A Journal for a Graphic Design Student

Week 5 Mon 22  The Stage 2 Meeting this week was about us getting on and developing our chosen brief - I have chosen to go forward with my idea for a recycling app so I need to start collecting some visualisations to build its identity. Tues 23 The learning team feedback this week helped me to realise gaps in my 'brand identity especially for things that weren't getting across clearly. It was useful though, to present current 'sustainability' apps available on smartphones to see what their style, colour scheme and layouts are like. Additionally, someone else in my team is also covering recycling so it was interesting to see her work and the more detailed approach she has taken to the topic. Thurs 25 The textworks lecture today looked at "Truth and the Media'. It's a very deep topic and really makes you think about what you take in without questioning, whenever you're alone, on your phone, in a park etc. What is always being forced upon us, what do we wa...

Week 4 Mon 15 The Stage 2 Meeting today introduced that we would be progressing with our brief ideas this week, in hopes that we would start forming a proposal for them by the end of the week. I had formed a couple of brief ideas from the workshop last week but I'm still not set on one idea. Tues 16 I had the first feedback session today with the rest of my learning team. We all presented some ideas for our self-initiated brief and got some thoughts back about what we presented. Out of my two ideas, lots of people liked the sound of the recycling app so I think I will be pressing forward with that one.  Thurs 18 The lecture today discussed the idea 'Design and Humour', two things that I generally never look for together. It was interesting to see that humour can fit pretty much anywhere into a design, whether it's trying to be direct or not - like how in the movie Shrek, it actually includes many adult jokes that we didn't truly appreciate until we were older.  Fri ...

Week 3 Mon 8  After the usual Stage 2 Meeting this morning, we learned that the designer Jack Hardiker would be giving us a mini live brief. The premise of this brief is to take this opportunity to break away from the screen and devise something more experimental involving sounds, household items, created objects, mobile phones, light, paint etc.  In the afternoon, I had a quick meeting with my groups to start brainstorming ideas for this brief and what routes could be potentially good. We really liked the idea of involving the senses. Tues 9 Continued on with the development of the live brief which was due at 1:30pm. We had sorted the foundation of the idea yesterday with wanting to focus on task/experiences that involve the senses so we made a variety of mood boards which presents those experiences.  During the review in the afternoon, Jack really liked our idea but found there were a few things for us to work on to make it more presentable.  Wed 10 Had quite a wor...

Week 2 Mon 1  I had our usual Stage 2 Meeting this morning with Matt. We found out that we would be presenting the initial ideas for our self-initiated brief next week, so I decided to focus on consolidating what ideas I wanted to focus on so I could clearly choose the best course of direction next week. Later on today, I had Tim's lettering workshop: it was very interesting to do over Teams and play around with the parallel pen again. Tues 2 I had the workshop 'Creative Catalyst' today, and we got to work in pairs which made the workshop really engaging. Having someone to talk to really helped with the fast development for each activity as well as pin-out certain problems or queries we had with our current brief ideas. Wed 3 I continued to review the work that I had done in the workshop on Tuesdays because I had generated lots of ideas but wanted to work more on the actual foundations of these mini briefs by either rewriting them or explaining them further. Thurs 4 This we...

Week 1 Mon 25  We had our first meeting back today for the new module, Design Direction. Matt and Kate went over all the work we're going to do, from the portfolio requirements to writing our own briefs. I spent more of today going through bits of my portfolio and started to brainstorm ideas for my brief. Tues 26 We had a long workshop today, lasting from 9:30am till around 4pm. All four of the workshops were interesting but used a lot of brainpower. I came up with many different outcomes for the individual workshops: I liked the workshop 'Finding Your Voice' because it made me look at the things I hate and try to find a way to solve a problem within it - almost like finding a way out of hating that one particular issue. Wed 27 I booked a portfolio review with Kate today because creating and progressing with a portfolio was something I was unsure about. I found it useful to go through the pieces of work I had chosen and see the best order to place them in. We decide that I ...

  Week 12 Mon 7 The final Stage 2 Meeting of 2020 just to give some tips for handin and to go over what was expected for it. After needed to find the assessment sheet so that I can start putting together all my work from the Kickstarter and the workshop tasks. Tues 8 I booked a 1-1 with Steven today so that I could go over my work. It was helpful to hear about my progress and what other directions I could focus on them. I still had a few things to finish odd before I could start with my boards but I was happy with the number of touchpoints I had at that point. Wed 9 I had a 1-1 with Matt just go over all the work I had to submit because they were a few pieces that had gonna missing or that I would have to redo. But it was good for me to explain my project to someone else other than my coursemates and learning teams tutor. Thurs 10 Handin Day!! Overall, I was happy with all my outcomes from this project. It was challenging out the start because the client information was small and l...

  Week 11 Mon 30  Had our stage 2 meeting at 10am and received some information about the upcoming week especially since our handin is very soon. Mostly that 1-2-1s are available again so that we could talk about our work with tutors. Tues 1 We had our second group learning teams today where we got to show off our current progress with our coursemates. We were all at a similar place, had a name and strapline sorted and had started on creating our visual elements for our brands. Most of us wanted some insight into what we could focus on and start our next part of development. Wed 2 So today I focused on getting my first brand finished so that I could start researching into my second idea - a bright brand that celebrates people drinking non-alcoholic substitutes. Exploring what bright colour schemes I wanted to use as well as what dynamic style I wanted for the labels. Thurs 3 The lecture this week was about the Branding of Christmas. It was interesting to learn that Christmas t...