Case Study Draft

PLACE - Mood Board

The biggest challenge I have when looking at portfolio websites is that oftentimes, the user experience is poor because of the amount of focus the designer has put into the user interface. I can appreciate a flashy website with a lot of moving pieces but I don’t think that there’s a place for them on a portfolio website unless it’s serving a purpose. For example, it might make sense for someone whose career is in uiux to show off what they can do, but something that’s been drilled into me as a design student is the concept of function over form.

When looking for a portfolio website that inspired me, I found that I leaned towards websites that used grids, that had a definite branded look (colour, style, etc) and that was easy to navigate.

Kate Moross is a bit of a hero of mine. (Kate goes by they/them) They’re a fantastic designer that has been in the business for over a decade and is based out of London. Their work is vibrant, stylized and unique. 

Their website neatly links to each piece and gives many examples of it in different lighting and with great photography. They lay out their involvement in the project in most cases and Kate’s site seems to update each year.

I really like the way Kate’s site is laid out because while they utilize a grid, it has a couple of quirks to it which stays true to their nature as a designer. Kate isn’t afraid to be themself on their own website and I think that’s important, as it was discussed in class, it’s vital to represent yourself truthfully.

I also really like how easy it is to navigate Kate’s website.

The sidebar is bright and easy to find and it pretty much takes you anywhere you might think to go. Kate also has an extensive background though with a lot more experience than I’ve had. They’re well known worldwide and even if you think you’ve never seen their stuff, you most likely have. While my portfolio will be smaller to start, I think a simple layout like this would be easier to keep building up.

Summary of takeaways for my own portfolio site:

Keep it simple, only use flashy stuff if it’s necessary. As a designer, I tend to lean towards a minimalistic approach so my website should reflect that.

Be honest. Don’t use language that you don’t mean when referring to yourself. 

Give users the information that they’re seeking with minimal effort. 

Try to use excellent photography and avoid unedited/poor quality imagery for the website. Reshoot if you have the time or use mockups for now. 

Explain what you did for each project so that people can understand what they’re looking at and why.

We’ve Got Shapes

So step one was to make some rough shapes on my ipad and then bring them into illustrator to make them into vectors. I tried to keep the style similar to the circle so that they would all match well and ended up with this:

Alright, not bad. You’ve got a square to promote balance, structure and in a more abstract sense, community and integrity. The circle represents wholeness, infinity, oneness. The triangle is known to be the strongest shape to build with as any weight placed on them is evenly distributed amongst the sides. Triangles also represent harmony.

Placing them in a line like this makes them look a little like building blocks, or children’s toys. The idea is that you can build Place into a space you need it to be.

Rough: verb.work or shape (something) in a rough, preliminary fashion."flat surfaces of wood are roughed down"

That’s a cool meaning and it applies well to Place because it’s supposed to be a space that you can make your own during use. 

Just to be sure, I also tried out smoothing out the shapes so that I could see whether a rough shape or a smooth shape would be better.

At this point, I’m still undecided. I feel like rough and smooth have very different meenings to me. I like the way the rough one looks because it feels more organic and handmade, which is the type of community I’m trying to promote and reach with place. I want Place to be like a community hub and don’t want it to come across too polished.

On the other hand, I want Place to still appeal to higher-end events as well, despite the playful atmosphere of the logo shapes. In that sense, I think the smoother shapes could do better. I also know that the smoother shape would shrink down easier, and probably be easier to work within the long run. That being said, I don’t think it’s necessary to choose one or the other. There may be opportunities to use both styles depending on the event. 

Competitor Analysis

My main competitor for Place is the Nanaimo Entertainment Centre. This is the only sort of location downtown that serves a similar purpose to what I’m going for with Place, even then, it isn’t quite the same. The Entertainment Centre is an old movie theatre that offers the use of the entire building for $500/24 hrs.

Unfortunately for me, the centre does not seem to have any actual branding and is sadly, a building that seems to be in disuse. When I walked through it, I felt this vast feeling inside me, nostalgia for a past I didn’t participate in and awe at the high ceilings. The place is a gem in the downtown core that gets overlooked because the building itself is in disrepair and it is not much to look at from the outside. With some proper branding and some money poured into it, I think it could be a good competitor for what I want Place to be. Still, the goal of the entertainment centre is to offer a rental location for various events in the community for a relatively cheap cost. 

Unfortunately, the competitor analysis for the group that I was in for class was far too different to be of use to me. My group was dealing with tour companies, a museum and a water taxi service so costs and branding were all over the place. My audience is also different as they are not tourists, but members of the community who I want to be tourists in their own city.

Learning about the Entertainment Centre only cemented my feeling that Place would be a good fit for Nanaimo.

Day Five - Blog Post #6

Today we got started on redesigning a package of our choice. It’s a project I was kind of looking forward to since I first saw my friends working on it two years ago!

I had two packages I wanted to work on at the start of conceptualizing. One of them was an easy choice, an over packaged, instant matcha tea satchet, four box extra, plastic wrapped disaster. 

The other, was a beautiful knife pushed inside a plastic cage.

Though I knew which one would be easiest for me, something about the knife called to me. I started to paint pictures in my head of what my package could be and I knew, in the end, that was the one that I wanted to do. 

I have started ideating and drawing thumbs but I think I know what I’m heading towards. I want my audience to really enjoy their experience of opening the package to reveal their tool, in the same excited way that a graphic designer might unwrap their gorgeous apple packaging to reveal a macbook. 

To a culinary student or worker, a pairing knife is the ultimate tool, like the macbook is to the graphic designer. Both are equally important, both give the same delight and ease of use.

Activity One - Blog Post #2

Activity One turned out to be a more fun challenge than I initially thought. I picked up a package that had a hole cut into it and when I unfolded it, I actually found that there were two holes! I was dreading trying to cut it. However, I decided not to worry about it too much and just enjoy the process.

I started out by tracing the package twice on tracing paper. I found I had to be careful with the tracing paper because it crinkled up easily when I used my eraser. I had trouble with tracing the entire package without it moving because it was too long for my hands. Eventually, I realized that if I folded it halfway, it was doable. 

After taking the measurements and making note of all the writing on the little package, I finally decided to draw it out with my ruler using the measurements that I had taken.

Before cutting it, I carefully used my bone tool to create folds in the package. It was actually really good to struggle with getting the same effect in class with a pen lid, only to do it so easy with the actual tool at home. Even so, my tool got a bit ruined by my ruler because it was only hard plastic so I’d like to find a better material to use in the future. 

I decided to opt out for drawing the fold marks, going off the measurements and bone fold lines instead. The hardest part was definitely trying to cut holes into the package and unfortunately, I didn’t do the best job at it. I need to figure out better tricks for cutting holes in the future. 

This time, I tried cutting a pie into the holes, hoping that I could cut them out section by section. This just resulted in a choppy cut.  

Still, it was a joyful experience to fold my little package up and understand just why each flap had to be different, and understand how it fit together. 

While I wasn’t entirely happy with the recreation, I was satisfied with the way it folded together and when I pushed the flaps together correctly, I knew some glue would keep the holes lined up. I decided to leave it unglued for further work in class as it held together perfectly otherwise. 

Reflection: Working with something tactile for the first time in a while was a joyful and happy experience. It reminded me what I love about graphic design, the simple happiness of making something that works. I need practice cutting holes too and I guess I’m going to need a steady supply of fresh blades in order to get through this semester and my fresh pad of bristol paper. 

Day 6 - Blog Post #7

Today, I brought in a sketch model and half of a mock-up. In class, I made the paper wrap-around for the box and made an insert for the inside to hold the knife in place. 

The lid will slide off of the package and I will seal it closed with a wax seal. This is to create an experience for my audience as well as make something truly beautiful. 

I really want the box to match the simple beauty of the knife, so what we’ve ended up with, is a fairly simply made box that will be joined together with wood glue and no nails to keep it in the Japanese style of wood joinery. I’ve also managed to find someone to help me make the box, which is excellent. We are using a nice, light spruce to create the box as that is what i could handle in my budget. 

The plan is to paint the lid with a beautiful Japanese illustration, a big feat. Everyone knows that I’m not an artist but I also know that if I put my mind to it, I can do it.

After some consideration with Nancy, I’ve decided on using wax paper for the informational insert that will go inside. This is to further the experience of the user. I just need to find out where to get it printed! 

I also started my digital file today. The only things that will truly be made on the computer are the paper wrap-around and the insert. Everything else will be made by hand.

My take away from this week is that sometimes I just need to get my hands going! I really had trouble starting this week for some reason, but once I got going, I got super into what I was doing. I enjoyed the simple happiness of creating.

DT: Secondary Research

So last time I posted about this, you know, before the world was ending, I was talking about the importance of coffee valves in a bag of coffee beans to keep the bag from exploding from the buildup of gasses. The valve allows carbon dioxide from the beans to escape, making it necessary. The problem with this, is that means it’s one of the things that makes a coffee bag not entirely compostable. So I was looking into that in particular and found that there’s a company called TricorBraun Flex that is working on a sustainable bag line called Biotrē that currently has a 60% compostable coffee bag and is working on a 100% compostable bag, so that’s great for the future of coffee. 

On that note, we researched what’s already out there for improving the coffee making process and I found it interesting that despite how old coffee is and the multitude of different ways of brewing it, most cultures have a certain way of doing it and have predominantly stuck to their methods and tools through history. Of course things have updated as technology evolved but there’s definitely been an ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ approach to at home brewing or, people have developed their own methods.

Of course, there are many influential coffee shops and brew masters out there, even on the west coast, that are constantly developing new methods and shortcuts that often make their way to the home via baristas but we’ve yet to see a significant, single method in coffee brewing. 

The reason for this is that brewing is a very personal, particular thing. People like their coffee a certain way and everyone stores it, grinds it and prepares it differently. Still, I did find some neat little things that have been introduced to the brewing world in the last century!

I mainly looked at spoons when doing my secondary research and really enjoyed this concept:

Using the spoon as a clip as well to keep the coffee bag closed is a neat idea because the spoon would always be around for measuring and the bag gets closed, meaning the coffee keeps fresh for longer.

Alternatively, a coffee scoop with a sliding lid could help when scooping coffee. This is a picture of one used for medicine. 

Another cool thing is that there are a few drip coffee makers out there that actually grind the beans for you. It’s a no mess method because it also portions out the beans, making a pot of coffee is just keeping the water tank full and clicking a button.

DAY ELEVEN - BLOG POST #13

Today we met with our client for the first time since our initial meeting two weeks ago! We also had a visit from Gord Wright, a Hemlock Printer rep. He had a lot to tell us about the printing process and he was very informative. 

With that though, I realized that the seed paper that I was so attached to might not be the right way to go. The problem with seed paper is how moisture effects it. Grocery stores and the Goodlife Juice store may not be a great environment moisture-wise for that. Then, there’s also the seeds that are used and whether or not they are native to BC. If the seed in the paper is an invasive species, that would not be great for our environment. 

Oh well, kill your darlings.

My client liked the box with the pour spout best out of the ideas I showed her but then we realized that the granola will probably be packaged inside a plastic bag inside the box to keep it dry. I’m wondering if I can come up with a solution for this, like a tearaway that’s attached to the bag and box so that when you pull the spout out, the bag is torn open. I’m not sure how this will work, but I’d like to give it a try.

If that doesn’t work, I’m also thinking of just cutting a corner of the top of the box out so that when it’s on the shelf, the bag can be seen. The user can then just tear the bag open without even having to open the box and reseal it with a clip.

I guess I’ll have to try both of these things.

Rough Rationales Blog Post #5A

Project Title: The Nav

The Challenge:

A new visual identity for an 8 issue annual student magazine that should have a new energy but must be recognizable as The Nav.

Should appeal to and embody the whole student body.

Need to be able to leave the magazine layout to the design team with the confidence that they can do it.

Redesigning my own design from the previous year.

The Approach:

Pull it back and give it a cleaner look from the previous year while still maintaining the personality within.

New set of standards and styles

What I did:

Art director

delegated layout, gave standards and rules

Initial design and layout of mag

coordinated a new printer and rules for mag layout

Notes:

Figure out which Nav to focus on, most likely most recent.

Highlight the leadership role.

Project Title: Balanced

The Challenge:

Overwork is a social stigma that promotes an unhealthy lifestyle.

I wanted to change the way that people thought of overworking and give them tools to change their relationship with work/life balance.

Create something usable that could be integrated easily into a busy lifestyle.

The Approach:

Not trying to be a fix-all but guide the user to make healthier choices by offering an integrated scheduling system. 

An ecosystem that learns about the user through use.

What I did:

I created a web app, mobile app, smart speaker (ish), smart watch ecosystem that could be applied to all aspects of life. 

Ish - an ai that learns about the user through conversation and gives helpful tips on a healthier work/life balance.

Brand identity.

Research.

Art Direction

Notes:

Clarity!

Explain this project to someone who has never seen it outside of class.

Project Title: Fox & Koi

The Challenge:

Last year, I realized that I needed a way to reconnect with my passion for graphic design and push myself to create outside of class work. I’ve always loved enamel pins and so along with a business partner, I began an enamel pin shop.

The Approach:

A pin business is a lot more than just drawing pins, there’s a lot that goes into it including the business side of it, like speaking to manufacturers and suppliers, understanding costs, creating a website and a presence in the online world and community.

What I Did:

I run the business side of fox & koi. I speak to the manufacturers, find new manufacturers, coordinate locations and markets for selling the pins, create the websites, package the pins, do the marketing and I also design pins, stickers and prints.

Notes: 

Put focus on leadership roles.

Explain more about the pin process?