Posts tagged Advertising Design
The Difficult Concept
Jan 14th
I have heard that when you work for a large design agency or ad agency, that your role as a designer tends to be more clearly defined. They have copywriters and editors and a plethora of other job roles to cover an advertising concept, leaving the design part to you, as the graphic designer.
However, when you work for yourself you tend to be more open to taking on a much broader view, especially during the time when you are trying to win new clientele and taking on the smaller enterprise market. It can be quite a challenge stretching yourself to come up with the catchy headline, the witty tagline, when it’s a product that you are unfamiliar with.
Well then, just like Helen Hunt did as Darcy Maguire in “What Women Want” starring alongside Mel Gibson at the fictitious agency Sloane Curtis, when she handed her execs a bunch of products and told them to test them out in order to be able to better brainstorm ideas.
What if your client is a local spa, and they’ve retained you as their advertising designer of choice, and they come to you with their new offering, which involves a facial, a manicure and pedicure, followed by an earth shatteringly brilliant colon cleanse?
Then they invite you try the package in order to better understand and brainstorm their ad campaign.
What do you do?
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Look to The Masters For Inspiration
Aug 2nd
One of my favourite websites at the moment, is Smashing Magazine. They are part techie, part designer, and just about everything they talk about I find absolutely fascinating, and very inspirational.
Today they did a post about the Bauhaus school of thought.
It took me RIGHT back to high school art class when I first studied the movement.
I felt the rush of excitement and pure pleasure at seeing some of the designs in front of me again. The image is clickable if you’d like to go and read it for yourself. They also talk about Kandinsky, Klee and a few other painters you may be familiar with if you’re an arto like myself.
It was a great reminder to me to always look to the masters when needing inspiration, refreshment and motivation. One should always seek advice and guidance from ‘those in the know’.
If you want to buy a new car, consult an expert, watch Top Gear, read a motoring magazine. If you want to lose weight, see a doctor, read a fat burner review or take a pill.
Consult those in the know.
It’s a good lesson.
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Flyer Design: For a Video Production Company: Phase Three
Jul 9th
This Flyer Design project has certainly been very interesting, and has made me feel like I’m really continuously learning from the process. One can become set in ones ways and ones own tastes very quickly, and yet, it can be so liberating at the same time, with advertising design, to just LET GO and let the design take you where it wants to take you. You end up trying things you would have been hesitant try before, and then, better yet, end up really pleased with the results!
When designing flyers, you have to remember the purpose of the flyer and keep it central to your design process. It is after all advertising design, and it’s purpose is to increase the business of the person that you are designing the flyer for.
Here are the two most recent samples, that were shown to this client, I’ve since received feedback, and know where we will be going with the final piece, but since I don’t want anyone to miss out on ‘the graphic design process’, I’m going to show you all the pieces in order, until I finish the last one, and post it here in it’s complete form.
If you want to view this project from it’s outset, follow these links for Phase One, and Phase Two to view the flyers as they’ve gone through the process.
From here, we’ve taken a more direct view of the still images (from the clients portfolio of work) and put them into shiny metallic buttons. This is in keeping with the clients desire for a sleek/chrome and rich texture. It’s helped to unify the images as a whole, and yet, make them stand out at the same time.
This second version below, we removed the large call to action (call bejamin, matthew or thembisa) and played around with the font sizing slightly. Less being more in this case. We also added some more images from the clients portfolio in order to make a final selection for the final draft.
See below:
I’m due to send out one more proof on this, to the client, then I’m off to the shops to get a heart pendant necklace by the time I’m back later, it should be feedback time and the production of final draft. Designs for advertising and marketing purposes must ultimately lead to increased business for the client, so it has to be absolutely perfect, as with any other graphic design project. If it’s the first thing a potential new client sees, then it had better grab their attention, be clear about what the business offers, and have enough clear information to warrant futher investigation by the potential client.
I will be posting the final draft as soon as it has client approval, and then moving onto my next project which is a logo design for an equine shiatsu therapist – which is going to be super, super exciting!
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Flyer Design: For a Video Production Company: Phase Two
Jun 29th
This post is a direct follow up to this post about flyer design, so that you can follow the development of the flyers’ design as a work in progress.
Feedback from the original design was that the fonts were not working. The adjustments to the brief indicated that the preferred development style for the client should reflect a chrome/metal/sexy vibe against a backdrop of plush, gentlemans club type texture. For awhile I mulled over these two concepts, and wondered how to bring them together. It was hard to move past the immediate images that sprang to mind with the theme gentlmans club, and I had to try hard to clear my mind of all the cigar smoke, wood panelling and worn leather wingback chairs imagery that kept wafting to the forefront of my consciousness.
As is usally the case with my design style, I find it best to just jump right in and start designing, and then let the design take me where it wants to go.
I then save my images in various stages of completion, go back to an earlier saved version and then take the design in another direction. In this case, I repeated the action a second time, ending up with three samples to present to the client. This client is on the other side of the planet – so naturally the designs were sent by email.
Here are the three working samples currently:
I changed the background image texture, to this one, which was supplied by the client, and introduced a molten metal/chrome type globule at the top. The still images were removed from the original flyer sample in favour of this simplified version.
The second sample looked like so:
The metal globule from the above sample, was transformed into a frame, to neaten the overall look and feel. The logo and company name were placed top centre, to make it the focal point of the flyer, and coupled with the spotlight effect (black radial gradient applied to the background ‘red carpet’ texture added to the focal point.
The last sample was a departure from the above two (it’s usually good practice to just go with it, at least once, because you never know where you’re creativity will take you sometimes, and it’s often in a new, fresh direction which may or may not pay off).
Here I revisited the still image concept (taken from one of the clients corporate videos). Using the most captivating of the three images the client supplied, I echoed the blue orbs of the still, by introducing faded red bokeh type orbs over the texture, which iteself was played down by applying a black background, and lowering the opacity of the texture.
The red orbs are meant to recall the blurry look of lights in the distance. A pure chrome finish was applied to the contact details and as a frame backing to the still image.
Still awaiting client feedback on this one.
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Flyer Design: For a Video Production Company
Jun 19th
I have been working on an exciting project for a video production company. They’re an exciting up and coming (and in fact already award winning) company of young and excellent directors and producers who produce everything from corporate videos to music videos and short/full length motion pictures.
You can visit their website by clicking on the first draft of the marketing and promotional flyer that I’m designing for them below. They’re definitely a company to keep an eye on. I’m really enjoying the project too, as it’s developing my design style beyond the ordinary.
If you do visit their website, then please tell ‘em I sent ‘cha okay?
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Graphic Design in Pharamceuticals
Jun 10th
Another area in which one finds graphic design, is pharmaceuticals! It’s an area of advertising design (okay, theoretically it’s packaging design). It is an area of the market that I find absolutely fascinating. I mean, when it comes to paediatric medicines one has to be careful so as to make the packaging attractive, and child-related, without making it SO attractive to children that they are reaching for the medicines like candy.
Just this morning I was reading a liporexall review, and it occurred to me…with the plethora of diet pills available on the market today – if faced with a client looking to market their new diet product, how do we, as graphic designers make it memorable, attractive and eye-catching – and of course totally unique?
*That* is a good question to ponder, while I tackle the 24 simultaneous projects that I have going right now!
Man I love this business!
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Graphic Design Jobs Are Everywhere
Jun 5th
Until I started graphic design, I really did not understand the incredible scope and broad applications that graphic design touches.
It literally touches nearly every single part of our lives.
Not just advertising, and corporate ID which are the more mainstream, well known applications, but what about the exciting world of product packaging, or television, or well, don’t even get me started on the internet, it really is a world of opportunity!
Yesterday I opened a new bag of disposable diapers and upon seeing the Elmo and Sesame Street cast of characters as an update to the more regular Winnie The Pooh variety, it dawned on me just how big a field of application, the world of graphic design has.
You can work practically *anywhere* and in any industry. So there should always be jobs for graphic designers, and just about everywhere around the globe.
How exciting!
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Design Work and New Directions
May 20th
As designers we love our work. It’s rare that we work on designs that we do not like, because we all have personal style, that is reflected in our work, regardless of what our clients want. The trick is to find that common ground with your client between what they think they want, what you know is best, and what works for them, and what looks best to you. Does that make sense to you?
Sometimes though we need to be able to drop what we’re doing, and go in a completely different direction if something is not working out right. I’m working on a particular project at the moment which is setting up a website (blog format) for a local printing company. The work has primarily consisted of optimizing an already established blog design, and tweaking it to meet the clients expectations.
The beauty of using the blog format is that we can upload and work on the content, and *then* tweak the design bits and pieces, without losing the content if we suddenly go off in a new direction. Which is what I found myself doing just yesterday. I’d been struggling with a blog header for this site for awhile, and getting it to fit properly, and get all the other elements to work together nicely. So I decided to take the plunge and stick in a fresh new template that I found whilst trawling the internet, and go for broke.
Sometime during the day after I installed the new template, and began to optimize it with customized headers and buttons etc, I got an email from the client, saying “I like what I see!”, so even though it was virtually a whole new look and feel, and it had been a leap of faith for me, it was clearly a step in the right direction, and ultimately a good decision.
Several emails followed with suggestions from the client, and I tweaked and made changes where they were requested, and it turned into a very productive afternoon. I worked from home, the client was at the office, and we had a perfectly do-able collaboration without so much as a phone call to one another.
So, lesson learned. If you hit a brick wall, with a design, take it as a sign to take the plunge let go of your initial work, and go in a totally new design direction, because the chances are that it will be a great decision and work out for the best.
Here is where the header from my last post (with the photo, and the mountain) has gone to. It’s totally different, but it works.
Now, one of the key design brief notes was that the business owners face had to be featured prominantly on the website. So when I went off in a new direction, I could not simply ignore that instruction, but I had to find a way to work around it. So I introduced a profile box on the right hand sidebar. Like so:
The reason for the prominence of the business owners profile is simply because she has been successful in the local printing industry for 20 years and her name is synonymous with integrity and great service in her business. To *not* have it there would have put the website at an immediate disadvantage, so it was imperative to make it a feature.
Beyond the clickable image, in otherwords linked to the profile box, is the story of how she originally came from Zimbabwe, (then known as Rhodesia), and grew her business from scratch, relying on sheer grit and determination to be successful.
I chose the textured paper look, and the ‘American Typewriter’ font type to give the profile box that retro printing look, a bit like an old newspaper. The story of her rise in business is actually taken from an article written about her a few years ago, so it all fits together beautifully.
Lower down the page, I’m using the ad-space slots provided in the template, for a completely different function entirely – to showcase the other members of her team.
This is one of the wonderful things about using the blog format for web design, because there are just SO many possibilities and opportunities to be creative!
Right enough talk, time for action, and it’s back to the grindstone!
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Simple, Clean, Elegant Blog Headers
May 9th
Here is the last in the series of blog headers that I’ve been doing for a fellow blogger.
To recap, here is the progression of development…
We went with the basic idea of a navy blue, and orange, to fit in with her blogs current template. The instructions were to produce an 800×150px blog header that was clean, simple, not too girly, a bit edgey.
We headed off in a slightly more artistic vibe here with the paint splash, and a bolder title.
We decided to bring back the header to a less bold, slightly more feminine font, return to the orginal orange brief, and retain a sense of edginess by using a cosmic-type graphic in the background, adding depth to the header.
Because I like to throw out a ‘what if’ to my clients to expand their initial brief, and provide them with options, I developed this whilst busy also developing her specified brief. While it was well received, the ‘Bond Girls’ were deemed a tad too s3xy for this mom of three.
So we head back to the original navy and orange, and we introduce her tagline. However in this particular version, the web colours were a bit too pink, so I went and designed some more! I’m definitely doing the right job, because I actually like it when I get to carry on with a project.
So I scaled back completely, brought the header back to the navy, orange and black brief, and went for bold graphics on the left, with the clients font of choice on the right, and included the tagline.
At this stage it looks as though this blog header is the winner, although my personal opinion (which is irrelavant here, I know, but still) leans towards the one at the very top. Although I must say, I really like all of them, and would use various versions of these on my own blogs.
What do you guys think? Which one is your favourite?
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It's All About Branding!
May 8th
Yes, it’s all about the branding these days!
I saw two atrocious examples of branding today, while I was in the car, on the hour long school run in the morning. The first was sign writing on a car, which read, “Personal Branding Specialists” and the letters were all squonky (“Squonky” of course is a word specific to the graphic design world, meaning something akin to, say, Craptastic, or the opposite of ’straight’), and the squonky lettering was followed by a random logo, which was completely indiscernable, and worse, repeated three times, in various hues. It was totally an advert, which said, Whatever you do, don’t waste your money on these people!
The second example of bad branding, was an banner advertisement, at a traffic light, for a printing shop. One of the first things on their poster that they were advertising, was banners. This may have been the worst banner I’ve seen in months. The text, logo, and image were *all* over the place, and then some random graphic, of a cat, with enlarged eyeballs bang in the middle of the banner.
What the *heck* for? What does the cat have to do with anything? It’s not even as though they were offering some kind of special, which would go a small way towards explaining the cats enlarged eyeballs. But nothing. Yikes. Remind me to not use their services. Ever.
So what do you do, when it comes to branding?
You use your brain.
You consult with a professional.
When you need graphic design, you hire a graphic designer, you don’t hire a plumber. Of course if you need a plumber, don’t go hiring a lawyer. Use-your-brain.
Here’s an example of super cute, and functional branding.
Yes I’m talking about custom tote bags! These should be on every corporate and small business shopping list. They can be used as give aways to clients, gifts for staff, but either way, *everybody* can use one. With the war on plastic shopping bags being won, and the environment standing to benefit from this everybody should be toting around their gear in these.
That makes good branding sense.
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