SB5: Evaluation

I began this brief hopeful that the results would be impressive and something that Catherine would be proud to use and show off. This was achieved with the completion of a website design, logo and business cards (and postcards). The considerations were to produce designs fit for a fashion/ documentary photographer, using 'girly' pastel colours whilst ensuring it was a clean and minimal design. One way to ensure that Catherine got the results that she wanted was to do visual research into what she liked herself and considered good design, after this was done it was a lot clearer what she expected from me. I would characterise this brief as a half live client, but also external collaboration. The reason for this being it was a brief set in live time, with a deadline and a client who will use the material, however some of the design was done with Catherine present and her input therefore it is also a collaborative outcome. As this was a live client brief, there was a strict deadline that I was stuck to as Catherine needed it done by a certain date, this was difficult to deal with as I had other briefs to do at the same time and I feel that in a way disadvantaged me, I couldn't have as many meetings with Catherine as I would have liked, or as many initial ideas as it was a faster process. One aspect that was very successful was the progression from wireframes to Wix website builder, the decision to keep the website design simple was both influenced by research into websites Catherine admired, and the fact I knew it would be difficult to recreate a complex design on the free Wix plan. The decision to leave out a contact page was another conscious one to keep the users attention on the different shoot pages, the contact information is on the about page and her Instagram link/ mobile telephone number is available at the bottom of each page. I overcame many difficulties in this brief, as the designer Catherine sought help at the production stage for her business cards to ensure they were of the right dimensions for her chosen service, I am not used to dealing with this side but was happy to help and gain further experience. The hardest part of this brief was having different ideas of what is good design in terms of logo and colours, you have to please the client whilst also steering them away from bad decisions that wouldn't be aware of, I successfully did this with the 'CK Photography' name idea. Overall I have learnt a lot from this brief in terms of working with a client and producing an identity for someone and I did enjoy, however feel I prefer identities for brands/companies as it isn't as down to their personal taste.