Start of Year Presentation

Me as a Designer

I've realised that design isn't as relaxed an environment as I'd have thought it was going to be, as I was expecting people to be more relaxed given that they're meant to be enjoying their work, but it seems that people are a lot more enthusiastic about design than I am. I also never realised just how much attention and time the commercial side of design needed to be considered.

My main interests are Packaging and App Design, but I don't particularly want to be solely working in these fields, as the prospect of variation and doing something different every few weeks was what attracted me to design in the first place.

CoP 3

Last year I looked at the ethics of fear and guilt and charity advertising, and ended up bashing the First Things First Manifesto a bit, got really into it, and struggled to fit everything in that I wanted to say, so this year gives me a much bigger opportunity to write something meaningful than last year.

I ended up accidentally stumbling across Nietzsche towards the back end of last year, got really intrigued about his thoughts, and after reading his books I found the difference between his thoughts and most philosophy and morality to be interesting, specifically his criticisms of Christianity, which is the base of Western society and established the values that First Things First abides by, so this is what I chose to look at.

Summer Progress

I've read a few of Nietzsche's books this summer, as well as books about him, and books by similar philosophers, YouTube videos and interviews about him, even a film based on one of his theories, so I've made a solid start to CoP.

PPP

Nietzsche's philosophies and thoughts generally advocate individual achievement and self fulfilment, and following your own mind to make decisions about right and wrong. To work in such a way would satisfy these thoughts would require a large amount of Networking, something which has been close to non-existing in my PPP so far.

Last year PPP really helped improve me attitude towards uni and the industry, but even after putting a considerable amount more effort in than first year, my branding was still a but disappointing. I also hope to find a placement that will confirm to me that I do still want to work in this industry.

SquareOne Design

Working in the industry was something I dabbled in over summer, I went to SquareOne Design in Sheffield for a week and worked on a live brief with/for them. I did enjoy this, but finding another studio I enjoy working in will assure me more that I'm going to enjoy working in design.

Level 6 In General

Enjoyment is something I want to focus on in general this year. Given that it's my last year I want to enjoy it rather than labouring through it like I did in first year. I'm going to do this by taking on briefs that I know I'm going to enjoy because I want to enjoy every brief. I'm also determined to continue putting as much time into CoP as I currently am, and to keep improving my commitment to PPP.

Me Before I Was A Designer

To ensure that I picked subjects for briefs that I know I'm going to enjoy working on, I looked back at the summer brief I did before coming to uni, as I based it on things I enjoyed doing. This was the last time my life wasn't completely dictated by the pace of uni work, so seemed like a good place to look.

Self-Directed & Collaborative Briefs

The main briefs I want to do are the Pantone brief from last years D&AD, which I never got round to doing last year, re-design the website for the Cesar Manrique Foundation, an artist and architect from the Canary Islands who was one of my main inspirations for getting into design in the first place, do and augmented campaign for Top Gear or Amazon Prime's new equivalent, and look at re-designing football program covers.

Live and Competition Briefs

In terms of live briefs, it obviously depends on what becomes available and what's realistic, but I've been in contact with some students from Reading University who developed a pen that makes it easier for people with Parkinson's disease to write, and I hope to be able to do something useful for them. This is important to me as it was a problem my late grandad struggled with heavily in his later years. I've also been speaking to a friend at Bristol Institute of Modern Music about what her course requires in terms of professionalism, and so this may lead to me doing something for her.

Given my interest in packaging, Starpack is probably the main competition I'm going to be keeping an eye on, but some of the D&AD and YCN briefs that involve marketing a product at a new audience are interesting too, something Jamie and I did last year with WWF.

Summary

So in short, my CoP will be looking at how the effects of a self-fulfilling approach to graphic design will differ from the traditional idea of "ethical" design, and this is going to be reflected in my Extended Practice by me only taking on briefs that I'm interested in wherever possible.

My PPP will be focussed on developing branding as a freelance designer, or someone looking for a part-time job in design, as this is what will be necessary for me to work in this way in the industry, unless I end up working in-house for a company in an area of my interest, which is probably the perfect way for me to work.