Comm Design IV

Bold, Bright and Contrast is what I aimed to achieve within my BLAD design. 

Front & Back Cover

Inside Page

Contents Page

Studio Pages

Inside Page

Exploring more with scribbles, I thought it would be interesting to try and draw around the text. This is a design element that could possibly go through the whole blad design to make my work more cohesive. 

With much decision making, I decided to swap out the gradient colour for the bold colours of orange/purple and enlarge the scribble element to achieve a more cheeky and fun vibe. 

By drawing up a flat plan for my plan I have a more clearer vision of how I am going to design. I have chosen to have front/back insider pages to achieve a nice flow into the contents and I decided to only focus on 3 studios to show variety. 

In terms of my BLAD explorations, I aimed to be cheeky, playful and cohesive with how I designed, through my colours, typography and layout.

What can I improve

Contents

I feel that my contents page could be explored more with the scribble element. What would it look like if the scribbles are more enlarged and thicker? What would it look like if I add more colour? I need to try and be more fun and less restrictive with my designs. 

Double Page Spreads

Overall I think that I need to develop these 2 DPS more. 

The body paragraph needs to be stretched out in order to be more legible. 

The scribble may be disrespectful as it covers majority of the studio work. What would it look like smaller?

The layout of images feel too chaotic - Where are my eyes looking!!! What would it look like with less imagery?

Agreeing with the formative feedback, I find that the before cover catered more to the Kea Publishing aspect than the directory. So, I tried to experiment with radial gradients, positive/negative space to create an eye catching cover that is able to capture young designers eyes from afar and make them intrigued enough to open and read through the contents.  

I find that the white lettering is more apparent and legible than the dark black lettering - hence why I am going to use the white lettering for the cover. 

In terms of the colour palette, I decided to be selective and focus more on bolder colour combinations involving purple, orange & white. I made this change because I find that this colour combination captures the ethos of the 80′s/90′s retrowave era and would appeal more to the Gen Z target audience than the before palette. 

The design scribble - Inspo

The Design Squiggle is a simple illustration of the design process. The journey of researching, uncovering insights, generating creative concepts, iteration of prototypes and eventually concluding in one single designed solution. It is intended to convey the feeling of the journey. Beginning on the left with mess and uncertainty and ending on the right in a single point of focus: the design.

- Research taken from https://thedesignsquiggle.com/

Hand drawn Exploration

Translated into AI 

PLAYFUL, FUN, BOLD, BRIGHT, CONTRAST!

One thing that lacked in our blad was the fun aspect. Looking for inspiration, I fell upon the Sonder Magazine double page spreads. What I loved about these images is the use of colour and the scribble element that ties everything together. 

Next Steps

The scribble idea is something that I can explore and experiment on as it would  designs more playful and less restrictive. 

Inspired by the group feedback, I decided to go for a more minimal and bolder approach for the publishing logo. Hence why I have made the decision of removing the kea feather, minimising the sub text (publishing co. and designing the ‘e’ of the Kea to resemble the Kea beak. I wanted the logo is less boxed, more apparent, identifiable - having personality and character. 

The things that worked well in our presentation was our research and design decisions justifying our WHY. However, overall we need to improve the consistency and flow of our presentation. In my opinion there were a lot of gaps that needed to be filled, involving our design system and blad. 

What can I improve:

BLAD - 

More Playful and not restrictive/limited

Needs to be more cohesive 

Design System

Clarity 

The inspiration for the cover design stems from a Kea bird's wings. The wings itself represent the 18 design studios within New Zealand and was designed to be symmetrical because when the book is opened, the wings fan out - symbolising the introduction to the world of design.

Grid & BLAD Inspiration

For our BLAD design we were inspired by a fusion of minimalistic yet eye catching book designs. Simple yet effective is what we aimed to achieve within our double page spreads. By going with a minimal approach, it allows space for the studio imagery to be the main focus. 

Grid Layout

Contents Page

Double Page Spreads

Exploring Type

For our typography choice, we wanted a type that was bold and legible. Therefore, we decided to explore San Serif types because of how timeless, modern and simple it is - therefore appealing to young designers.  

Final Type Choice