After a reminder of the print lecture from last week I started to create the outer cover for my CD artwork. After spending a number of weeks creating the style guide I was glad to be doing something more creative. I had done some initial sketches based around the idea of a train with light trails coming off it but I felt that this a little bit cliché and suggested that the music was of a much faster pace than it actually is.

Finding the right image did prove something of a challenge as the number of 300dpi images available of free stock image sites such as; sxc, was very limited. I am happy with the progression of my CD artwork and the alternative style of the seminar group this week, consisting of us sticking our work on the work and giving feedback, really helped.

With this being the last few weeks of the last year one assignment at lot of focus is being put on the 2nd year and this was the topic of discussion on Tuesday morning. I am looking forward to the second year and the prospect of working for a real client as I believe this will provide invaluable experience for the future.

The volume of work in the second year will be much bigger than any course I have previously been and this will help me to understand the pressures of a career in the creative industry. This will be beneficial to be and make me more employable when I come to finish the course.

A major part of the second year that I am looking forward to is learning CSS. Although I have already built some websites using CSS I know that I have barely scratched the surface of what is possible.

With next week being a self study week I plan to get the assignment completed to ensure I have time to make any changes necessary on Monday.

My goals for next week are:

• To have my CD artwork finished
• To have my style guide amendments completed
• Initial ideas completed for 'The Wire' advert
• Completed pre-flight document

Progress this week has been slower than I would have liked. My target was to have this finish by the end of last week but it has taken longer than I anticipated. However the style guide is just about completed now and that means that I can finally start working on my CD artwork during self study.

Creating the style guide has been something I have really enjoyed. Designing the business cards, letterheads, envelope etc... has helped to allow me to get into a more professional mind set and approach the work from a more commercial viewpoint.

After the presentation on how to set work up properly for the commercial print process I feel ready to begin designing the CD artwork but I don't won't to have to listen to the CD again!

I have already got some ideas of what the artwork should look like but I plan to try a number of different designs before settling on the final one. Designing the artwork is the task I have been most looking forward to since I first read the assignment so I can't wait to start.

As well as working A7 this week I needed to do A6 presentation again as my previous attempt was only around 3 minutes. My second attempt didn't much better either and I was disappointed as I knew that there was sufficient content in the presentation to last to 5 minutes due to my practice runs.

I also received feedback on the A5 assignment and I was pleased with the merit grade I achieved. Looking back on the website now the only major change I would make would be t o change the shade of blue to something that is more suitable to the target audience and not quite as bright.

My targets for next week:

• Complete style guide
• Create initial sketches for CD artwork
• Develop CD artwork using Adobe Photoshop

After choosing a different logo to my original design I now feel happy with it and this week I have started to create my corporate style guide

Due to the last three weeks of developing my logo I now feel I have a much larger appreciation of the difficulty of the designing logos. Previously I had a very naive view of logo design and I had never considered the intricacies involved.

The major problem I have had with my logo is reducing it down to 1cm whilst still maintaining its presence and suitable weight. For the majority of Monday morning this was my main focus was adding extra weight to the symbol.

Once I had finished my logo I moved onto creating the corporate style guide. This involves stipulating things such as: how to use the logo effectively, what the corporate fonts and colours are etc... I have enjoyed this and I am looking forward to the challenge of creating my business cards, letterheads etc... to meet the standards I have set in the corporate guide.

Initially I have been focusing on the content of the style guide and during the week I am going to focus on the design. Once this is complete I will move on to designing the letterhead, business cards etc...

I am happy with my progress so far on this assignment but I would like to have my style guide completed by the end of the week so that I can create my letterheads and business cards etc... This means that I can spend the next few weeks designing my CD artwork and preparing my work properly for print.

My targets for next week are:

• Make final adjustments to logo
• Complete corporate style
• Begin designing business cards, letterheads etc...
• Start generate ideas for CD artwork
• Practice presentation from A6 assignment in preparation for presenting on
  

Here is a developed version of my chosen logo so any feedback would appreciated.

I will also be posting it in a range of colours tomorrow so let me know what you think.

Thanks

These are four of my final design and I would really appreciate any feedback before I develop them and begin to add colour.

Thanks

Another week focused on logo designs and there development and this means that I have had the chance to use my sketchbook for large amounts of the week. Developing the logo this week has caused me some frustration as I have a design I like and I have found it difficult to deviate from this idea as I have wanted to develop it further.

To help develop the logos we had two tutorials on Macromedia Freehand this week. I have never used Macromedia Freehand and it lacks the familiarity of the more modern Adobe products and this has been frustrating at time. Although I prefer Adobe Illustrator I do feel that it will be beneficial for me in the future as I will be able to use a larger range of software applications and this will be an advantage when it come to gaining employment.

Like last week we had an ex-student of the course, Mark Feather, visit us and talk about the work he does for Empire Direct. The work that Mark does consists of web banners, html emails, image manipulation etc... This variety of work appealed to me as I think it would allow a larger learning curve in a much shorter time span compared and it would allow a broader range of skills to be obtained.

My targets for next week are:

• Have a completed version of logo
• To have chosen the Emit colour scheme and corporate typeface/s
• Develop initial ideas for style guide
• Plan content for style guide
• Build on current knowledge of Freehand
  

With the emphasis this week being on logos I have spent a large amount of the week focusing on my sketchbook and developing initial ideas for my 'Emit' logo. I have enjoyed this and I have already generated a number of ideas which I am going to develop during the week. I will be posting some scans of my initial designs from sketchbook, so feel free to leave and feedback you have.

Initial ideas:


I have found the case studies from the lectures very interesting especially seeing how the logos have developed over the years as the logos have been redesigned to meet with current attitudes and trends.

During the first lecture, this featured an overview of the four basic types of logos (wordmarks, lettermarks, graphic and new generation). I was a big fan of the graphic only logos as I felt that they provided the best impact, where the easiest to recognise and often the most simplistic.

Examples of graphic only logos:


Most of my initial ideas have focused on the words Emit and playing around with the letters to see what logos I could come up with. I plan to start thinking about graphic only logos that will represent the company Emit but I am not sure whether a graphic only logo would be the best option as I am not sure if the company is strong enough to be easily recognised.

This week we also had a visit from Jonny Haynes a previous student on the course who now works at Technophobia. The meeting was really interesting and provided a great insight into the work he does and the work of Technophobia.

My targets for next week are:

• Develop my initial logo ideas and hopefully have a number of possible logos
• Start thinking about the typefaces that the company will use and the colour scheme
• Continue to research logos and annotate them
• Research style guides and what they contain in preparation for the Emit style