Reflection
28/10/2016
The ‘FOOD’ event was an absolute success and it was fantastic, if I say so myself…but I’m sure others would agree! Starting off on this all I was absolutely confused, what is this ‘FOOD’ event suppose to be? What are we suppose to do? And these specialist modules?? I was utterly lost upon entering all of this. Sometimes though confusion is a good thing and as I have learnt from Andy and the other specialist teachers sometimes an open, vague brief is a good thing, it does in fact give you a bit more freedom and control. Andy mentioned that the three specialist modules would be stuff that we would be applying to our core project. It’s hard to seperate them though and thing about them as seperate things within the realm of design. They do not act as individual parts, you cannot make without futures, craft or strategy everything we do in design includes all three whether we think about it consciously or not.
I began with Craft, the most obvious aspect of design, the concept of making. I suppose I couldn’t help really but to be excited by this stream, not because I just wanted to make something but because it was different, because Georgia had us really think about what food meant to us and it got me thinking about the conversations I had that night when I went out with my group to ‘meet as a nice restaurant’ as well as many other conversations I have had with people. I never realised it before but there are times I will be designing things are start thinking about people like that, it’s one of the things that influences my designs and is probably a good thing because design is about other people, it’s about the designers too but about other people, about designing for people so I took to designing my ‘exquisite corpse’ with a deep message for an audience, to speak to people and so that is what I did, I suppose I put some of my own values into it but also considered others and it’s something I never considered so much of doing so communication was a key aspect to this area. Experimenting with illustrator was also great, I still have a lot to learn though with digital mediums to create illustrations and designs with, I find I am stronger with traditional mediums so find myself using pencil and watercolour a lot. This was definitely a test on my use of medium and communication skills, but a rewarding one.
The very next specialist that I was involved in had been the Strategy studio. It was a bit of an eye opener hearing that Chris while working for clients would be handed huge slabs of paper which went through to explain the business strategy of a company. As a designer Chris explained how we have to consider and design towards both a business and design strategy. A client comes to you wanting to advertise, design or market something and other times they have no idea what it is they are wanting, our job is to pull and piece together that from them. I suppose through this specialist studio the idea was developing ways to do that, looking through the company’s manifesto, product objectives, target audience and if they already have existing design in place to look over that as well. There is also room to look into existing problems, current benefits of the company, unmet customer needs, changing customer behaviour, emerging trends and opportunities to differentiate. These are all things that can influence and being a jumping point in starting up a brief. This proved really helpful and there are a lot of things I learnt that I could apply to my design practises and the core project.
The last specialist I got to look into was finally Futures. At first I was a bit confused entering this studio module, we were told we would partner up, write up a ‘return brief’ and then create an artefact from that, photographic it in a place that would connect with the artefact to tell a story. As I said before, confusion is not always a bad thing as it has me questioning things and through that process of questions I am formulating answers and go through my own exploration for those answers. I found this stream quite enjoyable, it was almost a very real client-designer experience, although I think I would have liked it if we did develop ideas and then showcase those concepts to the people we partnered with to create out ‘return briefs’ which would have made it a more informal kind of client-designer partnership, even till though I enjoyed this specialist. There was a lot of communication involved and made me more confident in expressing my ideas and concepts on my designs, that peer feedback was great to get back and designing with the critique of others is better that designing on your own. I have come to appreciate it much more, I actually always look for other’s opinions on my work now, I just find it makes me a better designer and makes my designs better. We were prompted to write our own brief and string out all we could from our discussion with our partner, note and draw and scribble. I decided the best way to gather ideas and present my thinking and the conversation I had with my partner was then a mood board, I felt this would tie everything in and give me colours, photos, my own sketches and the conversation to all use for inspiration. I usually go about designing things now by sticking things up, having a colour set and a box or folder of images to all open up and look at whilst designing anything. Having that informs my design a lot better and I don’t then come across the dilemma of rethinking things and leaving things out or not meeting a brief. The more information you have, the easier it is to create a brief and design in response to the brief I have noticed and I was able to take my brief and run the rest of the process smoothly, brainstorming ideas and then producing concepts that I received positive feedback over which lead me to creating a final artefact within a photograph that I was happy with.
These aspect were all things I applied to the core project where I could as well as applying the things I learnt and read over in Michael Jada’s book ‘Burn Your Portfolio’. The project tested teamwork, communication, production speed, design strategies and a whole number of attributes that any designer should manage and take consideration to applying to any project, even as a freelancer many of these attributes would still come as exceptionally useful. The FOOD event was one where it broke barriers between designer, client and audience as we all became all three and I think by Andy getting us to do that he put us in a position to get in the mind and headspace of all three. We were to create a ‘brief’ which had been the aims we all attributed to and had also been our pitch, that being the role of the client almost we then got into the mindset of a designer and so our group, the Maker Pals found a way to advertise our maker abilities and aid others and whilst considering the making process we considered what we and our peers would like, putting our ideas forward on what they make like, what they may consider. Andy and April have been an amazing help and inspiration. I was hesitant to become the ‘Maker group’ as they had both suggested but our group banded together and we ended up working really well together, forming bonds and that was one of the greatest things about this, I am so proud of my team and I’ve loved every bit of working with them, we have worked as such a strong team and ended up successfully helping everyone that needed it!
This experience is one that will probably be unforgettable. My thinking and the way I look at design now would have never been the same without going through this whole exciting, rewarding experience. This whole project and the specialist modules connected to it have given me more confidence in my ideas, my work, they have made me see group work as a positive thing which has changed the negative perspective I used to have about it because I have now seen how individual ideas can bind together and work with each other and opinions need to be heard out and that communication is absolutely vital to that.
Thank you to everyone, especially to my wonderful, amazing group the Maker Pals and Andy and April, you have all been such a great support through all of this and I have had so much fun along the way with you all and more importantly you guys have all taught me so much! (So I guess Andy I can probably forgive you for binning our model XD haha, I kid though) Thank you for a fantastic semester!
