Design For Print - Interm Crit

In preparation for this crit, we should have a clear focus for our design direction. The crit gives us an opportunity to discuss our outcomes and see if there would be any alternative approaches that would be more successful/ suit our target audience more.

** Don't look for validation...

5 questions that I'd like answering...

• I'm unsure about what stock colours to choose with the given time frame, do you have any suggestions for the stock of my front covers? (something that would fit well with perspex and wood)
• Could I focus my research on more stronger/ relevant matters as oppose to covering almost everything?
• Would the style of my approach to design look more striking with the content arranged effectively as oppose to a lot of visuals?
• Have I arranged my research into suitable categories?
• Would black gloss perspex or clear frosted perspex look better?

Strengths

• Seems very well organised
• The container idea is visually strong, especially for an audience interested in design
• It's more interactive and makes it look like a collectible
• The proposed stocks are strong, tactile, make it more enjoyable to read

Areas for Improvement

• Perspex seems slightly frosted, clear would look better
• Maybe the A4 size is a little too large, A5 would be easier to read/ pick up and carry
• Clear frosted perspex would look better black, might be a little intimidating

Considerations

• Green (like the example booklet) Goes well with wood.
• If you want maximum points you should probably cover as many points as possible.
• Half & Half, in terms of image and information.
• We like the idea of black perspex, would be nice to see an example...because black would look sleeker and more high class.
• More focused research would be useful instead of just covering everything briefly, more useful for an audience who want to be educated.

After taking my feedback into account, I found some points more useful than others, I've decided to change my approach slightly & focus more in-depth on certain areas, as oppose to just briefly explaining them. With this in mind I might filter my topics, subtracting the less useful points... this will help the workload and the detail of my content. I don't really agree that the Perspex would look better black, partly because it wouldn't really suit the shade of wood/ wood type I've chosen. Furthermore I want the booklets to be A4 format, simply because I think ordering the information was more appropriate and that the format wouldn't really effect; carrying/ reading and picking it up, because in reality, people are going to be putting the booklets into some form of carrier. One A-size in my opinion wouldn't really make that much difference.

Here are my initial design sheets for the layouts of my three books, as you can see the layouts are quite experimental. This is to balance out the fact that most of my designs are going to be quite simple and follow a consistent theme, I want the graphics to speak loudly as oppose to detailed graphics which is a mistake I usually make.