Jimmy Smith FMP: June 2009

¬My original statement of intent focused on typographic based communication in the fields of editorial design, type design, web design, moving image and interactive media. It was my love for typography, shaping, styling, and manipulating letterforms that steered me in this direction. This is something that still stands today. Something else that has still stood is the way I develop work. In the original SOI it stated that I would work in two ways, one being to show my skills on a professional practice basis, skills that would potentially get me a first job. Secondly there was a much more experimental, almost personal approach that had more concern with building character into the alphabet to make engaging typography. What I have learnt now is that these two work in harmony. The less controlled type design approach is given a form of context through the ways in which it is executed through. This has potential to be across print and digital.

It was important for me to cover both print and digital forms of communication. I came to this conclusion through understanding where design and advertising is moving, but also by talking to people on work placements. It is only now that I realise I always favour print. However I am still conscious of digital, which is evident in the advance level software workshops I have completed, these being in Dreamweaver and Flash. There were small parts in the E numbers and football hooligan promotion that documented this, plus my website which has been built on Dreamweaver. So even though the digital has not featured heavily in my work I still feel it is a part of what I can do. A point made in my SOI was to be well rounded in terms of software and application to various media channels, and this is something I achieved by incorporating the workshops.

The approach to designing and thinking towards an outcome has changed dramatically. Prior to the final major project I was less concerned with researching and finding out. I was much more interested in designing. It was only when I started to think more about what I wanted to achieve with my work, rather than diving straight in, that the work became more interesting. A great example of this was with the E Numbers brief. It wasn’t until I did the research that I could inform myself of the materials I had to work with. It was the finding out of what is in some foods that became the starting point of styling the typography. This researching and finding out needs to become fundamental to future practice. Not just for a given brief, but in general. Within editorial design it is important to understand where the font originated, this way conscious decisions can be made. I am not trained within true typography design, which is why it is vital to know what and where a font was made for.

Another approach change has been within the designing process. The designing and evaluating have become two separate things rather than going on at the same time. This allows the work to become more experimental in it’s approach. Its then after when you have a wide range of possibilities that you can think what is and is not working and for what reasons. An example of this was with the layout of the football violence publication. I would produce 30-50 spreads, print them out in a booklet and then see which ones were responding conceptually to the brief but also fundamentally to typography.

A major influence on the final major project has been the design context. It is only now that I am learning and continuing to do so, about the areas I wish to work among. It was the research into editorial design that continued to add to my bag of questions when working with type. Previous to researching editorial I was too naive to think that everything should be designed with huge white spaces, tidy type set to a corner e.t.c. However when working on the 5-A-Day Recipe book and the Football Violence publication I was trying to make each page interesting, rather than being generic. This was various parts stand out to the viewer with the aim to engage with the pages oppose to just flicking through. An example within the 5-A-Day publication was the layout of the recipes. I used an order of 3 to a double spread, some large and some small. The idea being the small ones would seem easier and the larger more challenging. The reader then appears to have that choice. This process was also though about with the Graphic Design Yearbook, using the same grid but having a rhythm sheet that broke the visual order of the publication up. This was important, as not to bore the reader with the same page after page.

Time management. This will be the one thing I continue to keep up with. When I get the balance of planning and doing I am clear about my objectives. I think the balance comes with how long I actually plan for and in what detail. Giving a specific allocation to how long I should spend on a brief, start to finish is fine. It is the hour-by-hour planning I cannot arrange and manage. There is an element of the unplanned with my experimental type work that I cannot stick to within a timetable. On the contrary, this has all been in a college environment. Working freelance, when having to give a price for a specific deadline then time management and budgeting will be essential. I hope in this case I don’t feel too pressures to produce and in turn loose the creativity. This is something that will only come with experience.

To summarise the final major project module has informed how I want to function. It is only now, within the past couple of weeks that I am realising the strengths and pitfalls in my work. I can only hope that the way I work is suitable to an agency. One of the main things for me is to keep on learning. The design context got me excited about design, the finding out of how people work and how their methods conflict with others. It is only myself that can start to test these now, wherever that may be.

To continuity within the publication we decided to shoot peoples work over two days. This also added to the aesthetic of the yearbook. Rather than single flat images making for a generic page, the photography allowed for a fresh appeal throughout the pages. This potentially gets people to look through all the work rather than getting bored of a continuous layout.

After the two days we met with Lorenzo to discuss the best potential for each image. This was based around cropping and highlight/shadow manipulation.

It was at this stage we realised that photographic on a white background was not the best option. For future reference it would be more appropriate to have options to suite the varied amount of work coming in.