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Evaluation

This was my final project at University and it was a challenge. It was a challenge because I wanted to push my self as much as possible to see what I can achieve, and unlike previous I didnt want to design stuff just for the sake of designing it and wanted to have a purpose. I think coming up with 5 briefs was a challenge in its self because alot of people had live work or friends/family that wanted designs doing so they used them, I didnt have any so I had to think of some on my own, But then decided to do the live briefs that university gave us so I wasnt thinking too long for  brief when I could get on straight away with designing

I think this is the first time I have focused on all learning outcomes and tried my hardest to get them to a high standard and tried to focus on all of them instead of previous where I only do a hand full.

First my research I took further by doing primary research first and finding things out myself and then finding what other people had found/done and observed. By going round Birmingham to research the places I could have googled them , but I decided to go round myself and too see what I could notice, then looking at google to further my research. I also did the same with the beer brief by going to different pubs and looking at menus, tasting different beers to see the flavours. I also went to a few museums with Katie to get inspiration and not just look at the one item too look at loads and get ideas from there. 

I did development in all my briefs but I think it mostly comes from my thirty day logo challenge. Doing this helped me get my logos faster and better quailty. I used to hate doing logos because I could never think of an idea, But doing this challenge really helped me and made me more confident in designs. I can know get ideas alot quicker and some logos didnt take that long to make. The development was important for this because I had some ideas to start off but when designing they werent the best ideas. So I had to go different tracks, With this brief I was trying to be alot more open minded to start off . So open to every single idea and then narrow it down to a final, Instead normally thinking of one idea and going down that path the whole way.  I also made myself design them that day and upload them on to Instagram on the same day, This made me have to do these in a day and I couldnt have one day where I couldnt be bothered to do it and lose motivation. This kept my motivation going to do this brief, the fact I got quite few followers/likes when doing this it made me feel really good about myself. I dont normally like my work because I just didnt think it looked that good. I can proudly say I love these briefs and doing this challenge has made me a lot better at illustrator, Before I didnt know how to colour in on there or even check that the lines werent sticking out of the vector. I used to colour in photoshop making it really blurry and lose quality. I’m glad I have learnt how to do it properly and I didnt even use photoshop at all for this project. All in illustrator so I think thats a good thing. 

Another project that boosted my confidence and got me out there a little bit was Gallery 1988. I liked the sound of the brief and I wanted to try it, I didnt think my work would have actually been selected to go in La. I was really pleased. I thought out of the box  ( or on the box if you like) Also it being sold and someone messaging asking if they can have one really made me feel proud of my work. I was in doubt my work wasnt good enough but the fact people wanted to buy it makes me more confident in my work 

The thingI would have changed if redid all these briefs is I wish I could have done more collaboration pieces as I only did a bit of one and also wish I got the ideas alot sooner so I could focus longer on making the briefs bigger and look better on my portfolio. I also wish I could have finished the video and maybe do the whole app for gradient as it was fun making it but the time I had was impossible to do every single page.

But I have had experience selling my work, working with customers and other designers and also push myself to work in a limited time zone ready for when I am in a design business and they need a design doing in a day or less so I would say I have prepared myself for the real design would. I also have used indesign for the first time and I am very confident using it so that is all good. I feel this work is probably my best work and I have worked the hardest to achieve these goals. 

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Here is the final ad I did but this wasnt the main focus on the brief just a little something extra to show. I made it slower and less was going on, but I feel if i had more time I could have done it properly and slowed down and made it make more sense to people who are watching it and also I would think about where the advert is being shown 

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Gradient Videos

Youtube wouldnt let me link all the videos. But here are some with a few changes. I also deleted some of the animations and some of the text to see how that would but wont let me show them but only subtle changes. However I can upload the final one I had in the end due to time running out. 

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I tried to slow this down but didnt seem to work. also the song is out of time at the start.

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Gradient Video 1

I knew what I wanted to do with the ad, I wanted the boxes to come in to a song and just have a few words about it. I thought this was far too fast and alot going on but I knew I wanted something like this

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This is the final app concept to show Joe, I taught Ollie how to use XD and how to prototype and animate the app. He enjoyed doing this and I enjoyed teaching him. We decided to keep it simple with animations and decided to go from sign in page to the checkout. The checkout goes back grey because I thought if it was too colourful people might not want to look at it and it would put them off. So I went back to greys and greens just to make it stand out. I really like this final outcome there is a lot of work that could happen to it like some of the pages did move around when changed colour which I noticed when playing it but only slighty and I knew I was looking at it but I think if you didnt it wouldnt be a big deal. I took a screen shot on all the pages that I had made, and when you are looking this is just being able to buy one top so doing the whole app was very optimist of me. But now I want to try and do an advert for the boxes. Joe said doesnt matter if not because hes in no rush for that, he just wanted the logo. But I will give it ago.  

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App development

Here is the Sign up page still going with the grey feel towards it but added a slight of colour. I think next post is going to be the full app because the pages were all the same process and I feel I am saying the same thing over and over, and also it gives you a bit of surprise because you dont know how the final is going to look. 

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Homepage development

I thought the app needed a sign up / sign in page as all the apps I looked at included them so you can get offers etc . But I knew the homepage was very colourful so I tried having the first page to have no colour and then each page adds abit more and well GRADually gets more colourful. a little hidden message I thought would be quite quirky because no one would realise it, and also a double meaning on the word GRAD which I thought was clever. This page I thought looked really professional and just all stood out.

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App Development

I changed all the boxes to rectangles and it looked so much better. I also spoke to Joe and said why dont we have the boxes as a coming soon feature to get people excited, a bit like a movie. They dont just release the movie if they want people to go watch it, They also release a trailer for it, So we decided to have it as a feature coming soon and maybe a trailer could be made for it as wlel to try and promote it.  

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App page Development

 I liked the colours I used fro the tees, so I thought I could do something with it for the homepage I thought of different styles of tops to show a variety. I also made sure the colours wear similar with bright vibrant colours and also really fitting because it is a gradient of colours and its called a gradient so it all fits. I did the picture in the background and faded slightly like the research I did. just to show how it would look or what the item is. I feel the icons at top were abit too small so I need to change that, I also wasnt sure if I wanted them all to be the same size boxes or if I liked this spilt up. I will try both to see.  

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I sorted out the tee shirt page and added a load of different designs to them, Even ones that would be included in the box package that I did. I think being able to see the model wearing it and the tee shirt on its own helps because it shows how it fits but sometimes the model my by standing funny or weird so helps when it is on its own. I sorted so all the boxes were all level, and also changed the size of the arrow so was easier to see and clickable. Time to go back onto the home page and I also want to do the checkout page as well. 

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PRINT SCREEN

Olly said that his dad works in the screen printing business and does tee shirt designs for a living and said it would be good if we got the T shirts actually printed. I emailed him and he said thats fine he can do it, So I got a plain tee shirt and sent that over and the logo and he got it printed. It came out so nice I really liked how it came out.   I also got a sticker printed of the logo as well just a nice touch. 

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Tee Shirt Development

I changed the app abit and made the description abit bigger so it is easier to read and made sure everything is level and I also made sure that when you go through the other pages it is all in the same position so it doesnt move around when you click through and just runs smoothly .

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T shirt App

I did the same with the logo but bigger on the t shirts and did the same like I did with the other and did all the keyframing. This took a while to do and now I am on 140 boards just for two t shirts. I am deciding it would be better to do a start to end app and then if i have time to go and add extra pages just because my laptop might crash and that is the last thing I would need. 

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Here is the animation showing all the colours and sizes working together. 

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T shirt Page App  Development

Here I did what I wanted the page to look like once you selected on the t shirt. I wanted to keep it real simple, And from my research I made sure to include a like button, a description, A variety of colours and an easy way to show sizes. Also the price is readable and clear. I liked the simple look.  I decided I wanted to really showcase this so I did all the colours (10) of each top, not only that but I also made every page with different sizes . I then also wireframed them all so like the page before you can click on every single option. I thought maybe it would be really impressive if I did the whole app and have every single option clickable from start to end and maybe could been shown at the Gradshow as an interactive piece. Just for the one top it was me of 70 boards so if I was doing the app it may take a long time, But I was willing to try.