22nd May - Wrote blog post and adjusted the code of the image to make it responsive and work on mobile devices,
27th May - Made some amends to the layout and text of a GGS E shot
28th - Created artwork for a Monsoon banner for Saxon Air
29th - Amended some business card artwork for Success Management and sent the AW to print.
30th - Did some cut outs of Kingsland Engineering company machinery and placed on a white background.
2nd June - Did more cut outs for Kingsland and also amended the E shot I had been working on.
3rd - Finished E shot and then sat with web designer and learnt how to build it online.
4th - Made some amends to a GGS D400 exhibition stand - balanced out the images and tweaked the layout.
9th - Amended the CNS school prospectus
10th - Continued working on CNS prospectus
11th - Made artwork for Country Cottage D Dodds and Sons, Monsoon and outdoors banners for Royal Norfolk show. Also sent the AW to print.
12th - Put a quote together for Open Door PR business cards and sent to client
17th - Built a practice E shot with web designer.
18th - Artwork for business cards (ODPR)
19th - New branding for Cryptomathic; concepts and the artwork of 5 product banner stands.
23rd - Continued work on Crypto branding and also amended the business card artwork for Open Door.
24th - Sent business cards to print and did some retouching for jewellery company Winsor Bishop.
25th - Created a leaving card for web designer; art working and discussions about mounting the artwork onto foam-ex.
26th - Made amends to the Crypto banners.
27th - Contingency plan made for Open door cards as a reprint was needed for their clients cards. (In House Manager).
1st July - Created a new E shot for GGS
2nd July - Started a map illustration for Westover Vets, an indication of vet visiting days in particular locations
3rd - Crypto banner amends.
4th - Practiced building an E shot on my own - Web designer has left now.
7th - New brief for KMS who want new packaging for their products.
9th - Requested and received printers quotes for the CNS prospectus.
11th - More work on Westover map.
15th - Built my first E shot independently!
16th - Quoted for amending the Lynn Grove Information booklet from last year. Requested print quotes and created a quote for client.
17th - Discussed maps with Westover vets, had a few queries and received approval on map artworks.
18th - Made amends for the Lynn Grove booklet and also started a new GGS E shot.
21st - Created web ready artwork for artist Tony Lodge and his new website. Front page artwork and the resizing and saving for web images for his online portfolio.
22nd - Broadland High school photography shoot for the new prospectus, sat with photographer Chris and together selected the best shots for the prospectus and the way in which they would be used.
23rd - KMS packaging artwork
24th - Artworking for Broadland, new images and text inserted into new layouts.
25th - Cut out several images of Broadland students - 5 hours worth of cut outs to be placed in a flick through book in center of prospectus.
28th - More amends to the Cryptomathic branding.
29th - Success Management website; updates to the 'About us' page. Had a new person to include, image and text which I added to their website. (Dreamweaver site).
30th - Created an A5 flyer for Lynn Grove, to be placed in local Advertiser.
31st - Our printer is away on holiday next week, consequently I had to learn how to use large format printers for the printing of banner stands and other exhibition equipment.
1st Aug - Updated the Booja Booja website; needed an update on an ingredient list so amended master PSD, saved as JPEG and uploaded onto site.
5th Aug - Made some amends to the KMS packaging, some more creative ideas were wanted.
6th - Printed out the Broadland Prospectus. Cut out and stuck pages together to create a physical booklet and mock layout for the prospectus.
7th - Did some large format printing for Seacon. An A3 poster, set up artwork, sent to printer where I prepared the file for print before loading the printer and hitting print.
8th - Did some social media posts. Scheduled for this evening and two more posts for next week.
11th - Made some amends to the layout of the Lynn Grove A5 Flyer.
12th - Built our latest Exhibition E shot but due to the relocation of our website onto a new server did not complete the upload. (to be continued tomorrow).
13th - Assisted Chris (Designer), with the creation of the Wrightform Brand Guidelines. Created some A4 Literature examples and listed the conventions.
14th - Made some amends to the CNS Prospectus; mainly text changes but some consequential tweaks to layout.
15th - I amended the Exhibition E-shot; the image of a curved pop-up was to be replaced with a photograph of a recent stand we did, I then took the generic artwork used for marketing materials and superimposed it onto the stand photograph, that section of the E-shot was then re-uploaded onto the GGS site.
18th - I inserted the high resolution images into the Broadland High School Prospectus. When doing photography for a prospectus, rather than editing all of the images to a high standard, we will first just select which images we want to use and where. At a later stage, once the images are in place and we are happy with their positions, we can insert the high resolution images and edit them as necessary.
19th - I did more work on the Wrightform guidelines, fine-tuning and getting the file ready for the proof stage.
20th - Changed the size of the Cryptomathic banners, 800mm wide instead of a 1000mm wide. I resized the documents and then proceeded to scale the content down to fit the new size.
21st - Began some design concepts for a MoCo van. Not definitely going ahead as a job and didn't know the specifics of the vans, so spent an hour trying out designs on black and white vans of different sizes.
22nd - Worked on a GGS leaflet, marketed at engineering companies. I prepared the final artwork and then we discussed whether we should print these in house or get them printed elsewhere. A practice print on the printer downstairs showed that duplexing on such a heavy material comes out slanted.
26th - Retouched an image for the UEA. Our photographer Peter, took a photograph from inside one of the rooms on campus. He then took a photo from outside the window to give a clearer and better image of the view. I had to combine these two images by using a mask to outline the edge of the window and then insert the better quality outside image into this mask. I feathered the edge of the mask and adjusted the levels of the image to make it seem more realistic.
27th - Worked on a flyer for Tony Lodge. After just having his new website built with us, he wanted some postcards that he could hand out with his contact information. The postcard uses the same main image from his website with his contact details on the reverse. I resized the web image to fit on the postcard and then created the artwork for the main and reverse sides.
28th - I made some amends to the Westover Vets maps. I made them more detailed by drawing on the roads and rivers, this made the maps more fit for purpose as people could identify their area on the maps more easily. They could use the roads as a reference point to figure out which area they are located in.
29th - I created the artwork for a new Roger Skinners banner. I included the dog food pack shots which we had in our archive and laid them out to match an A3 poster which they had done recently.
1st Sep - Made some amends to the images in the Broadland Prospectus. The images of the students in the middle were looking rather dark and unsaturated so I created an action in Photoshop and applied it to the row of thirty students. I used levels to brighten the images, and then I increased the saturation and included more yellow.
2nd - Today I liaised with someone who works at the local printers. He came in to discuss some printed proofs of the CNS prospectus and we gave him an older version of the prospectus that he could match the colours to.
3rd - I did some more work on the Westover maps, I resized them so that they can be zoomed in on without becoming blurry. We realised that if we export them as GIF files in an Indexed colour mode, at 1500px wide, this was the optimum format for them to be in.
4th - Built the latest GGS E shot and sent a proof around the building.
5th - Spoke
on the phone to Cryptomathic about the main images used in their
banners. They were having doubts about the main images which we had
selected and so we discussed possible alternatives and also ways in
which they can be improved. Spent some time going through stock libraries to find better alternatives.
8th - Fixed the logo section of the GGS site. We realised on Friday afternoon that the logo section of our website wasn't loading images properly. We were planning on sending out an e-shot advertising our logo services and so it was crucial we had the site working by Wednesday. I managed to fix it though, to my surprise, by simply adding in new images and this seemed to fix itself.
9th - I put together a quote for some billboards and bus shelter adverts for CNS. I worked out how many hours I thought we might spend creating the artwork and sent over a price based on this.
Thursday, 31 July 2014
Thursday, 17 July 2014
Evidence 8 - Communicating and Presenting Ideas in the Creative Media
There are many different ways of communicating your ideas, direct discussion, email, telephone, social media messaging, blogging and many more. These generally will fall under either one of two headings, one being verbal and the other being non-verbal. Each of these techniques will all have their own pros and cons but it is important to know in what situation it is best to use a certain technique. For example, I would say that presenting an idea to a client, a logo idea for example, is best handled in a verbal, face to face situation where you can both show your ideas and also put across your thought processes. This method allows for easy interaction and if the client has any feedback or queries it is much easier to understand the response and the questions your client has if they are directly in front of you giving you their instant reactions and questionings. It can be argued that these techniques are formal and informal, a message on twitter (being informal) is hardly an appropriate place to discuss an upcoming project but it is a good place to post similar work that you’ve done that may attract the client in a different way. Each has its own purpose.
In a situation where you would need to influence or persuade a client to follow a certain idea, you can handle this in different ways. There is never a 100% correct or incorrect way of doing things but there are social standards and accepted norms that you should consider in these decisions. If you were to disagree with your client about a particular idea, you would probably be better to approach this in a formal yet friendly manner. Informal may come across as being patronizing and really it is best to approach this situation with care so not to offend. A formal option could be sending the client an email; with this option you can carefully word your response to make sure that you get your point across but also appreciate your clients ideas without dismissing them immediately. However, an email or in any form of non-verbal communication it can be very difficult to convey tone. You may type something that you think sounds light hearted and intuitive but the other person could read it as being offensive and mocking. People read things like that with different meaning. A verbal response, through phone or direct discussion, although it allows for you to project tone and manner it does mean that you are more on the spot so to speak. You have less time to carefully word answers and will have to rely on your instant responses. There is the advantage of being able to see your client’s instant response also, in which case if they are offended it can be easily rectified. Also negotiation is much easier to deal with verbally rather than in a long email exchange for example.
Giving feedback to a client is also a grey area with what the best technique is. Feedback can be conceived as either positive or negative, but it is very important to avoid destructive feedback which may affect all future communication and your working relationship. You should always be polite when it comes to giving feedback whether it is positive or negative and generally I would say that you can do this either through verbal or non-verbal communication as long as you are clear and concise with your feedback. Not only should you remain polite and considerate when giving feedback, but also when receiving it. A client may not like one of your ideas and rightly should say so, but this should be handled correctly and not taken to heart. Instead of being offended or questioning their feedback, it should be accepted and a solution should be taking shape in a discussion between those involved. If you handle constructive feedback well, then your client has no reason not to handle your feedback well either.
Another matter to consider when communicating in this sector is when the need arises to have a technical conversation. This may be an issue that arises or it could just be a decision that you need a client to make. The use of technical jargon with clients who do not understand it should be very limited, I think it is best to mention the jargon when dealing with the problem but also offer a full explanation of what the word or term means. This way if the client knows what you mean they can pick it up instantly by the term, if not you have covered all basis with the explanation; you are being professional, knowledgeable but also helpful and approachable. This type of conversation I think is best handled by verbal communication. Either by phone or direct conversation, but this will allow for explanations to be much simpler and also any questions they may have will be answered instantly. When dealing with professionals in the sector I think it is best to use the technical jargon when necessary, it gives the impression that you are experienced and knowledgeable. Depending on how confident you are with using these terms is a determining factor in whether this discussion should be made through digital means or verbal communication. If you are confident with the terms and can use them easily, it may be best to use a verbal method. If not you can word your ideas non-verbally and still come across as professional and experienced with your jargon.
In a situation where you would need to influence or persuade a client to follow a certain idea, you can handle this in different ways. There is never a 100% correct or incorrect way of doing things but there are social standards and accepted norms that you should consider in these decisions. If you were to disagree with your client about a particular idea, you would probably be better to approach this in a formal yet friendly manner. Informal may come across as being patronizing and really it is best to approach this situation with care so not to offend. A formal option could be sending the client an email; with this option you can carefully word your response to make sure that you get your point across but also appreciate your clients ideas without dismissing them immediately. However, an email or in any form of non-verbal communication it can be very difficult to convey tone. You may type something that you think sounds light hearted and intuitive but the other person could read it as being offensive and mocking. People read things like that with different meaning. A verbal response, through phone or direct discussion, although it allows for you to project tone and manner it does mean that you are more on the spot so to speak. You have less time to carefully word answers and will have to rely on your instant responses. There is the advantage of being able to see your client’s instant response also, in which case if they are offended it can be easily rectified. Also negotiation is much easier to deal with verbally rather than in a long email exchange for example.
Giving feedback to a client is also a grey area with what the best technique is. Feedback can be conceived as either positive or negative, but it is very important to avoid destructive feedback which may affect all future communication and your working relationship. You should always be polite when it comes to giving feedback whether it is positive or negative and generally I would say that you can do this either through verbal or non-verbal communication as long as you are clear and concise with your feedback. Not only should you remain polite and considerate when giving feedback, but also when receiving it. A client may not like one of your ideas and rightly should say so, but this should be handled correctly and not taken to heart. Instead of being offended or questioning their feedback, it should be accepted and a solution should be taking shape in a discussion between those involved. If you handle constructive feedback well, then your client has no reason not to handle your feedback well either.
Another matter to consider when communicating in this sector is when the need arises to have a technical conversation. This may be an issue that arises or it could just be a decision that you need a client to make. The use of technical jargon with clients who do not understand it should be very limited, I think it is best to mention the jargon when dealing with the problem but also offer a full explanation of what the word or term means. This way if the client knows what you mean they can pick it up instantly by the term, if not you have covered all basis with the explanation; you are being professional, knowledgeable but also helpful and approachable. This type of conversation I think is best handled by verbal communication. Either by phone or direct conversation, but this will allow for explanations to be much simpler and also any questions they may have will be answered instantly. When dealing with professionals in the sector I think it is best to use the technical jargon when necessary, it gives the impression that you are experienced and knowledgeable. Depending on how confident you are with using these terms is a determining factor in whether this discussion should be made through digital means or verbal communication. If you are confident with the terms and can use them easily, it may be best to use a verbal method. If not you can word your ideas non-verbally and still come across as professional and experienced with your jargon.
Evidence 7 - Case History - Business Cards
A client recently approached us regarding some business cards that they needed for an event. They had recently acquired a new logo and wanted to show off their new branding at this event.
To complete this work it was important to use time management techniques so that we could both complete the work before the deadline and also spend only a reasonable amount of time actually completing the work.
Initially before I began working on the cards I quoted the client a design cost based on how many hours I thought it would take to create the cards. This price was based on an hourly rate and so I decided that the cards would take three hours to design, prepare and send to print. This time limit was based on previous jobs of a similar nature and also means that we can stay competitive with other companies when it comes to price.
Once work had begun on the cards I kept various accounts of the amount of time I had spent on the job. Firstly, I filled out a Time Sheet which featured listed chronological entries of the time spent, the work done and the date of which it was complete. For example, 17th June – insertion of text and logo – 1 hour. Another tool that I used was a diary; this diary is used on a day-to-day basis and keeps track of all the work completed on a day-to-day basis. I fill this out daily with all the work I have completed on each day and at the end of the week we analyse the data and work out how many hours of work is billable work and how many hours are for our own projects within the company.
By filling out this time sheet, completed the diary and working to the deadline this enables me to monitor the project and work out what still needs to be done and how much time should be spent on the remaining work. I also will work to internal deadlines, so for example with the business cards, they were needed for the end of May ready for the event, and we made sure that the cards would be sent to print on the 19th, so to allow for a weeks printing and for delivery time to the client’s office.
In order for us at GGS to begin work, we usually insist that our clients look over quotations that we send for costs and time scales and ask for them to agree to it before beginning. By doing this, we have agreed a set date that the work needs to be completed and internally we can agree on dates that we send artwork to print and delivery dates. This simple project plan is constructed by the designer, the directors; who oversee the time management process and also the studio manager; who will consider billing dates and also arrange delivery. We also discuss whether any resources are needed, whether this is people, materials or equipment, we consider whether this are actually available and this whether it will effect the project plan. Progress on work is always discussed on a weekly basis where all those who are involved in the particular job remain updated with what is happening. This is also where contingency plans are discussed, for example, if one of our resources is missing then we can collaborate for a solution and then keep everyone in the loop at the same time. A contingency plan is also commonly referred to as a plan B, a plan that gets put into place when things go wrong and an alternative procedure is needed. In this case it was necessary to come up with a contingency plan in order to meet the deadline after problems with printing. We had ordered two different sets of cards from the printers and both were intended for the same client on the same date. The first set that came back had actually been printed on the wrong material due to the printers’ error and so we had to create a contingency plan to solve this. In our plan, we arranged for the cards to be reprinted, and worked out what date they should be with us in order to meet the delivery schedule. As long as the cards were sent out on delivery before 2pm they would be delivered the very next morning. Once our plan was in place we were able to effectively liaise with the printers and the client to guarantee that the cards would be complete by our deadline.
Storing work effectively is also a great factor in the company. The business cards for example were worked on initially on my own Mac computer, this computer is backed up onto a server each night in case of any problems, and then once the job is complete, the files are moved onto a sharing back-up drive which everyone in the company can access. Also, any amendments that I may make during the design process are always saved as another version instead of simply replacing the current file. For example with my business cards, I sent a proof to the client with my initial ideas and then after this, the file received a ‘+’ at the end to indicate the latest version. This is generally applied to all work within the company and so when looking through our file archives; everyone in the company knows that the latest file will be ‘+++’ rather than ‘++’. File names are very important, especially when you are storing files onto a shared drive. For every job that we do, when it gets booked in as an official job, it is assigned a letter and number code depending on who created it and when it was created. For example, a person named Joe Bloggs books in jobs under the reference JB, and this is then followed with a number. All files and emails that are related to this job then get filed under this job number. This means that when searching through archives for work everyone can find the files relatively easily as the code never changes and is unique to every job. The convenience of assigning job numbers to all means that if you were to come back to a job and had to amend it slightly there is not overwriting of files, the new files will likely be given a new file name and will also be saved in the new job folder. The system is reliable and all is included in a database which tells you the company name, the job number and the nature of each job, it is always in date order and also gives details like the company address and the amount charged to the client.
To complete this work it was important to use time management techniques so that we could both complete the work before the deadline and also spend only a reasonable amount of time actually completing the work.
Initially before I began working on the cards I quoted the client a design cost based on how many hours I thought it would take to create the cards. This price was based on an hourly rate and so I decided that the cards would take three hours to design, prepare and send to print. This time limit was based on previous jobs of a similar nature and also means that we can stay competitive with other companies when it comes to price.
Once work had begun on the cards I kept various accounts of the amount of time I had spent on the job. Firstly, I filled out a Time Sheet which featured listed chronological entries of the time spent, the work done and the date of which it was complete. For example, 17th June – insertion of text and logo – 1 hour. Another tool that I used was a diary; this diary is used on a day-to-day basis and keeps track of all the work completed on a day-to-day basis. I fill this out daily with all the work I have completed on each day and at the end of the week we analyse the data and work out how many hours of work is billable work and how many hours are for our own projects within the company.
By filling out this time sheet, completed the diary and working to the deadline this enables me to monitor the project and work out what still needs to be done and how much time should be spent on the remaining work. I also will work to internal deadlines, so for example with the business cards, they were needed for the end of May ready for the event, and we made sure that the cards would be sent to print on the 19th, so to allow for a weeks printing and for delivery time to the client’s office.
In order for us at GGS to begin work, we usually insist that our clients look over quotations that we send for costs and time scales and ask for them to agree to it before beginning. By doing this, we have agreed a set date that the work needs to be completed and internally we can agree on dates that we send artwork to print and delivery dates. This simple project plan is constructed by the designer, the directors; who oversee the time management process and also the studio manager; who will consider billing dates and also arrange delivery. We also discuss whether any resources are needed, whether this is people, materials or equipment, we consider whether this are actually available and this whether it will effect the project plan. Progress on work is always discussed on a weekly basis where all those who are involved in the particular job remain updated with what is happening. This is also where contingency plans are discussed, for example, if one of our resources is missing then we can collaborate for a solution and then keep everyone in the loop at the same time. A contingency plan is also commonly referred to as a plan B, a plan that gets put into place when things go wrong and an alternative procedure is needed. In this case it was necessary to come up with a contingency plan in order to meet the deadline after problems with printing. We had ordered two different sets of cards from the printers and both were intended for the same client on the same date. The first set that came back had actually been printed on the wrong material due to the printers’ error and so we had to create a contingency plan to solve this. In our plan, we arranged for the cards to be reprinted, and worked out what date they should be with us in order to meet the delivery schedule. As long as the cards were sent out on delivery before 2pm they would be delivered the very next morning. Once our plan was in place we were able to effectively liaise with the printers and the client to guarantee that the cards would be complete by our deadline.
Storing work effectively is also a great factor in the company. The business cards for example were worked on initially on my own Mac computer, this computer is backed up onto a server each night in case of any problems, and then once the job is complete, the files are moved onto a sharing back-up drive which everyone in the company can access. Also, any amendments that I may make during the design process are always saved as another version instead of simply replacing the current file. For example with my business cards, I sent a proof to the client with my initial ideas and then after this, the file received a ‘+’ at the end to indicate the latest version. This is generally applied to all work within the company and so when looking through our file archives; everyone in the company knows that the latest file will be ‘+++’ rather than ‘++’. File names are very important, especially when you are storing files onto a shared drive. For every job that we do, when it gets booked in as an official job, it is assigned a letter and number code depending on who created it and when it was created. For example, a person named Joe Bloggs books in jobs under the reference JB, and this is then followed with a number. All files and emails that are related to this job then get filed under this job number. This means that when searching through archives for work everyone can find the files relatively easily as the code never changes and is unique to every job. The convenience of assigning job numbers to all means that if you were to come back to a job and had to amend it slightly there is not overwriting of files, the new files will likely be given a new file name and will also be saved in the new job folder. The system is reliable and all is included in a database which tells you the company name, the job number and the nature of each job, it is always in date order and also gives details like the company address and the amount charged to the client.
Evidence 6 - Personal Development Plan
Continuous Professional Development is the process where an individual keeps up to date with their work in a particular industry. They continue to update their knowledge and skills not only in their relevant industry but also their personal skills such as team work.
A personal development plan is a way of keeping track of progress. This may mean that you use it to determine what skills you have learnt on a training course for example, or as a way to determining your plans for the future and what you need to develop next. The plan itself can go into details of when the skill needs to be developed, how it will be used and the purpose of actually learning it. By filling out a plan similar to the one above it gives perspective on whether it was a cost effective use of time or simply just to evaluate what you have learnt.
After filling out your plan you can consider what opportunities there are to develop any skills and partake in more training. The relevance of training should be decided by existing knowledge and skills and those that will be required for future jobs.
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