PS: Notice the fancy randomized header image I added, sweeet!

But I shouldn’t get a head of myself. First there will have to be another job, but before that happens I am back into updating my portfolio, start writing my résumé, design and create my portfolio (analog or cd?), getting letters of recommendation from my mananger and maybe some clients and whole lot more… Wish me luck!

The idea was to create a unique and special display for a garden light company. They already had some nice brochures with good looking photography and an own personalised display in several outdoor/garden shops, but I wanted to take it a bit further

As I said, there already was some graphic expressions and the company also had a website already. I analysed the brochure and it basically showed two layers of information:

1. Technical specifications
2. Application

I wanted to combine those two with a third one. The next step should be the experience. What does your garden look like when certain lighting elements are used? Different moods had to be visualised so that customers can relate to that and imagine what it might do for their garden.

I won’t explain the whole process and everything I tried or made, but it basicly came down to the idea to create an animation that incorporates all of the above points including the experience. The animation can be used on the web (as a really interactive one) or on a screen incorporated into the display in the store. Either way it shows the same, but the web version is easier to interact with.

I made a lot of sketches and eventually came down to an animation that shows a dark garden at first. Then lights pop-up everywhere and turn on. The user can now interact with the animation and move the camera over it’s track (and by doing so all the lamps are shown one by one) and make a tour around the garden. Individual lamps can be turned on and off or selected to check more details specification.

I took a lot of inspiration from the following two clips. The first one shows a scene from the movie Fight Club where we zoom in on an IKEA brochure and litherally are inside the page. Great use of text and lighting, this is exactly as I imagened the animation should be:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkVRL2po0Y8

The second one is a clip from a commercial from a Dutch hardware store. It visualises the start of the Garden Lights animation I had in mind:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZoRrPwNSKI

These two clips were really showing my whole idea and as a last teaser I created this film still in Photoshop as a possible shot from the Garden Lights animation:

Too bad the animation never really made it due to money problems, but hey, that’s wat concepting is about too. Just make great ideas and not really focussing on the constraints at first. Atleast it was a very fun project to work on!

To be honest I have been pretty bussy with working at TriMM lately. We decided to postpone my farewell at TriMM so that gives me and them a bit more time to find a next job/co-worker. Just yesterday I made a list with all the web related work I want to add to this site so that potential employers get a better idea and picture of me. Or atleast my work.

Updates will be made, but for now let me reward you with a nice link to 50 great examples of infographics!

Working with my hands is what I like and that made me think of some old school work I did that wasn’t on the website already. Simple redesign of a matchbox and some ‘shoebox’ pictures based on the lyrics of DJ Shadows Six Days. Apart from the schoolwork there is a lot more that needs to be uploaded, but I have to get approval from the big bosses first… Very frustrating to have very nice work laying on the shelve, but you can’t show it to the world… Aargh! To hell with legal issues!

Ow and by the way, the titled is written in the dialect of Cologne meaning “the water of Cologne is good”. Since it is pooring with rain today I thought it was appropriate.

Because she is just running a small business the number of prints was also very low. Because of that I decided to try out an online business card printer called Moocards. I must say that they did a really nice job. You can either upload your own designs (like I did) or use some standard templates. The fonts are not really complete as I heard they use some faux bold for their bold typefaces. Too bad, but as long as you used your own designs there is nothing wrong with it!

PS: I also added some package shots to the Travelogue “Ich Hab’s”. You can now check out the complete movie and view the box it comes in.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXzovqAuJh8

If you take a good look you can even spot Miss Montreal in the dressing room! Ow, hell, she is already in the preview picture I see now.

And in the category manual labor: I am so glad I found back this tutorial on book making: The Basic Binding of Books by Jamier Butler. Go read it and go do it!

My latest assignment for a corporate identity was for Marloes Rooswinkel. She was going to start her own business with financial services. She will be providing people with insurance, loans and pensions.  This post will explain the design proces I followed with her and ending the whole story with some conclusions. This really worked well!

Marloes Rooswinkel and I had a first meeting in which we discussed the following 5 keywords:

• Brand – User experience
• Customer – Transmitter
• User – Receiver
• Information – Content
• Design

Customer and User communicate with each other and the Information and Design are your restrictions or boundaries.

First, I had no knowledge of the types of services she offers. This will often occur and as a designer you have to dive in to it to some extent. To get  more feeling with the design, but also to understand the customer or the user of the product (in this case the website).

Basis

After a brief explanation about her field of work, we also discussed her history as a financial consultant, why she now wanted to start on her own and how she got to that. Everything went well and I had a whole list of questions, but during the conversation a lot of those got answered. I didn’t have to start an interview in which I asked a question, got an answer, wrote it down and went on to the next question. Luckily! Sometimes it is difficult to  keep the conversation going because you also want to wright down things, but don’t want to be looking away from your conversational partner at the same time. Plus, you have to write in such a way that your handwriting is still readable, hehe.

During the conversation I already had a vision about the website and how it should look like. As I found out this was completely matching Marloes’ vision too.

Because this is a corporate identity, we first determined that about 5 words should form the basis for the complete design of her company’s identity. This worked super! The following words were chosen:

• Classic
• Elegant
• Quiet
• Open
• Familiar

Logo/Wordmark

After this first meeting I had a good feeling with the branding. Then comes the hardest part. Translating that feeling into a graphic or something visual, which then is transfered to paper and then into the computer. I did a few sketch sessions with the word and some style tryouts. I just tend to throw anything onto paper that pops up. Afterwards you can always throw something away. At the end of such session, I lined up the drawings and reflected them to the keywords I established earlier. From each drawing some things had to go, sometimes the complete sketch, but all those little parts together were forming a very nice image.

Eventually I had a logo with a badge that addresses the feeling very well. After some minimal changes to it I showed it Marloes and explained it on the basis the (by me) rejected logos. To make the path I followed clear to her.

Stationary

The days after I finished the wordmark I got on to the letterhead, business cards and envelopes. This was a fairly small step. The logo really lends itself for this and everything fell in it’s right place. After a meeting where everything was approved and finalized I got on to the next step I wanted to determine. After the 5 keywords I wanted to get the tone of voice for the photography clear. I had some trouble doing this and I think that’s also because of those keywords. There is nog need for a tone of voice. The keywords are enough, plus there isn’t much photography in the website too.

Funny thing I discovered was that those keywords were automatically some sort of filter system. Classical, but not too frivolous. Elegant, but not too feminine. Maybe next time this can be used in a design process. For now there wasn’t enough time to use these ‘scales’ to their full extent.

Website

I handled the design of the website in the same way as the logo was tackled. Create sketches and then check it against the keywords. It still fits? If not, why not, what is not right? Change it. And start over. So I came to a clear site design. The top menu bar is always present and the wordmark is centered above that. Then there is a small introduction text and below that three clearly separated business lines. Completely appropriate within the keywords.

One thing that the website differed from other parts of the corporate website is that it has a real purpose. This was necessary to get clear. Was the website just going to be informative? Or selling? Or maybe another purpose? In the case of Marloes the purposed of the website was to give the visitor/client confidence in Rooswinkel’s bussiness and thereby generate trust with the customer. That trust is important for a long term customer relationships where Marloes is at. Clients can not order an insurance or loan online, that’s not the purpose. Marloes Rooswinkel wants long term relationships so the client has to put in a bit of effort to get into contact with here and arrange a loan, insurance, credit, or what so ever.

Conclusions: Looking for these keywords is a good foundation. Five pieces is a good number. It is enough to remember, they are more than three and it is a whole handful. Certainly in this case where there is still nothing. Comparing the websites of competitors was also a handy trick.

Check your design with the keywords every time. Sketch a lot and immediately. Any inspiration that helps, you put on paper. Sometimes you build your design from many pieces of  ‘wrong’ sketches. All those pieces together constitute the logo.

Words on a scale to help for photography or other manifestations of the brand can help. A colleague if mine also called archetypes, a sort of defining your brand as a person. For Rooswinkel there was too little time and it wasn’t really necessary. Rooswinkel is perhaps a little too small, after all it’s just one person.

What do you find good approaches to a design proces or how do you like to work?