David Emin - Daily Mirror

As the Metro work is moving on, the brief asks for a strap line to be used on all types of media. As my ideas are developing, I was interested to see how other newspapers sell the product. I contacted the Daily Mirrors design and advertising team to see what thoughts they had on strap lines, methods of advertising and different audiences to engage into. I was lucky to hear back from designer David Emin who replied with some positive ideas. He explained that the Metro is a paper for the audience to relax to and have the ''me time'' in the morning when traveling to work. He advised me to think about this area and work my ideas around this.

Tolerance Campaign

As the deadline for the Tolerance brief arrived, Kat and myself pushed our ideas to the limit these past few weeks. As our original idea of playing with typography didn't seem to work, we asked ourselves why and tried to come up with a solution without using type. Overall, we felt the typographic elements were not hard hitting enough for the audience to engage in the subject and understand the true meaning of tolerance. This meant we had to go back to our research and find a good meaning of tolerance and come up with an idea what sells the subject greatly. As every Monday was now a small presentation of our work to a small group, we started to use the count to ten idea and see what we could do with numbers. Our feedback was positive as we were told to push this idea as much as we can but most importantly, keep it as simple as possible.

Kat and myself felt this was a challenge in itself but we were motivated to crack the brief. As ideas came back and fourth between us, we suddenly developed an idea, which would then go on to our final outcome. We decided to focus on the number nine in the count to ten theories and make it the main subject matter throughout the campaign. Our first idea was queue jumping and then we used a clock type layout with the numbers from one to twelve showing but missing the nine. This seemed slightly confusing, as the numbers were not showing a consistency sequence as well as the other ideas we had.

We decided to scrap the idea of being late and focus on the ones which we could only use one to ten at its best ability’s. After a few crits with our tutors, we set a goal to keep our ideas simple and communicate them as clear as possible. As we applied the finishing touches, we were happy with the results. I myself was convinced we could not move on from our typography idea but I have learnt that pushing an idea to its fullest can lead to greater and more positive results.

BBC Feedback

This past week, I was lucky to get some feedback from the BBC. As I was unfortunate not to win the pitch, I was expecting some heavy criticism regarding my work but was pleasantly surprised with what there thoughts were. Guy Bradshaw explained that he loved the idea of the stick men carrying the sub headers and also the use of colour within the layout. All though I was not successful, I was pleased with there thoughts.

Reform Creative. Visit Number two

Last week I once again made a portfolio visit to Reform Creative, the agency in Manchester where I had my placement last June. As I have been in contact with Paul on a regular basis, I have been sending work, asking his thoughts on my ideas and talking about the quality’s you need as a designer within the industry. Paul had a good idea of my portfolio when it was formatted in a book/brochure and I was eager to hear his thoughts on my progression and layout of work and what he could advise regarding my next steps.

As Paul arrived, he was happy to see my work take so many steps since the last time he saw me. He was positive about the black box, as my presentation seemed better than last time I saw him. He explained that the positives of having a brochure is being different but, as a box presents your work and ideas in a more professional way, these may be the elements when getting a job in an interview. Paul also pointed out that having a box makes it easier for the person going through your work as they get a better understanding of what the ideas are. Communication seemed to be easier in relation to the previous visit as the A3 plus sized sleeves helped me feel more focused on what I was trying to say.

As we talked about each piece of work, I was unfortunate not to have my new Metro, Tolerance and BBC ideas in my portfolio as at the time, I was still on the creative journey of finalising the projects. I did explain my ideas for each of the briefs and he seemed eager to have a look at them when I had finished. As I asked Paul what projects he felt I should take out of my box, he explained that as a designer, you don’t just have one portfolio. If you are visiting an advertising agency, have more advertising work to show. If you are visiting an agency that focus mainly on branding, have more identity projects. I still had the old brochure and explained I felt it was important for people to see the progression I had taken but Paul disagreed. He advised me to leave the brochure behind as whoever is going through my work, they might not have time or even want to see it as the main work you want to show will be in the box.

One piece of work, which Paul spoke highly about was the tolerance project. He felt that typographically, the ideas work well but as tolerance is such a big subject, having a stronger idea to answer the brief was needed. Maybe having one of the typographic ideas as a logo may work, but using this as the main concept would not engage the audience. Communication is a vital element within a brief such as promoting tolerance and engaging with them on a personal level emotionally was vital as the subject is not a fun filled, entertaining matter. I was able to show Paul one Metro idea and he felt the concept worked greatly. He advised that the creative process will lead the project further and eventually, the answer will come when you least expect it.

Penguin Advertising Campaign

As I try to keep a fresh acknowledgement of clever ideas, I am also motivated to gain a better understanding of how to apply an idea for it to work. I am feeling very motivated with the Tolerance work as Kat and I feel we are close on answering the brief but we still find ourselves in a tricky patch of a applying our ideas effectively. I had noticed this Penguin advertising campaign in the 2006 D&AD Annual and the typographic idea of using quotations and focusing on the different shapes letter forms have, I feel the idea works perfectly.

Think Before You Advertise

As I logged on to a Mac today, I found some images on my desktop, I assume from the previous user who had logged off. As I curiously looked through them very quickly, I noticed some billboard displays from America. I found the advertisements very funny as one ad displays one message, where the next billboard is advertising another. I do agree, child obesity is a major issue but for the fact that a major food chain has advertised something so appealing next to this issue baffles me. This shows that some people do not take it in all the different possibilities when advertising or sending out the right message.

Paul Rand

During the past few months, I have been gathering research of the creative process from my inspirations and have also documented my own creative journey. The creative process will be my main theme throughout my journal (the academical, writing side of the degree) and I wanted to involve some historical content. As I was reading about Vince Frost, it was explained Paul Rand was his inspiration and I was motivated to get a better understanding of his work and the creative process Rand went through. I gathered some great information and was instantly impressed with the Westinghouse branding project. Besides the logo, Rand also designed a number of Annual Reports for over ten years and these show a different use of creativity within the design itself.