OUGD502 Potential Studio Visits

I knew that getting to see the inside of a professional design studio, it's facilities and how the employees work would aid me in choosing a more specialist path. I did some research into some local design studios that would be easily accessible for a visit.

OUGD502 Networking

Due to the vast number and huge variation of Graphic Designers across the globe, networking is highly important in this field. Contacts can be easily made through communicating with other students, designers and professionals, as any contact could lead to potential employment in the future in some form or another.

Methods to contact studios, agencies or other designers:

• Email - biggest guarantee of a response in a timely and efficient manner, also keeps a record of all exchanges made with the recipient.
• Websites/Blog - best option when looking for freelance or collaborative work as clients will be able to see your work in a professional setting. This method is also the best to try and get your name heard or known to other designers or studios.
• Telephone - very direct but not seen as being as professional an approach as others.
• Visiting studios - Gives a good insight into the working environment, also good for making contacts.
• Exhibitions - will often find plenty of other designers and professionals visiting (particularly at openings)
• Work Experience and Internships - gives an employer an insight into how you work and how efficiently, if you have left a good lasting impression and kept in touch it could be useful as a reference or future work.
• Collaboration - working collaboratively gives you another dimension in your work and shows your ability to work with others. It also helps to have a good relationship with people you have worked with in the past.
• Competitions and Live Briefs - Professionals will look at the results of competition briefs and may want to use your work or work with you.
• Creative CV - a different CV will make it stand out from a pile of others, and so should be innovative and intriguing, and accompanied by a business card.
• Seek advice - from peers, tutors and in some cases professionals, it will ensure that your work will be better received if you've had plenty of feedback on it.

OUGD502 Revised 10 Things

At the beginning of first year we wrote a list of 10 things that we wanted to learn/achieve throughout the year. Looking back on this list I am going to determine which have been successful and which may need to carry on to a new list this year.

10 things I want to learn during my time on the programme:

• Improve knowledge and skills of digital media
• Develop and vary my research methods
• Learn how to effectively collaborate
• Use Illustrator and Indesign more in my work
• Improve on my presentation skills
• Gain a more in depth understanding of the design industry as a whole
• Use and apply design blogs to my research
• Gain an understanding of principles of graphic design, in particular effective use of colour
• Work on applying effective time management and stick to it.
• Gain a sense of enthusiasm and confidence in my own work

Improve knowledge and skills of digital media

To some extent I have achieved this goal, my knowledge has improved a lot, but I would still like to be able to apply these skills more effectively, as sometimes it has just been experimental. This is a goal that I could take further into second year and perhaps adapt to suit my improvements.

Develop and vary my research skills

This is an area in which I feel I have greatly improved, learning the importance of primary research being a big factor in my improvement. It has allowed me to vary my outcome much more because I know what is needed from it.

Learn how to effectively collaborate

While this area could do with some improvement, I feel that I have come a long way from the first group project, particularly in how to evenly divide the work load and allocate different jobs to different members of the group.

Use Illustrator and Indesign more in my work

This is one of the goals that I feel I have reached in the short run. I have spent a lot of time over the year practising my software skills and attempting to apply them effectively. This has improved as I've been learning as a designer and understanding basic principles to apply to this field.

Improve on my presentation skills

While I have never been a nervous presenter, there is sometimes a rushed and disorganised element to my presentations, in terms of my speaking over what I'm presenting. I think I have improved marginally on this as I've stayed relaxed about presenting throughout the year, but it could still be improved with more practice.

Gain a more in depth understanding of the design industry

This has been somewhat achieved, I feel that my awareness of the industry and different areas within it have improved greatly, but I also think that I can never know enough about it to be a successful designer and should spend more time this year involving myself in it.

Use and apply design blogs to my research

This area is one in which I have improved a lot, and I have enjoyed browsing through design blogs a lot more since I learnt more about principles of design and have been able to identify good and bad design.

Gain an understanding of design principles

This is by far the area in which I have improved the most, coincidentally particularly in colour theory! Gaining an understanding of tints and shades has improved the standard of my work by a mile, as has the knowledge I gained in layout and editorial design, and since learning about it, I know consider it an area that I would be very interested in pursuing as a career.

Work on applying effective time management

This was always an area where I've struggled, and things are often left to the last minute. The perfect example is our first module submission in first year where I had allowed myself to get very behind and had to work double as hard as I otherwise would have. Since then, blogging and work progression in general has become second nature, and while I do occasionally slip up, the improvement in this area is so vast.

Gain a sense of enthusiasm and confidence in my own work

While I think I have achieved this in part, it may not be down to my overall enthusiasm or confidence but I have gained it because my work has improved so greatly. There are still many areas in which I need to improve but those I have been working on have enough to make me more proud of what I'm producing.

10 things I want to improve on in second year:

• I would still like to work on and improve my digital media skills
• Spend more time trying different print processes
• Spend more time producing hand rendered design
• Develop a knowledge and understanding of Dreamweaver and Aftereffects
• Improve knowledge of the design industry further, and try to become more involved in it
• Try to apply what skills I do have to more freelance work
• To collaborate effectively with other designers
• Improve on contextual knowledge of graphic design as this will aid my current work
• Finish work more professionally and spend more time perfecting it
• Experiment with determining a personal approach to graphic design

OUGD402 Evaluation

1.  What skills have you developed through this module and how effectively do you think you have applied them?

I have developed skills in recognising different aspects of both my own design and other peoples. As a result of gaining knowledge based on these areas I have been able to give and receive more informed criticism, which has really helped my work in the crits, and allowed me to have a lot more focus when it comes to my own design.

2. What approaches to/methods of design production have you developed and how have they informed your design development process?

I have altered the way in which I approach design in terms of time, and now know what part of the design process I need to spend more time on in order to produce an effective end product. I have learnt to get up early and work in the morning as it seems that this way I get plenty more donw without feeling like I've spent a whole day working.

3. What strengths can you identify in your work and how have/will you capitalise on these?

I have identified strengths in illustrative practice, something I haven't felt I've been able to do all year and plan on incorporating this into digital design, and merge the two together somehow, to create more mixed media designs.
After all of self-reflection exercises we have done this year, I have also come to feel much more comfortable in the analysis of my own work, being able to pick up on what needs improvement. This has helped me greatly in crits as I feel I have more understanding of the feedback I am receiving.

4. What weaknesses can you identify in your work and how will you address these in the future?

I can identify some weaknesses in covering all aspects of the possibilities of a brief before settling down on an idea, often meaning I settle for something early, and find later that there is plenty more I could have done with it. I plan on changing this by allotting time to design research and brainstorming and not allowing myself to finish earlier than that allotted time.
I have also identified a weakness in breaking out of my comfort zone, something I have been reluctant with all year, preventing me from experimenting. Over the summer I plan to experiment with print and letterpress in my time so that I don't feel I have something at stake when I do it.

5. Identify five things that you will do differently next time and what do you expect to gain from doing these?

1) Spend more time looking at design blogs, in a more casual manner, making design more of a part of my life than part of my degree.

2) Spend more time in the library - the internet is repetitive, unreliable and sometimes too current.

3) EXPERIMENT - screen printing, letterpress, embossing. Use this to help break out of my comfort zone in second year by using alternate production methods.

4) BLOG everything and keep up to date with it - blog immediately after sessions so the information is still fresh.

5) Look into applying for placements over the course of the summer and next year - don't be hesitant in contacting designers.

6.How would you grade yourself on the following areas: (please indicate using an ‘x’)  5= excellent, 4 = very good, 3 = good, 2 = average, 1 = poor
	1	2	3	4	5
Attendance			x
Punctuality			x
Motivation			x
Commitment				x
Quantity of work produced			x
Quality of work produced				x
Contribution to the group			x
The evaluation of your work is an important part of the assessment criteria and represents a percentage of the overall grade. It is essential that you give yourself enough time to complete your written evaluation fully and with appropriate depth and level of self-reflection. If you have any questions relating to the self evaluation process speak to a member of staff as soon as possible.

It's Up To You Evaluation

There are some elements of my promo pack which I am happy with and proud of, but other parts that I am not. While I quite like the varied themes within the promo pack, flickering between illustrative and infographic may not have benefited the end product as much as possible. I think the contents would show more partnership and consistency with each other if the whole pack followed a slightly stricter theme.

Of all things, I am least happy with the business cards. I feel as though I rushed it a lot to get them printed and finished, and although I did have the time, I perhaps didn't allocate it appropriately