ORION

This blog is for recording the progress of my work for my BSc Digital Media Creative Platforms course. Which covers the production of my logo, CV, personal website, business cards, and other aspects of my own branding.

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Future Improvements

Finally the only thing left to do is highlight all the future improvements I think I should make after this unit:

Expand my skill set. Whether it be by improving my understand of web design with HTML, CSS and Javascript or by learning something entirely new like how animate. Anything to get an edge over the competition.

Produce more work for my portfolio. It would be great if I could get commission based work, but even if its just personal projects, any high quality work should be used in my portfolio.

Develop a website using online HTML, CSS, and Javascript to the same quality as the one I made with WIX. To show I do have the skills to use HTML and CSS effectively to at the very least help out with any projects needing them. 

Get a series of professional or at least high-quality, photos done for when I need to put my face on my work somewhere.

Investigate more graphic designers, and keep up with the latest in the graphic design world. I need to show I have a keen interest in the industry.

Possibly start up an Instagram for my work. With Instagram becoming so prevalent for finding work, or getting out there, I should at least attempt to properly set one up. Regardless of my interest in my Social Media.

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Reviewing My Work To See If It Will Live Up To Industry Standards

Logo: Since my goal was to create a consistent and versatile brand, that could continue to evolve with me, I went with a minimalistic logo design. Which would work very well with a lot of marketing materials or parts of my brand. The logo also had the benefits of being open to experimentation with colours, gradients, and even being animated into motion graphics depending on what format it was being developed for.

CV: Looking at what my lecturer provided in her lessons during presentations, and from my own research online, I believe my CV hits the mark. It represents my own brand, without being too different from established norms. The information is easy to make out, and is quick to the point which is essential to keeping an employers initial interest. It shows off my technical skills, and communication skills, which are both important to employers. As well as the little professional experience I have. Though my sources aren’t exactly concrete facts, employers are different from one another, Mark from Superrb made it very clear not to use skill bars yet one of my sources use an example with such a thing. Its all about finding the right balance between individual preferences, and industry standards.

Business Cards: Have the same expectations of them no matter what industry, to find the right balance between representing your own individual flair and making your job and how to contact you easily known. I believe my Business Cards accomplish this very well. With their small size it is easy for me to carry them around, ad for people to keep them on them. They have no wasted space, and considering only one side is dedicated to giving my job and contact details I have the other side to express my own unique flare. The images used for the printing the business cards were at the recommended resolution of 300 dpi, and keeping all text at least 5mm away from the edges.

Portfolio: A portfolio is meant to showcase your best work, how diverse your skill set is, the process and ideas you used to approach making a piece, and who you are. These days some employers want to just look at one document and see if they like you, which means a portfolio needs to function like a CV. My portfolio accomplishes all of these things, lacking only examples of my ability to draw, section headers, and more pieces done in my own time. Once again, I would also need to branch out and develop my skill set and then present it here with high quality work. 

Sources: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12

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Liz Earle Application

In an attempt to put all of the self branding I have developed to test, I have applied for a position as a full-time Graphic Designer at a Liz Earle Branch on the isle of wight.

This position would be perfect for me location wise. However I was lacking in the agency experience department, so I needed to make up for my shortcomings elsewhere. This was good practice for getting my foot in the front door so to speak, using any means I can to get a start in the industry I want.  

I lowered the income I would ask for to the UK average for an entry-level Graphic Designer, £20,500 and expressed my desire to show what work I could do with their brand by creating some mock ups. Unfortunately I didn't have time to go about creating these mock-ups with the final deadlines of university to deal with. And finishing my own personal illustration to fill out my portfolio.

I think the main thing I may have slipped up on with my application is the fact I was too humble, I needed to present myself as confidant in my skill and in my belief I was suitable for their team. But I phrased in too meek a manner, saying things like ‘I think’ and ‘I would Like’. I will keep this in mind for future applications.

After finishing up my last 2 units, I will begin the process of sending out applications left, right and centre learning from each of them. like I have from this one. And continue to grow my portfolio in any way I can. As well as my skill set.

If it reaches a point where the lack of experience proves to great a hurdle to climb, I will seek out an internship which I should have the credentials for considering some of them take in students that haven’t even attended university.

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Portfolio Development #3

A few more adjustments to my portfolio.

Adding the final page the about my blue man illustration, for the time being until I complete my Geralt Illustration. 

The changes I made to the business card page, adding a few more steps to the process.

The about me page was supposed to include an picture of myself in the upper left hand corner, however I wasn’t able to find the time to get a good photo taken of myself. And I want a good quality photo of myself to match the quality I am aiming for with the rest of my portfolio. So I will chalk it up as a future improvement.

I though about adding section headers to break up the reading process, but since each section would be around 2 pages long currently I don’t think that is a wise change. I may flip every other page so that there is some change to the design as people read through it.

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CV Development #5

The final version of my CV didn’t actually require a large amount of changes. Just small ones to streamline its design. Such as changing the way some titles to reduce the number of different font sizes in the CV, as some people may have found it in bad taste.

As well as lining up all of the element in 2 separate columns. Just to make it more natural for someone to read through the CV. 

Finally I made some small changes to the spacing of certain elements, and some of the text. Just to make sure it was easier to read, and presented all of the information I needed to present.

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Side Project: Illustration Development #2

Progress has been smooth, but at my current speed this piece will not be done in time for hand in. So, I will continue to work on it in my own time after this unit. I believe to really develop my portfolio in the future, I need to find more time for these side illustrations as well as more hand drawings. They are some of my greatest strengths and I shouldn’t waste them.

When it comes to the actual piece, I am slightly concerned I am using far too much gold and bronze colours, and that the green sections are lacking in variety of colour. I will continue building up the shapes to create the illustration, then experiment with more colours after wards. Before moving on to create the background, which I intend to be in the shape of Geralt’s famous wolf head medallion.

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My Sources of Inspiration

Throughout my design process during this project, there have been a handful of graphic and multimedia designers that I have been drawing inspiration from. Designers that I have neglected talking about until now.

These Designers were examples I followed out of both personal interest and the fact they had large portfolios supporting the fact that they were receiving clients. Which implies their personal branding was working.

Anna Nowokunsa / Graphic Designer: was a great source of reference for designing my website, mainly when considering how I would handle writing about my skills and the use of my little symbols. Anna had a very personal feel to her website, right out the gate she informs visitors of her personal interests. And even when informing visitors of information such as her location and past clients, she tries to spin it in a personal way with talk about where she’d like to go or who she like to work for. 

Sagmeister & Walsh / Creative Agency: a creative agency is the most apt way of describing Sagmeister & Walsh as they cover around 28 different areas of design, ranging from advertising to signage. I looked at the way they laid out their website for inspiration on how I should lay out mine. Their website was plain in terms of colours and text. Leaving 90% for just the necessary parts such as examples of works or text explaining aspects about them. Their chosen typeface, was also a great example for me to follow when choosing my own. Contemporary but also easy to read.

ILOVEDUST / Design Crew: Located in Portsmouth and focusing heavily on illustration work. ILOVEDUST is the best local example of what I should be striving for. Their website is completely barren except for a looping video image for the background and 4 links, these 4 links open up 3 pop ups or a link to their Instagram page. ILOVEDUST have completely embraced the rise of Instagram, using it as their portfolio and best source of gathering followers. Which is something I should keep in mind, if Instagram is so prevalent these days I should really give it some thought to setting one up.

Build In Amsterdam / Branding Agency: I started looking to this company for inspiration after Mark from Superrb’s recommendation. As the projects they’re currently working on are very intuitive and innovative. Their website was a bit too advanced in terms of transitions and effects for me to hope to replicate. But Looking at what I could possibly learn skill wise for the future would be useful. The Branding work they have done is also in line with my skill set and strengths, so it is good of me to keep up with what is being done at the highest level.

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‘Superrb’ Industry Feedback

During the Industry talk held in March I was able to get some feedback on the design of my website from Matt Pilkington the MD of Superrb. 

While Matt was focused on the business side of things, and had little input over the actual design process of the company, He did have the experience of seeing the work his colleagues have put out over the years the business have been running. As well as helping write up design briefs for his team, with the input of their client. Meaning he definitely had a good idea of what was popular within the branding industry at this time.

Since Superrb handled the brand side of web design. Which meant they fully fleshed out a narrative for their website using employees with multiple skills, outside that of just web design and development.

Matt only had a little bit of time after his 2 hour talk, but he did give me some good points to think on:

The Header took up too much screen space due to the shape of my logo, he suggested I rethink the layout or remove the text to reduce the space.

Present some examples of all of my skills, I lack examples of conceptual drawing and saying I understand HTML and CSS doesn’t work when using an online website builder.

Try and present the process of my work better, employers want to see the way I tackle solutions and the insight I offer.

The use of space, and my selected typeface was good, but the elements were a bit too zoomed in there needed to be a better balance between all of it. 

Try and learn some more skills or further the ones I already had, being flexible is a great sell for any agency looking to add you to their team.

I also needed to get more examples of personal projects.

While I’ve made progress on all of these points, I feel some of them will need work on after the completion of this unit. Such as, developing my website design skills and developing a large series of personal projects both digital and hand drawn.

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Business Cards Development #6

I finally ordered my business cards from Solo Press a few days ago. 100 square, double sided, standard thickness business cards made of the standard silk material available on Solo Press.

I think they turned out exceptionally well, using the square shape made sure there was no wasted space, and the font on both sides is easy to read. My logo also takes up just the right amount of space on the front, where its clear what the symbol is without making the card look cramped.

The pattern on the front is slightly grainy, but not to the point it makes the people who look at it unable to make out what its meant to be. There is also some slight differences in size between a few of the cards and the rest, most likely due to the common mistakes made during the mass printing process

Solo Press also provided 2 plastic cases to store them in.

I believe for my next set of business cards I will use a slightly thicker paper, as because of their smaller size the thinner paper makes them easier to bend. But the smaller size does make it easier to keep more in my pocket, meaning I can hand more out during something like a job fair or large meeting.

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Website Development #2

To shorten the height of the header I dropped off the Orion graphics title below the logo, and shrank ever so slightly.

I’ve also temporarily added a full logo to the about me page, in case I am unable to get a professional quality photo of myself taken before the hand in. 

I’ve also completed the ORION branding page, to talk about the best and most interesting parts about how I developed my own brand.As its some of the best examples I have for consistent brand design, and page structuring. 

Finally, I have linked my custom domain to my WIX account, and have published my site its now live for everyone to see.

https://www.orion-jf.com/

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Side Project: Illustration Development #1

A lot of my peers, and my teacher seemed to really like the blue man piece I featured on the home page of my website and suggested I do more in that style.

I figured trying to do this couldn’t hurt, and would only strengthen my portfolio. So I went online and got a reference image of a video game favourite of mine, The Witcher Geralt of Rivia.

I have been using Adobe Illustrator to make this illustration. Using the pen tool to build up each individual shape and layer them over one another. Like I did with the previous illustration I did in this style, I wanted to do something unique with the visuals, so I’ve designed the hair to form into bigger cube shapes the longer it is, before splitting up towards the end of the strands. I also wanted the ideas to continue to stand out like they do in the source material by making the whites of the eyes a golden yellow and the pupils orange. 

I’ve put in around 15 - 17 hours into this piece already, by just using little bits of free time I have. Meaning I don’t know if it will be done in time for hand-in for this unit, but I’ll persevere to see if it can. Even though I estimate another 30- 33 hours of work.

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Portfolio Development #2

Development of the Portfolio is progressing smoothly, after finding a large amount of Photoshop mock ups to use its much easier for me to create these mock ups of my designs to present here. I really do think they were worth the search, they make the pages look so much more professional as a result.

I’m at around 7 pages now. Looking to have 10 in it at the end. I’m not trying to overload a possible client or viewer of it with information, just examples of my best work, with a bit of background and insight into my development process that’s it. 

I may add section into pages to separate the different sections from one another and to artificially increase the page count if need be.

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Digital Portfolio Development #1

Finally begun development on my digital portfolio, after finishing both my CV and Business Cards, and nearly being done with my website. Meaning I have a very fleshed out idea for my brand as a whole, making it easier to build up a signature portfolio.

I want my portfolio to function as a CV and a showcase of my most recent and best work so that if employers ask for my work or check out my website online this portfolio will be an easy to browse document that will allow them to research me quickly.

Currently the projects I will include in my portfolio are: Personal Branding; ORCA work; and Illustrations. I may also include my AA project if I need to, but that project wasn’t as fleshed out as the others I am planning to include. I am trying to show off my development process as well, but this is difficult for most of my projects as I never really had the habit of recording the development process.

For my portfolio I’ve been using In design to develop it, but I have also been experimenting with Photoshop and these mock up templates you can acquire online to show off stylised examples of how each of my pieces look online.

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Website Development #1

Just some screenshots detailing the early stages of my website development.

Images 1 - 3: Showcasing what I’ve done so far with my home page, which will showcase an example of my best work, currently ‘the blue man’, and links to my past work. Since most of my branding uses whites, blacks and greys I though the links to my past project should use a bit of colour to add some pizzazz to the screen and make it easier to distinguish each project from one another, excluding logos and names. I still think it comes off as a bit empty however, like its missing one last thing before I can say its done or at the very least all the pieces are there. 

Images 4 - 5: I will show off my past work by creating a sub-page for all of my past projects which will have a background colour tied to the colour used on  their link. I will keep the page minimalist, having a gallery of 6 examples of work made for this project. I will talk a little bit about the project on the right hand side of the screen.  I think having my logo encase the logo linked to the project the page is about works well as a design choice and just serves to distinguish this page from how other designers have done it. 

Images 6 - 7: The about me page is still very much a work in progress, as I wrestle with exactly what needs to be put in and how I want to present it. For the time being though its a good start and it matches the theme of the other pages so people will understand it is a part of the site. 

In all honesty the website has been quite difficult to produce so far. These days a simple website design with plain colours and 1 highlight colours are what designers should be aiming for. Which sounds like something easy to produce, but it only makes it harder to make your website stand out from all of the others. Graphic design is a very competitive industry after all. I will investigate some other examples of graphic designer websites, and review whats been mentioned in the lectures so far to see if I can find some more inspiration.

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Deciding what online website builder to use for my website.

I know starting off of the bat that I didn’t want to build the website from scratch, using code. While, I am experienced with front-end development with HTML5 and CSS3 I am not at a standard where I would be able to produce a website to the standard I want.

So I decided to use one of the online website builder services, that allow you to essentially build up a website like if you were using software like Adobe Illustrator. The question now was which one to use? The options I looked at were.

SquareSpace: The most popular web builder currently, and the first to show up when searching online web developers on google. Squarespace does have the capabilities to easily add advanced features to your website but after trying to use it for a day I decided against this builder. Its simplistic menus don’t seem to offer much in terms of freedom and creativity, and if they do they aren’t easy to access like with WIX.

WIX: One of the earlier website builders, and one that I have previous experience with. Meaning I wouldn’t need to waste time getting accustomed to how it works. The major downside is that if I wanted to add more advanced features later on to my website it would be quite difficult with WIX as its builders is quite basic and clunky in comparison to the others. Regardless I think I’ll go ahead and use WIX for the time being, as I don’t plan currently on implementing any advanced features.

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CV Development #4

Not much was need in terms of changes this time, my teacher just wanted me to make sure my formatting was to industry standards and I was getting in as much information that employers wanted to see as possible. 

For example the other skills section is now for things relating to my social skills, ability to work in a team environment, etc. 

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Business Card Development #5

After showing my last series of designs to my teacher, she told me that she liked what I was going for with them but they were too unfocused and it was difficult to make out the information behind all the patterns.  

I also still didn’t have my name, or job, on the business cards which was a major no no.

So I decided to strip the designs down to the bare essentials, I still wanted to include a pattern of sorts so I made the pattern with light greys instead of blacks and shrank down the size of the symbols. 

I added my name and job to the back, which I had more room to work with thanks to the changes.