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

OUGD 602// New Website

I've got my new website up and running, with a new logo and information bar and new content. The site is based of the the framework of the old one and is built from the ground up by myself. This will be a great advantage when emailing potential clients or for job opportunities and acts as an online portfolio website for now.

It can be found at:

http://www.lukerossiter.co.uk/

On another note, if you search my name on google the website is now the top result. I put this down to good search optimisation on the site and also the fact that I have a google mail account linked on the page, which apparently helps with the search equations acting in you favour at google's end.

OUGD 602// New Logo

I have altered my branding very slightly. I was happy with how it looked before but I think that I felt that the way I had stitched the L and the R together was a little heavy handed. This is heavily based on the old logo but with a little bit of a more dynamic style. It is also slightly more ambiguous and could be seen as my initials again or perhaps an 'x' or half of a love heart. I think it is just slightly more interesting to look at. At the same time it is still close enough to my old logo design that I can use my old business cards for a little while longer before I have to order new ones.

Again it comes in black or red. 

OUGD 602// Second Email to Deep Space Industries - Bryan Versteeg

Bryan Versteeg is the creative force behind Deep Space Industries and the guy who makes all of their digital 3D illustrations of the space probes and stations that the organisation releases. His also the founder of SpaceHabs and does work for a number of other clients in the space exploration business. 

http://www.bryanversteeg.com/

I thought that it would be great to get in  touch with him and try to find out how he got involved in designing stuff for all these amazing organisations and see if he could have a look at my own ideas. Here is the email that I sent to him, I left my website off because I was paranoid that I would get caught in spam filters: 

Hello Bryan,

I am a student graphic designer in my third year at Leeds College of Art, England. Having finished a dissertation project on graphic designs role in the space race I have been looking up modern day creatives operating in the space industry, which lead me to your site. I'm really into the work you're doing, especially the projects for space habitats; that area where science fiction meets our near future reality really fascinates me.

I understand that it takes years of experience and operating in industry to get to where you are currently. I thought I would take the opportunity to ask advice on how I, as a soon to be graduating graphic designer, could get involved with the space industry?

On another note, as part of my studies I have been working on a conceptual logo rebrand for Deep Space Industries as well as a few ideas for mission insignia and markers. If you are interested it would be great to show you some of these, the feedback would be invaluable for the development of my work, especially from someone involved with the company. 

Thanks for your time, best regards,

Luke.

OUGD 602// Third Email to Propagation House

 This is the third Email I have sent to Propagation House asking for their opinions on the new work I have been doing. It is important to note that I have been making more frequent phone calls to the studio and these emails are just a way to explain stuff to them in writing and for reference. Still it is good practice to keep people informed.

 

 

 

 

Hello!

I've put together a few more ideas for the new logo;

The first concept continues with the folk/ blues hand-drawn type idea from before, there are several elements within the logo (like the lightning and circles) which can be removed or altered, but this is the 'most busy' version of this concept. I've also added a small 'established' mark separated by a simple interpretation of your older logo for the 'heritage' aspect. (I put 1996, I don't know if this is correct and can be changed). The interesting thing about this one is the balance between a hand drawn aesthetic and its conversion into a digital vector drawing, if you think the lines could be straighter and the image sharpened up that is possible, alternatively the lines could be given a more 'lo fi' quality for a more folky, creative style.

The second idea I have been working on has a more modern aesthetic and leans more towards a rock audience. The idea here is to have a stronger, heavier identity with a similar feel to some of the studio websites Mark and myself looked through a few days ago. The broken up blocky style comes from the necessity of spelling out such a long name, avoiding repetition of the exact same shapes to give a more dynamic range in the lettering. The circular shape on the right separates the two words and also acts as the Sun or the Moon rising over a countryside setting creating a silhouette of the studio. The chimney smoke is interpreted here as a lightning rod illustrating the nature of the work going on inside the building. I've included a range of colours for this one because they give a very different tone of voice to the design that you may be interested in seeing.   

I have also put together these two images to show the two vectors in a different setting. The purpose is to just illustrate their usage in a real life setting, for example a gig poster.

Thanks again for having a look through these, I hope they are closer to what you are looking for. As always I can edit and change these, or start with some new ideas too!

Luke

P.S.I just though it might be useful to put this image in the email, it shows some of the ideas I have ended up with. Could be useful to see all of the outcomes on the same page.