1. What skills have you developed through this module and how effectively do you think you have applied them?
During this module I feel that I have developed my skills in layout design which is my main interest as a designer. Doing the LCC brief was good for deciding how a publication with such a variable content should be layed out. Even though the proposal that myself and Jane submitted was not chosen to be taken forward it was a good exercise for us both as we had to create an aesthetic for the brochure in just under a week. This was also a chance to practice collaborating with another person which is always useful.
I also worked hard on the layouts for my instructional leaflet for the cross stitch project which was difficult as I had to fit so many illustrations to demonstrate the various stages of cross stitching onto the page. The Design For Print sessions we had with Mike were very helpful as even though I knew most of the things he taught us about InDesign, he helped me to arrange the type how I wanted so that there was an even amount of space between the number and the accompanying text using anchored objects. Doing this brief also helped me with my illustrative skills as I tried to make my card designs slightly more interesting than just plain typography. I also came up with the illustrations for the leaflet myself and think that these are pretty good for someone who cannot draw.
I am most proud of the type and layout I did for the exhibition brief. I feel that these looked to be of a professional standard and were appropriate to the visual identity of the Millennium Gallery. They were also appropriate to the exhibition subject of grids and reflected the clean Modernist designs of the Swiss style. The exhibition identity worked on many different formats from the poster to the leaflet to promo walls within the gallery. I think that I have come up with something that will continue to work for the other deliverables in the brief that I will complete as a part of my Final Major Project. This brief also allowed me to experiment with creating large scale graphics which was difficult as I could not actually create the walls without great expense to myself and spending copious amounts of time in the digital print room. But I still had to think about reading height, length of text, proportions, heirarchy and type size which was all very different to designing for a publication.
Although the idioms brief started out as an exploration of language it became more about reveal formats. When I realised that I am not actually that good that paper crafting I wanted to change it again but simplification and persistance allowed me to finish the brief to a high enough standard. This was important as crafting skills are so vital as a designer so it was a good opportunity to experiment with scoring & folding and choosing the most appropriate paper stocks. In the end photography & image manipulation became important also as I used these to create the final reveals.
2. What approaches to generating work and solutions to problems have you developed and how have they helped?
I have spent a long time in the module drawing out my ideas, especially for the Christmas cards. That is currently how I work and I think this helped me to create strong designs. I felt that I would be able to create something better than if I had just started on the computer, I just need to speed up the decision making about these designs.
I did a lot of research on the designers involved in my exhibition and I think this helped in creating the body copy for the leaflet and exhibition walls. It is also very closely linked to my dissertation topic so I already knew a lot about the subject and I was able to use things I have written for my dissertation in my project. It was important to look at things like timelines and development of their style and work as these are the kind of things that people are interested in when they visit exhibitions. This research can be carried on for the FMP as I will have to create and entire exhibition catalogue which will be a lot more detailed.
Doing my Design Context blog has also helped me in creating my own work as looking at the kind of stuff that is already out there has informed my design decisions. By looking at Christmas cards already on the market I knew that I had to come up with something that had not been done before which is why I chose to do typographic interpretations of Christmas food. I have also looked at the kind of cross stitch kits out there which are either packaged in a horrible looking envelope or come free with a magazine. This was why I wanted my kits to be packaged in a way that looked good but was still disposable as it was not an important part of the actual kit.
I also spent a lot of time researching the reveal formats, trying to find out the best way to score & fold in order to make things pop up or fit within another part. I looked at many different books and websites with explainations on how to do it but it was actually creating mock ups and testing things out that allowed me to find the best way to create the reveals.
3. What strengths can you identify in your work and how have/will you capitalise on these?
As usual the strong points in my work were to do with anything based on type and layout. It was fun to try out different leaflet formats and find appropriate layouts to fit in all the content needed. This was why 3 of my briefs featured lots of layout work. I have said that I want to focus on design for publications and I feel that I have done this to a high standard within this module. I spend a lot of time trying to find a design style that is appropriate to a brief rather than using one style to suit them all. They may all be type based but otherwise I think everything I do looks different, new and visually interesting. I will capitalise on my strengths in type and layout by doing even more briefs to do with this in my FMP.
4. What weaknesses can you identify in your work and how could you exploit these more fully?
In this module someone in a crit with me told me that my work and design development was really thorough but it was almost too thorough. This has stuck with me since then and I felt that I made my design decisions a lot quicker after this point. Unfortunately this was fairly near the end so some of my projects became rushed in order to finish them for the deadline. As usual illustration is not a strong point of mine but by keeping things really simple it is easier for me and I would expect it is easier for the viewers to understand the cross stitching process from these diagrams. Likewise my crafting skills were pretty poor but by keeping the reveal processes simple on the idioms brief it was easier to finish the project and create effective reveals.
Although I did do quite a bit of research I feel like this could always have been extended into more primary sources and perhaps this could have informed my design decisions. After doing my work placement this Summer I got into the habit of just designing on the computer so I made a concious effort to do loads of design sheets but I was too slow at then redoing them on the computer. So in the future I'll make sure that I decide what I'm doing quickly enough to act on them to high standard.
At the beginning of the module my presentation skills were severely lacking and my and Jane's submission for the LCC brief was really let down by how we had presented it. I feel that I have improved on these now as by the time I did the boards for my briefs I was able to mount these well (i.e. not using pritt stick!) and hand in all my work in a clear and coherent manner.
My circumstances have not really helped in this module as I have not been able to pull any all nighters but by working hard during the day and staying late at college, I think I have compensated for my pregnancy. My only regret is not doing more briefs as I think I could have done more if I was not so tired all the time!
5. Identify five things that you will do different next time and what do you expect to gain from doing these?
1. Create a time management plan at the start of the project to give me some idea of where I should be with a project at any given time as well as working harder from the beginning. I will also update this as circumstances change and depending on how much work I have completed.
2. Ensure that I have tailored briefs to suit my interests and goals as a a designer rather than attempting things that I may need help with.
3. Continue to work hard on designs but speed up the process by doing just initial sketches by hand and moving onto the computer quicker.
4. Speed up my decision making process so that I can do more work on each project and ensure I have the best designs possible for any given element. This will also allow me to complete more briefs.
5. Use my blog more to document my design sheets and I will annotate and evaluate each of these to aid my design process.
6. How would you grade yourself on the following areas:
Attendance - 5
Punctuality - 5
Motivation - 4
Commitment - 4
Quantity Of Work Produced - 3
Quality Of Work Produced - 4
Contribution To The Group - 4
14 years ago
