OUGD504 // Studio Brief 01: Study task 01

The Design Process

During this week you will design and produce a folded leaflet entitled "My Design Process" that describes your understanding of the design process and specifically how you apply this process to your own work. This assignment will allow you to explore the nature of design at an increasingly commercial level while also exploring creative approaches to leaflet design and folding. This brief is only one week long and therefore will be very intensive. You will be given support by your tutors in the form of crits and tutorials while studio tasks will focus on aspects related to constructing and designing leaflets. You will be expected to explore and experiment with paper and card stock: folding techniques and styles; and graphic concepts and communication. Your progress, developments and creative decisions should be documented in your studio blog. At the end of the week you will present your final leaflet design and plan for print to the rest of the group. You will receive feedback and points to consider during this final crit.

As a starter task, in small groups we brainstormed exactly which processes we go through to reach our final outcome when tackling a brief.

Almost everything we each wanted to jot down was around the same lines: research, concepts, thoughts/ideas. Every person pins a different amount of importance on each area, however. 

Next we put the stages into order as individuals. I picked the key aspects of the brainstorm, and left out things like 'taking a step back', because I don't understand how to do that when you have a short amount of time to work on something and you can't clear your mind of it.

I think that research is a key aspect that should crop up throughout the entire process, so on the diagram the arrows keep visiting it, but as 'broad' or 'specific'.  When I first get a brief, I do some general research to get a clear idea of whats already out there. I then jot down initial ideas before doing more research to expand these thoughts. 

I make sure to narrow down my ideas at each stage, until I have a few with a good amount of potential. This is the point where feedback from my peers is very helpful.

Next, we practiced some folding by trying to be imaginative with leaflet folds. I tried my best to stay away from folds like the concertina, as I've been using them for years. 

This is a leaflet I made which is quite adventurous, but I found that the orientation of the pages would be hard to navigate as each fold turns everything upside down.

 Above is another fold I made, which I then put my design process onto. I found too late that I was making the process stages too cramped, when there is a lot of space near the end of folding it out.
This fold doesn't inspire me; it seems too ordinary... which I do not want to reflect me and my way of working.