Peer Feedback

This morning I had a crit with Dom and some peers to discuss the research that I have done over Christmas. I received positive feedback and I feel really confident about the direction that I'm heading in. 

Dom mentioned that there are strong links between my contemporary research and contextual research - particularly between the styles of design shown in '93: punching the air and Yassen Faik's posters. The collage/ hand-done effect shown in both of these examples is a strong was of visually communicating the genres and is something that I now definitely want to explore.

I mentioned that I felt I had been focusing on the visuals for posters too much rather than 'branding' such as logos etc. but Dom assured me that by exploring lots of visual styles I have actually been exploring an appropriate tone of voice. This has reassured be because now I know that my branding will be fully informed by my research and I feel happy about the tone of voice that I have been exploring. The brand that I create will be informed by 90s rave flyers and graphics of that sort. 

Further research that I need to do includes finding some source material to collage with. I haven't been given any material such as images from the client so I need to out source some to work with. What would be appropriate is archival imagery of 90s raves and I am confident that this will be easily findable on the internet as there are many photo archives out there. There is actually an Instagram page that I'm a big fan of called British Culture Archive that 'Highlights the changing face of British society through documentary photography'. I'm a big fan of documentary photography and a lot of the images on this page revolve around 90s rave culture - so I'm confident that this will lead me on to even more pages of appropriate images to use. 

It was also mentioned that I should perhaps think about what is constant among the posters - the image treatment, the way that the type is formatted etc. When I spoke with the client he expressed how his past posters leaned into this idea way too much and all looked too similar, so I actually want to stray away from this. Dom mentioned that the 'constant' could actually be that the posters are all of different styles! I definitely want there to be a link - but I think this will be evident through the style of design that I end up choosing, I don't want all of the posters to be identical (especially when the client has expressed he does not want this). 

It was also mentioned that I should perhaps listen to the artists that the client has provided and make work inspired by them. I think that this is a valid and interesting way of working, however, I think that my designs should reflect the brand rather than the artists. Dom helped me understand this by explaining how my brief almost splits into two - first I identify the brand through creating visuals. Second, I can tailor this style that I can come up with to the artists. I definitely prefer this way of working because it's more focused on creating a strong tone of voice for the brand rather than getting distracted by individual artists. 

To Do 

What I want to start doing now is getting stuck in with creating imagery. I'm simply going to look at the example visuals I have found and use those methods/ ways of working to create some development. 

I think I'm going to set myself some small study tasks like:

working with type only 

image treatment 

collage 

After that I can pick out what works best and start to refine. I also want to use this process to develop ideas for a logo.