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MDM691 Reflection

1) How has each course contributed to your personal and professional development   as a media designer?

Mastery: Personal Development and Leadership Course: This course allowed me to find myself again. It pulled me into what made me want to be a designer in the first place. Be creative. Be original. Be myself.

Defining Client Needs: The why became my hero. Why we make, create and do what we do. This is the X factor in making something magical, both on the client side and design side.

Brand Development: By diving into the brand full on, I got to live it. Research and truly looking deep into the brand and its tribe drove me to feel the brand’s essence.

Effective Copywriting: Writing has never been my strong suite. This course pushed my writing skills a tad further and allowed me to explore my writing style.

Design Research: All good design begins with good research. Understanding, living and setting up a successful project hinges on it.

Organizational Structures: Mood boards, dynamic mood boards and building a narrative drove the brand to understand what made the brand the brand. This was the first time I had created a brand narrative and it was a great experience in learning and exploration.

Design Strategies and Motivation: Giving a visual identity to the brand is allows one of my favorite parts of design. Giving structure and guidelines shares that creative style with rules and order for the brand when you are not there to direct it.

Design Integration: Using the branding from the previous course drove us to create a guerilla marketing campaign and radio and TV spot. This was good fun and pushed my creativity to the next level with fresh ways at looking at marketing and promotion.

Multi-Platform Delivery: Understanding which design projects make up a campaign and why to focus on them when launching a brand keys on a great understanding of the brand and its customers.

Measuring Design Effectiveness: Extending the brand to the various pieces and products pushed my creative vigor and drove me to create some of the most fun projects I have worked on to date.

Thesis: Presentation of Design Solution: Putting everything together in a book and video presentation pushed my creative chops to come up with some truly unique and purposed work.

Professional Practice: This course made me focus on me and my work for the portfolio creation projects. I got back into promoting my design versus the company and its work. Something I have not done in over twenty years.

2) How well were you able to utilize the concepts and techniques you learned from the program (theories, design process, and the creation of multimedia content) as you designed, developed, and completed your MDMFA Thesis Project?

This program set me up well for completing my thesis project. From thinking about, researching and learning new tools to allowing me to focus on being more creative and exploratory with my design. It pushed me to think what’s next and how I will get there and most importantly… why.

3) Describe your most outstanding personal triumph in each course.

Mastery: Personal Development and Leadership Course: For the first time in many years, I got to focus on what I wanted to do and why.

Defining Client Needs: Pushed me to research more. I showed me a new way of looking at target demographics by creating personas. I will use this technique on every project from now on.

Brand Development: Looking at myself as a brand.

Effective Copywriting: Pushing my writing skills to the next level.

Design Research: Reconnected me with my field and its masters.

Organizational Structures: Narrative and why create one. Learned a new tool… Adobe After Effects.

Design Strategies and Motivation: Made the Toy Solider brand standards guide fun and spot on in an original way.

Design Integration: Got to plan a guerilla marketing campaign that I would love to see happen and extent that campaign into a radio and TV spot. I learned to use a few new tools here as well, Apple Garage Band and Tilt shift photography. Thanks to Brent for introducing me to this tech.

Multi-Platform Delivery: Got to work on a brand genre I have wanted to work on for years and take it to the extreme fun zone by pushing my illustration skills.

Measuring Design Effectiveness: Got to work on another lifetime genre I wanted to work on and created a card game I am actually working on producing. I also got to push my illustration skills further again.

Thesis: Presentation of Design Solution: Designing a book and video presentation with an animated 8 bit style game leading you on a journey through my thesis project pushed my work to the next level.

Professional Practice: Putting my personal portfolio together for the first time in twenty years felt like the icing on the cake to taking my design career back.

Congrats to my classmates and I wish you all the best. Almost there... stay on target.

Cheers

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MDM690 Reflection

It has been a long and exciting month.

The first project was a brand project book collecting all of the work we have done over the last few months. I tackled this project like I do with most of my work… in a clean, simple and minimalist style. After working on the project for a week, I started anew. I really wanted to capture the brand mantra of fun in a unique way. I added a bottom bar that included an 8bit style game that led you through the book like an adventure. I really had a good time running with the idea of game themes throughout the book.

Over the next two weeks, I created a video presentation for Exigent. This was a bit more of a challenge due to me wanting to add a lot of animation in an 8bit style. It ended up being a blast.

Again one of the takeaways from this course was working in Adobe After Effects. The more time I spend in it … the more amazing things I can do with this app. Another takeaway was using Issuu to publish a project book. It was an easy and smooth experience and the finished project looked fantastic. The best takeaway is the shared experience of classroom discussions and helping others reach their goals and design potential.

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Exigent Project Book Spread 2

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Exigent Project Book Spread 1

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Exigent Project Book Cover

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MDM690 | Exigent Brand Presentation

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MDM690 Project Book

Here is the link to my project book for Exigent.

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MDM640 Reflection

Examples from this course included in previous posts below.

10.2.1 | WK 1-2 | Exigent & EBF | Logo

We sally forth from the last course at full speed. Building upon the research and strategy we created... I begin to visually express the company and it’s brand. I really enjoyed exploring the fun and fantasy genre inspired concept directions. I always enjoy sketching and refining the ideas into a solid logo. I also elected to do a game logo as well. I figured what’s a gaming company without a game. So I created Epic Boss Fight. What a great time I had with this. We also used a survey system to strengthen, expand and focus in on which designs worked best for the project.

10.4.1 | WK 3-4 | Exigent & EBF | Assets

In the third and fourth weeks, we were to create the brand assets that best suited the rebrand and launch RFP. I worked on pushing the idea of brand differentiation by doing the unexpected ... I went with minimalism and white versus the chaos and black design that most game companies run with. It really stands out from the crowd here and the shapes created by the dragon are sharp, bold and invoke a sense of movement. Surveys played crucial to our work in these two weeks as well. Driving us to be better and on target.

Course Highlights

1. Blowing out the brand

Not only did I have a blast creating the logo for a gaming company but it just got better when I got to blow the brand out. From the CI (which was one of my favorite of my career) to the ads and storefront. The surveys focused and tuned me into the direction the advertising should go in. From the offline billboards to the ad placements on a trade website... the surveys told me these were the best vehicles for the marketplace.

2. Working on a game project

Woot... not only a game company but a game to boot. A tad more work but man ... it didn't feel like it. It was fun, inspiring and stretched my creative legs a bit more than usual. I really wanted to contrast my typical design style which is the one I used for Exigent by doing an all illustration heavy concept for EBF. I got so into EBF that I have been inspired to actually create the game ( my kids really drove the idea home when they saw the work). It will take a bit of work but it is worth it... working on the card game system mechanics at the moment.

3. Stay on target and go beyond using surveys

I always looked at focus groups and the like as a watering down of the designer’s concepts and a marketing person’s scapegoat. I was influenced by designers like Massimo Vignelli, who I got to see speak. He said “that people don’t know what they really want... we need to help them and believed focus groups were impediments to game changing design”. I have learned to be a bit more open to these concepts this course and continue to grow. Although I believe pushing design past the mundane truly delivers a job well done and a stronger brand.

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MDM640 | WK4 | Exigent | Brand Storefront

This is the storefront design concept for Exigent. Wanted to push the action a bit further with the idea of it is a spike, wing or is it fire... all good. The simplicity of the logo mark dragon playing out nicely.

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MDM640 | WK4 | Exigent | Billboard | Teaser

Here is another form of the launch advertising for Exigent. This is the teaser version of the billboard.

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MDM640 | WK4 | Exigent | Web Ad

Here is the reveal web ad on IGN for Exigent.

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MDM640 | WK4 | Exigent | CI

This is the CI for Exigent. The business cards are screen printed semi-translucent plastic to echo the scale of the dragon concept. The second side of the stationary has scales.

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