Professional Project Evalution
This 12 weeks project provides the opportunity to plan and produce the practical work required to the highest prodessional standard. I chose “Phobias” as my topic. The concept is to visually communicate different irrational and weired phobias in a consistence graphic system. I have been interested in this topic many years ago, and expected to do some design while it is a perfect time for me to fulfill my dream.
I started with brainstorming about bounce ideas. I had many different ideas, but my problem is I am not confident about my ability so that I can’t choose a specialist subject area. When writing the learning agreement, this is one of the aims I really want to achieve. I think my tutors are very helpful, somehow guided me on the right track. I decided to design a book which includes various phobias for the final submission. There are several of ideas, one is a book of “A to Z” phobia alphabets which is to create 3D experimental typefaces. However, considering the limited of time, I don’t think I could finish 26 different typography design. One idea is to do series of black and white illustrations with linocuts. And another idea is to use photograph and illustration.
There are various ways help myself collecting information. I researched on different types of interesting phobias on the websites, social network sites such as twitter. Also, I did a survey to investigate what kind of phobias people suffered around me. Moreover, I analysed and record other designer’s works which inspiring me and clever ways of communicating information. To inspire myself, I did a lot of experiments with typography. I created 3D typefaces. For instance, I experimented with peanut butter to spread and print “Arachibutyrophobia”(which is the fear of peanut butter sticking on the roof of one’s mouth). I also did for the fear of vegetables, cats…etc.
I generated based on the ideas from my brainstorm and experiments. I defined my book as “a visual compendium to see, feel and explore.” The title of the book is “Irrational Phobias / Read With Caution!” The book includes 10 phobias that people probably never heard of. I made a photography-illustration montage for each phobias. I illustrated objects to metaphor each phobias with simple black lines. And combined with photos. The book was developed into a French fold style. Considering this book as a start to explore phobias, I photographed and collected the surface or texture of phobias which will be folded inside. The audience can choose to see and explore the phobias inside each pages depend on themselves.
During the process of design, troubles have never stopped popping out. I keep testing printing them out as long as I adjusted or modified the design as this is an experience through the previous projects. To keep the consistence of the visual language is not simple. But this help myself to explore aspects such as font style, colour scheme, moods, textures, imagery and materials. In terms of font style, as Richard said: “A good font changes everything.” I did further research on font system, history and really cautious to choose the font. Finally, I chose Trade Gothic which is a traditional sans-serif typeface.
A good book need an attractive cover. I had an idea of making my warning title “Read with Caution!” to be indented with no ink on the paper. To achieve this considering to keep the consistence of graphic style, I used letterpress after experimenting with linocuts. In terms of book binding, I bound the book by myself in a Japanese stab binding style.
In a nutshell, I feel I successfully fulfilled the aims I had written in the learning agreement, compared to the previous projects, another thing I paid attention is time management. As the first self directed project, I arranged my time even better than before. Also, I have never felt this sense of achievement whenever I solved a problem. I think this project not only just
develop the design skills, problem-solving skills and concept generation, but also kind of build up my confidence!
