OUGD 602// End Of Module Evaluation

This has been a really interesting module for me this year. It felt like a lifetime ago that I visited 42 Square which market the start of this module. After that I managed to secure two live briefs with what I consider to be big clients; Propagation House Recording Studios and DHR International. These were both cases of knowing, or meeting the right people over summer. Securing these jobs was a great learning curve for me and this has definitely been reflected by the tone I use in my emails, shifting from being apologetic to more confident and assertive in my thoughts and ideas to clients and people who I have emailed alike. It was great to know that I can operate confidently as a freelance graphic designer, and I hope to continue finding jobs like this in the future, especially as I begin searching for more stable employment.

Its a shame that Deep Space Industries never got back to me, now that the course is over and things have been quieting down a bit I think I will begin to email them again. I'm sure they get hundreds of emails a day so perhaps one day I will get through.

My biggest regret for this module has been not finding out more about studios back home in London. I was comfortable working as a freelancer over this year, and I suppose that I thought that if I could get enough work in, why would I stop? In reality I believe that I need some more experience to do some of the bigger jobs properly, and I definitely need more contacts in industry, something that I need to start building on right now.

On a more positive note I am very pleased with my current identity and website, which is up and running perfectly. I will continue to add new projects to the page over summer and edit out the old ones to keep the ideas fresh. One thing I am particularly happy with is that searching my name gets the website as the top result in google, a definite advantage for my professional practice.

All in all I have had a good year of finding myself as a designer, perhaps more in the process and style side than the professional side. However I am happy with where I am at the moment, but cautious that if I don't start moving forward right now I could have some problems by the end of summer. I need to hit the ground running and the time to start is now.

OUGD 602// Thompson Brand Partners Feedback

The visit to TBP was great, easily one of the nicest studios I have ever been to and the people were very helpful too, offering to look at our portfolios again in the future and to help out in general. I have shown them my first portfolio now, I knew it needed some changes before hand but some of the stuff Jimmy said I should keep in and take out were opposites of what I had thought it would be.

Here are some of the notes I made during the portfolio crit:

Application:
-Talk through things on the page.
-Take the reader on a journey.
-Include more images of the WPP video.
-Use more work in progress images.
-Add more context to your identity work.
-The Ubergine looks great and more effort should be made to show off the logo.

Make more mac mockups with images on screens.

WPP images have to tell a story.
-Two or three lines per page.

Fedrigoni should be one page.

Target the portfolio to the studio you are visiting.

DHR- build this brief up some more. It looks great and should be expanded on.

Use the Text version of the UKSA logo.

OUGD 602// Porfolio 1 For Visit to Thompson Brand Partners

Ahead of my visit to Thompson Brand Partners I have put together a portfolio for them to loo at. This includes a few projects from this year and last year. I know full well that this will not be my last attempt at the portfolio before we leave but it is a start. The aim here has been to perhaps include slightly too many projects so that during its crit I do not have too little and I can learn about what to exclude and include in the future. I have gone for minimalistic boards with just images and a small title on each so that I get a chance to present my work rather than read text directly off the boards. Also this allows the pictures to fill the whole page for a larger format.

OUGD 602// Video Email Sent to Propagation House

This is the Email I have sent to Mark with a run through of the website to explain its features and workings so far. I plan on adding much more to the site before it is finished however:

 

 

Hi Mark, I made a quick video of the website coming together as I thought it would be the easiest way to show you its functionality.
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 Prop House.wmv

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This should open in a separate window, it might be blocked as a pop-up.^

I get a lot of glare through my windows so they're shut in the vid, which is why its a bit dark. For example the picture of the trees hasn't been edited, that deep blue sky is much lighter on the actual site as are a few other colours.

Any changes you would like at all or thoughts would be great. I'm planning on getting a first version of this done by the end of tomorrow, however things like colours, text and images can been changed easily.

See you soon,

Luke

OUGD 602// A Visit To Propagation House

 Over the weekend I went to visit Mark at Propagation House. This was a great experience and although I have met Mark a few times before this was the first time I had spend an extended amount of time working with him. The day was all about collecting photos and information about the website for the studios and making sure that we were both on the same page in terms of design and content. We also discussed the logos development and that the current version is 90% of the way there.

Finally Mark suggested that it would be interesting to see if I could do any work for the Bands who come to the studios to record. Although at the same time he suggested I don't work for them as they are notorious for not being great clients for designers.

Overall it was a great visit and I got loads out of it both for my extended practice module and my PPP module. It was great to work as a professional designer with a professional client. 

I have taken way more photos than this, but here are a few decent shots of the studio and surrounding countryside and ocean....

OUGD 602// Letterheads

I have had a look at my new logo identity and have decided to apply it to a range of printed and digital outcomes. Here is a mock up of what I will be producing shortly. Once I have time I can print these off and put them to use.

OUGD 602// PPP Presentation