NCI410 Digital Skills Acquisition Graphics (Self Branding)

Our second project, Digital Skills / Self Branding was a brief where we had to brand ourselves 

(hence the title)

The course was based on our skill in both Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign

I thought, seeing as this project was about our skills on the computer that I would try my hand at doing my portfolio for the project on InDesign, as we were shown another students work who did it just like this. I did everything from Research to Initial Ideas, and even Development work, all on InDesign.

These are a few pages from my work

My Colour Palette 

My Research Into Colour

My Research Into Style & Layout 

Research Into Photography 

My Logo Development

I found this project to be quiet hard, as I think branding yourself is a hard task, trying to capture yourself In a single logo, that has to define who you are, and what your work is like is a complicated task, but after a long time thinking and jotting down ideas I managed to come up with a logo that I liked (sort of) 

I got 78% for this project, which was a massive jump from my last project.

I think from now on I will be setting out my work like this, as its easier and looks a lot neater and nicer.

One Nine Four - Colin Davies

Colin Davies, founder of One Nine Four came in to give us a talk today. Colin is a self taught graphical wizard, who dropped out of a non creative related course in his 3rd year at Newcastle University. He then learnt graphic design, on his own, completely self taught, now he's the owner and founder of Newcastle based One Nine Four.

Colins presentation and story of how he got to where he is today was very inspirational and showed me that if you set your mind to it, you can get anything you want.

He also went through some "rules" of graphic design and working freelance, which I found extremely helpful, some of these rules were along the lines of...

 "write up a contract before you do any work"

"always keep the client up to date"

"make sure both you and the client know the cost of the project"

And 

"always ensure you have time to do the project, before you take it on" 

I found these very helpful and it is one of those lovely situations where somebody shares their experiences, so that you can learn from their mistakes. 

Which was nice of him

But while Colin was showing the work that he had done in the past there was one project he worked on that really caught my attention. 

Based in gateshead the council were looking to brighten up the place, as old, closed down shops were making the streets look untidy.

Colin was given the task to go all out with his creativity and paint the stores to how he liked.

he made disgusting, dirty buildings that nobody would give a second look, into beautiful works of art that you could stand and look at all day. 

Did I mention that his Agency is called One Nine Four, because thats how much he got paid for a brief he did for his friends dad. (he was meant to get paid more)

He learnt from his mistakes and thats why he named his company One Nine Four. 

So he would never forget.

That's cool.

NCI453 - Branding and Corporate Image

To start off our 1st project of the year we were given the research task of creating an alphabet by only using Logo's, we were given two days to do this, and at the end of those days we had to mount our work and put it on display for the class to see, this research task went towards our final marks for the project.

We were then introduced to the brief for the project, the project was a live brief for a little company starting up, that would allow young teens to drop by and learn about music.

Newcastle Music Hub

We were asked in the brief to create a logo that didn't involve things that directed towards newcastle, like the tyne or millennium bridge, they wanted something young but also something smart and professional, this is what I came up with.

An old turntable, but also an antenna, sending out a signal, trying to keep it new, but also retro, something everyone can relate too.

The signal and antenna part of the logo was for the community, sending out a message and keep everyone in touch with the company and their message and music.

I don't think this project was the best project I've done, and it certainly wasn't my best work, I got a 54% grade, which is lower than I normally get, but I'm taking this as a motive to try harder in upcoming projects, as it is the 1st project of the year, and theres a lot more to come this year.

Edinburgh - New Haven & Leith

A great way to start off a new year at college, as we're off to Edinburgh to see not one, not two, but three agencies, We Jumped on the train early morning and arrived in Edinburgh just after half nine, by ten o'clock we were on our way to New Haven, a little design agency just off the main streets.

Whist there we were shown around the place and given a talk, the place wasn't what I expected and neither was the second Agency we visited, Leith, I was expecting desks, chairs, shinny new mac's and paper covered tables, but instead they're were Shinny macs, book covered desks, pool tables and tv's.

The talk at New Haven was very inspirational and gave me an insight to what was to come once I finished my course and get released into the real world, Leith gave me an Idea of the different types of Agencies and was more polished and formal, as we all sat around a conference table (on a boat) They showed us some of their work, that they did for Irn Bru and gave us a little look at the other side of the creative industry world, all in all though, the day was very inspiring and motivational, and I really enjoyed myself.