OUGD603 DBA

The Brief

 We had a group chat about this brief straight after the initial briefing. Our group consists of Abi, Alex, Danielle, Laura and myself. We decided the best way to start was to discuss each others strengths to determine if as a group we would work effectively better with each other.

Skills
Abi- Iconography, UX design, Web design, Colour
Dannielle- Travel info, Illustration, Concepts
Alex- Branding, Concepts, Implementation (print), software skills
Sophie- Concepts, Packaging, Branding
Laura- Print, Layout, Art/Hand-crafting, Organisation

We decided that we would go away and think about the brief ourselves, come up with concept ideas, visual ideas etc and meet up the next day to discuss our findings.

When we met back up some had done more then others but we still didn't have a definite idea.
I thought about phrases and sayings that meant something was better and I thought about the phrase 'Apple of my eye'
From that I tried out some designs and quickly realised that it devalued the project and wouldn't necessarily represent what I wanted to display.

I then thought about another aspect. The north is at the top (pretty much) something being at the top normally means that it is superior to others, so as a visual I thought about a compass, arrows a pyramid etc, basically symbolising that the top (north) is better then the bottom (south). As the brief is asking us to encourage people to think about the north being a competitor to the south which is the capital. Trying to persuade peoples to change there perceptions of the south.

During the initial presentation, there was a visual that pointed out the four cities :

So far left is Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds and then Hull

We thought that this line would be a good visual to use, perhaps in the logo. The above logo examples I produced have some examples of how it could be used, however ultimately it didn't really work. Also there are some examples of logo ideas in which use the idea of a compass or an arrow. I presented these ideas to the group and they liked the concept idea the most.

Alex came up with the idea of using the above geographical line as some sort of grid reference we could use.

We planned to meet up again before the crit, however during this time, many people with in the group got ill or had other commitments. Although we didn't meet face to face we still spoke within a group online chat via Facebook.

We met up with the gentlemen from DBA who set the brief and talked through our idea/ concept, we however were the last group they had seen, and they then went on to tell us that there were numerous groups within our year who had the same idea for the concept some better and some worse. They suggested that because we hadn't done much yet that we revisited the brief and try come up with a new aspect to the design. This left us feeling quite dis-heartened as we felt that we were just stuck already finding this brief challenging it didn't really help.

However they came back in and chose groups who they felt needed some more direction and help, and one gentlemen came to help us. He went to explain that he was from a brand agency and the most important aspect of that was coming up with the concept idea.

He drew us a diagram that should help:

So ultimately what it means is that when you work out the Region, Competition, Audience. We would then get how this can move it forward to the future. From that is the golden opportunity where they all work together to get the final outcome.

As Alex, laura and myself met with the gent from DBA we decided that we would take a section each, I was given the Us section to research as I am Northern, Alex chose Competition, and Laura was the Audience. We then arranged to meet up as a whole group to discuss our findings.

RESEARCH ON THE NORTH- THE GOOD OR THE BAD

From this we delegated jobs to each other
Alex wanted to do the branding, Laura wanted to design the posters, Abi designed the whats on App and I designed the info graphic and way finding for the train. I was also supposed to design the exterior of the train however Alex designed it instead as he had the logo which made it easier.

I spent a lot of time attempting the design way finding for the train platform which was a waste of time due to the fact that it wasn't that important due to time constraints within our group. I started off thinking about the different signs you find on trains and I realised that the most noted signage you find is the signs that show you where the train stops. These signs are typically found above the train doors. As we had decided on a set colour scheme that represents each city I took this and brought it through to this design so the brand was consistent. I took the earlier design of using the geographical points on the map to show the stops on train rather then the typical straight line. We had decided that Liverpool was representing culture, Leeds was education, Manchester was business and Hull was politics so to represent this in the sign I created an illustration of landmarks or buildings that were appropriate to those categories. 

OUGD603 Band Logo

I was asked by a band called Paisley Rehab to create them a new identity. Basically they wanted a new logo, which could be used on posters, banners and on the drum skin as well as material to use on there social media such as Facebook cover photo. They also asked me to create a poster in which could be adapted to the different venues and dates in which they play at. 

Below is the logo that they are using now, Buz the lead member in the band is who I have had correspondence with regarding the design. He told me that he produced the logo below really quick on Paint. After asking the band about there name they told me that they just wrote a list of 'cool' words on a piece of paper and put two together that sounded 'awesome' 

Mandatory requirements were that the logo is put on a white background, as they do all the printing themselves they didn't want to waste loads of ink for the posters when they would be producing loads. They pretty much allowed me to come up with what ever I thought would be best for this project. However after sending them what I had done they came back with numerous changes and requests. This was quite a frustrating project for my self as I found it quite challenging in terms of I don't really listen to Rock bands so to create a rock band logo proved difficult as well as the fact that they wanted a lot of changes to the designs I had already done.

From looking at their original design I realised that there is too much going on and the font doesn't compliment the design. I decided that it would be interesting to keep the paisley design throughout but incorporate it differently (not in the text)
Research

Initial Designs
At the time of starting the initial designs I didn't know at the time that they would like the design on a white background, so I decided to use tones of grey, as it kept it appropriate to what I would presume was quite 'rocky'

Throughout this project I am using a font called 'Fight Night'
I didn't feel as if the top two worked very well as the vector image wasn't very clear. I decided not to present the top two designs to the client as I felt they just were up to no standard what so ever. As I was already struggling for inspiration I decided to research some more into rock bands and how there logos work. A lot of them used just a text based logo with no imagery what so ever, but due to the fact that typography is my strongest point I wanted to have an image which took the focus off the font so much. Which is when I came up with the third design. (below) 

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3.

After showing one member of the group my initial Idea he asked if I could change the logo to capital Letters, which I went on to do. I also did variants of different coloured backgrounds (still didn't know about the white background rule)

Below is the email correspondence I received after sending the above designs.

After receiving this email, I also received a text saying :

'Would you be able to do one on a white background with the skull as it is, but the background white and the text a colour, mainly so I can print it on white paper without using up all the ink at work. And I don't know how hard it would be but that skull would look ace as a deep purple. Like Cadburys' 

So in response to that email I sent them the below logo:

After sending the above logo I then received this email.

After receiving this email, I was beginning to feel incredibly frustrated with this project due to the fact that the list of demands to have things changed were just so on going. Something that should have taken a few days was being dragged out. At the start of this project I shouldn't have believed that I had complete reign over this project and asked more questions regarding what they wanted rather then believed I could do what I want. In response to this email I agreed to change it to a portrait canvas, however I told them that I wouldn't allow them to have the full skull due to the fact I would have to re-draw it then scan it back in to the computer and then go on to change it to a vector image which was going to take too long. 

So these were the responses I sent back to the band: 

Poster design:

Banner Designs

(Still need to choose the final)

This banner would also be online as well as printed into an actual promo banner.

The Drum cover