The only problem I had, that I dug too deep into the research and didn't start doing the designs earlier so designs had glitches, which I was not happy about.  Visual investigation: As i said before, I think I could have experimented visually a bit more.  BRIEF Based on the data, information and source material that you have collected in response to Part 1 of this brief produce a visual/graphic investigation of the communication of '100 things you need to know about' your chosen content. 1 - CATEGORISE: the development of you response to this brief will require you o explore a range of ways of combining, categorising and expanding the facts, figures, statistics and visual material that you have gathered in order to find and explore new knowledge and areas of interest. Throughout this process you will need to exploit opportunities to develop further research, investigate new lines of inquiry and gather new source material. 2 - COMMUNICATE: Having explored a range of possible approaches to the organisation, interpretation and categorisation of your source material, design and produce a set, series or sequence of 10 related graphic products that effectively communicate an informative response to your content. Your resolutions should be print based, focus on the relationship between type and image and explore their function within the visual communication of content. Your products/resolutions can take many different forms dependent on its content, function, audience and context. How will this affect the decisions that you make about format, scale, media etc....? #8 The next brief was a life brief for KesselsKramer "Rain". It was really exiting we only had a week to produce  the final pieces and I was quite surprised that in a weeks time if I really focus I can actually do quite a lot of thinking  ad designing. I did three posters which I'm quite proud of. Now every time I do a brief I try to learn something new. A new technique or approach, I know sometimes I'm going to fail, actually more than sometimes, but I'm not scared of it. Actually I rather experiment and learn something new than always play 'safe'. Because this year out marks are not going to the final mark after three year. I rather use this year to experiment and than  next year I'll know how not to make the same mistakes again. #9 Oh, this brief was hard. Not that I not enjoyed it at all, I think just the group thing didn't work maybe because we all are friends Mike, David and Andrea and we all have really strong opinions and different approaches. I would say that from all the brief we had so long this one (for me) was the hardest. There was a lack of communication and I think that was one of the reasons that we failed. In a group I really need direction, if I don't get it I start making my own rules which never ends u well. Because than everyone is just wasting each others time by doing the same things over and over again. I think t's really important to decide who's going to be a leader and everyone should sit together and just decide what needs to be done for today and than tomorrow. Organisation is one of the most important things in a group and to a graphic designer. I don't think I could blame one person for the failure of this brief I think everyone did their mistakes and I wish I would never need to repeat this brief.  Used Intuitive approach. Problem: Communication is a virus. How does it spread?  Key considerations: Who is the audience? What are we trying to communicate? What is the most effective way to do it? Research activities: surveys, library and online researching.  Breath of initial ideas: I think we had too many and couldn't decided at the right moment by doing that we delayed the designs and didn't really think trough it.  Visual investigation: quite varied at the beginning and too solum at the end. BRIEF You have been given an idea, concept, message or task. You are required to produce a graphic response that engages with a specific audience. Your response should consider the context and environment in which you aim for it to be delivered. You will need to identify this as part of your initial concept proposal. You should aim to identify, analyse and use existing means of distributions in order to select an appropriate method of communication.  #10 I started this brief by doing quite a lot of research and I think I came up with quite an interesting idea but as I already noticed the main mistake that I always do if I over think the brief - I don't spend as much as time for the final design. I will re-do the design,after the crits I know the mistakes that I did so I can improve. I used systematic approach Problem: How to help the planet and make the future brighter for the up-coming generations?  Key considerations: Format and the size, how to spread the message? Research activities: Web based research and my own personal experience. Breath of initial ideas: Well environmental problems have been the same for a while now so the solutions are already known, just how to get people actually participating and helping the planet by doing simple things.  Visual investigation: Could have done better.  BRIEF Produce a set of 4 postage stamps that effectively and creatively communicate a unique and informed response to theRSA Postage Stamp Brief. You will also be required to produce the first day cover packaging and design/propose any promotional material that you see as relevant to their release Your response should generate interest in your subject as well as inform people about the content.