Tuesday, 9 November 2010

More Berlin based studios

I'm getting really stuck in with searching for Berlin studios, theres quite a few that suit me and what areas of design I want to be practicing.





Berlin - based studios


I've been looking into some Berlin - based design studios for when I go to Berlin next year. Hopefully I can tie my visit which well last a few months in with some Industry experience. I've also learnt recently that Berlin being a hub of international creatives means not speaking German won't hinder me, but I do plan on learning the language.


Monday, 8 November 2010

ppD group Prep

What are your concerns about industrial experience?

- Not being good enough, having my work or portfolio not at the standard that agencies will be interested in me.

- Bad financial climate, Agencies and studios may not be so willing to take me on.

- Not being to draw, sounds silly but I feel that it's something thats going to slow me down when it come to the industry (Need to start drawing again)

- Making a bad impression, blowing it and losing out on a good contact or reference



PPD group Prep

What areas of Industry are you interested in?


Typography




Information Graphics



Branding and Identity



Editorial/Book design

Circular 16 by Pentagram






PPD group Prep

What form/format can industrial experience take?

Agencies and studios, big or small, local, national or international

'Ice cream for free' based in Berlin


B&W Studio, Leeds

Effective studio based in London


Working Freelance or setting up your own studio

Alex Turvey, a long time idol of mine a talented young designer who set up his own studio months after graduating.

-Printers, specialists and stockists (visits, tours)



Exhibitions/Galleries

a manga exhibition at the former urbis in Manchester.



PPD group Prep

What can you learn from industrial experience?

- Industry level skills both in communication and design practice.
- How to work within a team more successfully
- Contacts within the Industry
- Portfolio advice
- what areas of design suits me best
- do i fit into a studio format/ in-house or freelance






PPD group Prep

What is Industrial experience?

Working in a design environment, working on real live briefs for real clients for the real world.

- Experiencing real time constraints, ongoing live briefs and working to a budget.
- Making sacrifices and compromising with clients views and instructions.

- working and adapting to a new team environment
- Being part of something real, not a self-made brief seeing the design process go from an idea to a resolution to being professionally printed and sent to the client.


Sunday, 31 October 2010

What is good Rationale

Good is... Healthy Coloured Foods

1. healthy

2. colourful

3. aesthetically exciting

4. grown by small scale farmers so profits from these foods go to small communities

5. Healthier than their everyday versions such as a red banana is healthier than a yellow banana


I intend to.... Inform people about the healthy properties of these foods and how some are healthier than normal versions.

I will produce.... Food packaging for these foods along with a form of print solutions (possibly a set of flash cards for each food)

Sunday, 13 June 2010

10 achievments i want to make over the summer

1. practice photography and develop skills
2. experiment with printing t-shirts
3. develop skills at drawing
4. practice Hand-rendered type
5. read more graphic design theory
6. visit several exhibitions and galleries including urbis and the design musuem
7. blog personal work and found design
8. develop skills in illustrator, photoshop and in-design
9. experiment with type and grid
10. collect different medias of graphic design

Saturday, 29 May 2010

Module self evaluation

1. What skills have you developed through this module and how effectively do you think you have applied them?

Through this module i have learnt how to collaborate with a partner and work through ideas and designs with someone who has separate abilities and knowledge. I have also developed my skills in hand rendered type and hand rendered images and illustrations and applying it to adobe illustrator and photoshop, which I then used across a variety of products which i think work very effectively.


2. What approaches to/methods of research have you developed and how have they informed your design development process?

Towards the end of the module i researched using more primary research and communicating personally with the intended audience. with speaking from experience i directly asked current 1st years there mistakes which gave me results more quickly and relevant than any other method of research would have. Through this research i found it easy to move forward in the design process as i used quotes from my participants.


3. What strengths can you identify in your work and how have/will you capitalise on these?

I would say that this module has been my strongest and i think this is because Ive used relevant research and taken more time to experiment with other ideas and medias. My illustration and hand rendered type are also strong and I will definitely develop these skills over the next two years applying them to a range of different medias and briefs but learning how to make them relevant each time.

4. What weaknesses can you identify in your work and how will you address these more fully?

I think at the beginning of the module i didn't experiment more or record design sheets and in speaking from experience i could of pushed the project further and applied it across different medias and made the identity stronger. In communication is a virus my research was minimum and weak which resulted in the project not reaching its full potential. I think that more planning and time management I would successfully overcome these weaknesses if future briefs.



5. Identify five things that you will do differently next time and what do you expect to gain from doing these?

1. Develop my skills in hand drawn type in my free time, i think this is something i want to get better in and maybe chose to specialise in so i think to get the best out of it i need to improve outside of the studio to apply it within the studio.

2. Develop ideas faster and produce design quicker so to develop concept earlier in the time given so leaving me time to explore more and correct faults.

3. Experiment more with processes such as screen printing outside of the studio time to allow my to apply it more successfully to a project and develop my skills in the process to allow my to produce more experimental and more experienced prints.

4. Research more thoroughly and more extensively to apply to the design process more effectively, making my projects more well informed and relevant.

5. Improve my time management, although it has improved greatly over this module i still need to develop it to a more professional level which would help all areas of my design. Which will include blogging as i don't leave enough time to record and evaluate my work to the level i would rather be at.

6.How would you grade yourself on the following areas:

5= excellent, 4 = very good, 3 = good, 2 = average, 1 = poor

Attendance 4
Punctuality 4
Motivation 4
Commitment 4
Quantity of work produced 3
Quality of work produced 4
Contribution to the group 4









Friday, 21 May 2010

speaking from experience.... self evaluation

What problems did you identify?
I discovered that students were afraid of making mistakes and not realising that they could take something good away and learn from them.

What evidence did you find to support your decisions?
From student's responses i gathered that everyone made mistakes but had always learnt something from them even thought sometimes they didn't realise they had.

What methods did you use to gather your evidence and what forms did it take?
Through questionnaires and interviews I collected all the research needed to move forward with the project. (primary, Qualitative)

What methods of research did you find useful and why?
Interviewing students and surveys proved most useful. I found that handing out and collecting questionnaires personally proved more productive than using a social network as not all of the students questioned in the 1st year would have replied, so by using a more interactive method produced the most responses.

How did these inform your response to your problem?
The quotes that people gave in the surveys were used directly as part of the work and were then typographically designed by hand.

What research could you have carried out that would have proved more useful?
I could of gone further with the interviewing stage and questioned second and third year graphic design students.

Five things I have learnt about the design process.
1. Time management - I planned and worked alongside a schedule which i kept to and produced a body of work that is substantially more than I have done on any other project.
2. Primary research. Without questioning the 1st year GD04 class as an audience i wouldn't have gathered the responses that made the project so interesting.
3. colour. I had to research colour so that the typography matched so none of them would clash
4. Screen printing. a much cheaper and more aesthetically pleasing print process that digital printing.
5. Sketchbook work was vital to the progression of the project and most of my time was dedicated to this.

five things I would do next time
1. push myself further to do more in less time
2. screen print more than one colour designs
3. blog more design practice and ppd as and when i work
4. evaluate design context more
5. push idea further and create a design campaign and not just a range of design medias

Tuesday, 4 May 2010

individual assessment

which of these words describes you as an indivisual?
-confident
-vocal

which of these words best describes you approach to life?
-Laid back
-critical

what do you to be?
-organised
-decisive

which of the following qualities do you look for in others?
-honesty
-creativity

list ten things that you have learned

1. illustrator 6. screen printing
2. indesign 7. book binding
3. idea generation 8. typography
4. photography 9. blogging
5. letterpress 10. type and grid



list ten things that you want to learn

1. information graphics 6. more about the graphic design industry
2. drawing 7. colour
3. more about typography 8. composition
4. t-shirt printing 9. different book binding techniques
5. branding 10. motion graphics

which of these words describe you ambitions as a designer?
-creative
-ambitous

what do you want your work to do?
-inform
-attract

which of the following words do you associate with your work?
-type
-idea

which of the following areas have you developed your skills in?
-type
-print
-idea generation

which of the following areas do you need to develop your skills in?
-drawing
-problem solving
-research

which of the following are you interested in developing skills in?
-information graphics
-typography





Monday, 26 April 2010

Rationale - 2 ideas Speaking from Experience

Brief/


1. Design a resolution that visualises Health & safety at a house party (humourous)

2. Learning From Mistakes; Create a resolution that shows the positives of making mistakes


Who needs to know?/


1. 1st year students

2. 1st year students


What do they need to know?/


1. How/what to mix (drinks, cocktails) what and what not to do at a house party

2. That getting things wrong is sometimes just as important as getting things right


Why do they need to know?/


1. To encourage house parties and meeting new people

2. To help them accept theyve got something wrong but to know to learn something from that mistake - Have no regrets


What will they respond to?/

1. Through humour they will be entertained by the design

2. Through worry and stress/ everone makes mistakes so people will respond to something that may build confidence


What research is required?/

1. House parties/stories/cocktails

2. Mistakes people have made/famous mistakes that have lead to great things/Mistake sin design that have lead to improvements

Monday, 22 February 2010

Monday, 15 February 2010

END OF MODULE SELF-EVALUATION - OUGD102

1. What skills have you developed through this module and how effectively do you think you have applied them?

Towards the end of the module my time management skills really developed, not to the level I would prefer them at but in a week I managed to do an amount of work I have not previously done in that time. Though still at a poor level I think that my time management helped me develop my resolution as they was a large amount of time spent on developing 100 designs which was very time consuming.

2. What approaches to/methods of research have you developed and how have they informed your design development process?

I didn’t develop my methods to the level I would of preferred but within my what if… brief i did collect primary research from the public which took confidence which has made me comfortable enough to do this approach more often it also supplied us with crucial information to progress to development and our resolution.


3. What strengths can you identify in your work and how have/will you capitalise on these?

In my what if… brief I developed several design ideas thoroughly, giving me several options for the final design which was more satisfying than relying on a few. Other than this i believe i haven't shown my strengths or potential but am determined to reach my potential in the next module.


4. What weaknesses can you identify in your work and how will you address these more fully?


My weakness is definitely research, and how to correctly gather an appropriate amount of information to support the development of ideas. In the next module or to correct this module if need be I need to create a full body of research from various sources and evaluate it and use that research to inspire intelligent ideas and concepts. Another weakness in my work is development of ideas, I’m too quick to decide my idea and stick with that one without exploring others. The level of my work and the standard is worryingly low compared to where I would prefer it and the low quality of research and development is the reason for this. My attendance, this effected the OUGD102 module to such an extent I was always catching up on work and ended up not reaching my potential and producing and very low standard of work compared to what I would of rather of created.


5. Identify five things that you will do differently next time and what do you expect to gain from doing these?


1.Organise and schedule time limits and selp appointed deadlines for certain points in a brief such as research and development, giving me guidelines so as not to waste time and get the most out of myself and reach my potential.

2. Build a creative and inspiring body of research to inspire ideas or strengthen existing concepts.

3. Develop several ideas not one and explore more to create more interesting designs and make my work exciting and intelligent.

4. Be punctual and attend 100%, so I can keep up with the amount of work given and complete it at a respectable standard.

5. Utilise my Blog, giving myself a point of reference and help record my development and progress.





6.How would you grade yourself on the following areas:
(please indicate using an ‘x’)

5= excellent, 4 = very good, 3 = good, 2 = average, 1 = poor



Attendance 3
Punctuality 3
Motivation 2
Commitment 2
Quantity of work produced 1
Quality of work produced 1
Contribution to the group 3