Updated four briefs:

Evaluating my first branding & identity brief...

Part one; The brand.

As I've said before, I was quite excited about doing branding and identity for the first time, working to create the kind of identities I see and think 'ooh thats good, why don't I do that'. I'd always been a bit wary of using type or doing anything that wasn't drawing/collage but starting this brief I wasn't worried at all, mainly because I know my client well and I knew what he wanted would be something I would like too. To prepare myself for working with type I looked at lots of logos etc and talked to Tom about what he wanted his brand to say about him and his work. I thought about using some of this illustration work within the identity/logo but decided that because of the nature of his work there wasn't a single piece that could nessecarily define him as an illustrator. We decided on type only for his identity, this acts as a direction to his work instead of distracting away from it. I hope that makes sense...

Creating the brand was quite simple, I probably didn't challenge myself enough but the overall design looks good and both me and Tom are really pleased with how it turned out. I kept thinking of ways to teak and change it, sometimes scrapping the whole design and starting again. Nothing worked as well as the original idea. Because of the nature of the design, the type only 'logo' etc it was quite easy to translate this into a running brand across his website...

In terms of my skill development, I know the type isn't perfect. I do wish I has pulled it together and talked to Graham about it. My overall crit feedback was really positive and in a rush to move on to the next brief, that idea got pushed to the side. It has given me much more confidence to work with type, and learning how to put type and image together. I now feel much happier working with type, which is what I wanted to get out of this. 


One thing I did want to develop through this brief was my print skills. However because of the low budget for re-producing business cards etc. Tom felt it would be pointless as these finishes would never be fully re produced. I do agree, it doesn't make sense to use spot varnish on the protoype knowing full well that this isn't within the client's budget, however I could have experimented just for personal skill development.




Part two; The website.

When it came to designing the web presence my client knew exactly what he wanted. this was great in a way because I could just get on with it but bad in another because I felt I didn't have much of a creative input. Having said that there were a few things I did have a say on so I wasn't completley at a loss.

Although I never intended to add web design to my CV, I did love doing it. I don't think it will become a main feature in my practice as a designer but it's really good to know I have that little bit of knowledge and I am capable of doing it if I want to.

The work involved was quite tedious, especially because of my client's huge back catalogue of work which needed to be included in the website. It's a very simple design, easy to navigate and view images which is exactly what he wanted. I did really enjoy the coding and making sure every little detail was perfect.

A variation on the original business card I did for Tom.

I used the pattern from the inside of the envelope. In a crit someone said that I should try putting purple triangles in the empty spaces (the purple ones are white on the envelope) so I gave that a go. I like it, but Tom prefers the solid purple of the original card. 

Development bits and bobs for Tom Howes -

The first thing to work on after deciding on the basic layout Tom wanted for his wesbite was to decide what typeface to use. Lucikly for me there is minimal type on his website because the content is mainly image based. We decided to use a running banner type thing across the whole site which acts more like a logo than anything else, all it had to say was 'Thomas Howes Illustration'. The rest of the dialogue on the site neeed to be a web safe typeface, we deided to go with courier because it's simple, classic and not too contempoary, something Tom wanted his whole site to echo.

Anyway, the main 'logo/banner' feature had to be something masculine, assertive but classy all rolled into one. I found a typeface called roadway which fitted this role perfectly. We talked about using roadway and another typeface but none of them seemed to fit quite right. Adelle Basic was the only real competitor but Tom wasn't keen on it so I ended up using Roadway but altering the kerning and size so it fitted with the larger type but didn't look too out of place.

 I had mocked up some potential business cards for Tom just before I started the work on his website. Tom had told me he wanted his identity and branding to be siple typography but without looking too naff and boring. I toyed with the idea of going against his wishes and mocking up some cards which included his illustrations then decided against it for the following reasons;

1) I suppose it's like walking around with a little portfolio in your pocket, and most people want to rip everything out of their portfolio and start again every few months. To make a new business card every few months would be financially stupid. The design would need to stand the test of time.

2) He has such an enormous cagtalogue of work and although they all follow the same style - finding an image to put on this business card that sort of summed up his entire practice would be too difficult.

I quite liked my first mock ups, I think tom did too. We both knew they wern't quite right - they look a bit too delicate and feminine. Back to the drawing board - 

I decided on using the same typeface for the cards as I did for the website - I think this gives his branding a bit more continuity and a good flow. I decided to cut out a load of decorative bits, the additional typefaces and anything else and keep it clean, bold and simple with plenty of 'doodle space'. I presented Tom with a range of possible colours, we felt as the front of the card is so simple and black and white it would be a good contrast to have the back in a really deep but bold colour. The two that fitted well were the red and dark purple but neither of us are mad on red so we went with the purple. 

In the crit someone questioned why I had written Tom's email address with an '(at)' rather than a '@'. Although seeral other people said they quite liked this small feature. Honestly, it was put there because ther was no @ symbol in Roadway, but I intened to find a similar typeface to accomodate the @ symbol at a later date. I think I will stick with the (at). Tom likes it and so do I. We talked about having all the olours printed so most people who took one would have a different colour - I really like this idea but imagine it would be expensive. In the future I might look at doing a different colour every year or six months etc. 

I printed a few off in the mac room for my crit - I was a bit worried because the printer ink didn't stick to the paper properly  which made them look a bit worn and tatty. In the crit everyone said they liked that quality and said it made them look screen printed! Yesss.

Please exuse the rubbish photos! I'm doing the photography workshop on Thursday so hopefully will get some good ones then...

Also ignore any missing 'c' letters my keyboard is going mad....

The Brief for Tom's website and branding...

Finished branding & stationery for Thomas Howes Illustration. I'll post some development for it all tomorrow, until then, goodbye!

Finished! Well not quite, there are a few problems with the screen resolution which I'm going to sort out tomorrow. Considering I don't like web design it's becoming quite a habit...

Anyway, have a look at the finished(ish) product...    thomashowesillustration.com

More business cards. This time not for me. 

He has also set me the task of making a website to house his vast portfolio of illustrations, it's going to take a while but it's nice to get my teeth stuck into a bit of web design for someone other than myself.