EVALUATION - Brabantia

I believe that I have started to really explore my illustrative skills. Instead of simply working with digital illustration, I got off the computer and decided to create something by hand. By doing this, I have been able to target my audience, and really relate to my content. This process was an enjoyable one, and it has allowed my products to work well as a unique range through the application of colour and pattern.

Initially, I struggled to mock-up professional looking prototypes. However, as I needed to show screen-based examples to show that they would work alongside other Brabantia products, I really had to build on these skills, and look into producing some effective mock-ups. A lot of this included the application of pattern, so I also had to work with clipping masks and defining patterns. I became much more confident with this, which allowed me to create a consistent range.

Throughout this brief, I made sure that during my research I didn't simply look at existing Brabantia products and pattern application on kitchenware. Initially, I looked at Brabantia as a brand, and the type of things they were doing, however they didn't really feature too much pattern design. I therefore pushed my research into digital and printed pattern that had been applied to a range of products, not just canisters. This allowed me to gain a better understanding of audience, colour, format and environment and how the product would interact with it's surrounding. Once a pattern was developed, my research then informed me of effective application and how to create a suitable range, balancing colour and composition. 

In terms of strengths, I believe that throughout, one of my main strengths has been my illustrative work. From this, I have enjoyed focusing my work more, and looking at different ways of using colour and line within it. During cries, my peers recognised my illustrations as a skill, describing them as a main focal point to my work. I will continue to experiment with and explore this in order to create appropriate and relevant designs. 

I feel that the products appropriate to the theme, creating a contemporary and updated version of the retro, floral Patrice print, that would work within its context. These products compliment each other, and application has been kept consistent throughout. Colour and pattern have been balanced out to create a set that is not over powering and will therefore appeal to an audience that is looking for high quality, contemporary designs. By working together effectively as a set, they will have shelf appeal, allowing the user to purchase a number of products that can be used together to create a complimentary kitchen environment.

In terms of weaknesses, this brief was initially intended to have a quick turnaround, as the brief only asked for a simple pattern design to be uploaded to their competition site. Although I am happy that I created an effective range of supporting items, I need to work on being content with short briefs. In the future, once a brief is complete, I will make sure to move on from it.

BRABANTIA - mid boards

BRABANTIA - final evaluation

What skills have you developed through this brief and how effectively do you think you have applied them?

I believe that I have started to really explore my illustrative skills. Instead of simply working with digital illustration, I got off the computer and decided to create something by hand. By doing this, I have been able to target my audience, and really relate to my content. This process was an enjoyable one, and it has allowed my products to work well as a range through the application of colour and pattern.

Initially, I struggled to mock-up professional looking prototypes. However, as I needed to show screen based examples, I really had to build on these skills, and look into producing some effective mock-ups. A lot of this included the application of pattern, so I also had to work with clipping masks and defining patterns. I became much more confident with this, which allowed me to create a range of products. 

What approaches to/methods of design production have you developed and how have they informed your design development process?

Throughout this brief, I made sure that during my research I didn't simply look at existing Brabantia products and pattern application on kitchenware. Initially, I made sure to look at Brabantia as a brand, and the type of things they were doing, however they didn't really feature pattern. I therefore pushed my research into digital and printed pattern that had been applied to a range of products, not just canisters. This allowed me to gain a better understanding of audience, colour, format and environment and how the product would interact with it's surrounding. Once a pattern was developed, my research then informed me of effective application and how to create a suitable range, balancing colour and composition. 

What strengths can you identify in your work and how have/will you capitalise on these?

1. I believe that throughout, one of my main strengths has been my illustrative work. From this, I have enjoyed focusing my work more, and looking at different ways of using colour and line within it. During crits, my peers recognised my illustrations as a strength, describing them as a main focal point to my work. I will continue to experiment with and explore this in order to create appropriate and relevant designs. 

2. I feel that I have created a strong range of products appropriate to the theme, context and environment they will be put in. These products compliment each other, and application of pattern, colour and type has been kept consistent throughout. Colour and pattern have been balanced out to create a set that is not over powering and will therefore appeal to a broader audience. By working together effectively as a set, they will have shelf appeal, allowing the user to purchase a number of products that can be used together to create a complimentary kitchen environment.

What weaknesses can you identify in your work and how will you address these in the future?

1. This brief was initially intended to be a short term brief of just a few days, as the brief only asked for a simple pattern design to be uploaded to their competition site. Although I am happy that I created an effective range of supporting items, I need to work on being content with short briefs. In the future, once a brief is complete, I will make sure to move on from it. 

2. As this was a competition brief, the idea behind it was to promote your design in order to get the most number of votes. Due to lack of confidence in myself, I didn't particularly want to put my design all over social networking sites begging for votes. Although you never want to push your design onto someone, I feel that I should try and have more confidence in myself and my abilities. 

3. More primary research could have informed my design much more in terms of colour, scale and composition. I feel that I should looked at existing kitchen environments and gathered opinions on appropriate colours and pattern. This would have allowed me to effectively target my audience and make a product suitable for it's surroundings. 

BRABANTIA - flyers and posters

For the Brabantia brief, I decided that it would be necessary to create some supporting material for the products. As it is a new range with a new pattern, there would need to be some form of advertisement. To promote the products, I felt that the best method was to use both flyers and posters. These could be found within the store, handed out in cities or put up on billboards. 

Flyers

For the flyers, I wanted to create something simple, but I also wanted to really get the feel of the new range across. Colours relevant to the pattern were used, and a typeface titled 'Jolly' was chosen. This typeface worked well as it complimented the pattern design with it's simplistic form, and it also worked well with the Brabantia logo. 

I began to create some layouts using the Brabantia logo, the title of the collection and a small tagline that simply stated when the range would become available. Below I have included one of the main elements of the pattern as this is evidently a really strong reflection of the products available. It looked slightly unbalanced however, and I felt that the space between the logo and the title made it difficult to know where to look.

I then decided to experiment with including the actual products. I feel that this may be a good idea as the customer evidently wants to know what products will be available in the range, and what the full pattern is going to look like. This layout looks too cluttered, and the size of the title doesn't balance out well with the illustration.

The coloured background was removed to see how this would effect the design. It looks a lot cleaner, and allows me to work with more. I still feel that using both the large title and the mock ups is too much for one small area. 

I then thought of the possibility of using both sides of the flyer. This way, the title could be displayed on the front quite large, which will catch attention and make the audience aware of the product. The title still looks slightly disjointed and I feel that the composition needs to be changed to make it tie in a bit snugger. 

Final Flyer

Below is the final flyer that will be printed double sided. I feel that by moving the leaves to create a more snug fit with the title has been effective, and it looks more thought through than before. The addition of the web address on the bottom allows me to balance out the space, but it is also a necessary addition so that the user can access the Brabantia website. 

By having a reverse side, I have allowed myself the opportunity to include the products. I feel that this gives more context to the design, clearly displaying to the customer the products and the new pattern design. The web address has been included again, as well as the addition of Brabantia's twitter username. This was included as social networking is very prominent at the moment, and it offers the user another way of keeping up to date with Brabantia's new pattern collection. 

Posters

I began to look at creating some posters in a similar manner. As it was a bigger space to work with I decided to try and incorporate a possible border using parts of the pattern. As much as I wanted this to work I feel that I was pushing it too much and it looked very unbalanced. The layout looked much cleaner once this was removed. 

I then just began to experiment with background colour as well as the composition of the logo, title and the mocked up products. 

After changing the title for the flyers, this was then applied to the poster also. I feel that it looks much more collective, and works better on a larger scale. 

Final Poster

The final poster can be seen below. I decided to opt for a larger scale title as this is what I wanted to draw the audience's eye to. I didn't want the title to become lost in contrast to the larger mocked up products. I made sure to include the logo as well as contact and social networking information. 

I feel this poster reflects the pattern and overall collection well, and is a strong way of promoting this. 

BRABANTIA - range

Simple design just to display how pattern and colour can be applied across a range of Brabantia products. All products used are Brabantia products that are available on their website, all of which you would expect to see within a kitchen environment. These products would be matte based, not glossy, as I feel that matte compliments pastel shades. The consumer then has the option to mix and match in terms of colour and product, in order to suit their wants and needs. 

BRABANTIA - a working range

I wanted to create a working range of Brabantia products that follow the colour scheme of my pattern. As it is for the Brabantia brand, I made sure that I used their actual existing products, and simply applied the colours to these. I wanted to build up a simple selection of products, that effectively showed off how these could work as part of a kitchen environment.

I created a number of products simply using the pen tool, adding colour and shadow to bring them to life.

Once I had a range of products to work with, I wanted to see how I could display them as a working range. I therefore used my existing pattern, changing it's opacity, and applied it to the background. This way, it sort of mimicked a room. The Brabantia logo was also added, however, I changed the colours so that they worked with my scheme.

Unfortunately, I feel that with the pattern as the background, even though the opacity is very low, it makes it way too busy. The eye cannot focus on the products and there appears to be too much block colour in contrast to the background. I tried changing the colours of the products round to see if I could improve it, however, it made little difference. 

As the above images weren't very effective, I decided to use a simple block colour for the background. I kept the opacity the same, and simply changed it from the pattern to the green I had been using throughout. This is a much cleaner look, and I feel that it showcases the pattern a lot more. The eye focuses on the products, which is what should happen. 

I then gave the logo a bit more space in the corner, as it was a bit squished in the above image. I also made sure to take reference from Brabantia advertisements, as to where they placed their logo.

I also experimented with a blue background. I feel that the blue represents both the kitchen environment and Brabantia as a brand. The Brabantia brand uses blue across all of it's packaging and also it's digital advertising, including it's website. I therefore feel that this best represents the company and it's products. 

BRABANTIA - extended products

For the design competition, Brabantia stated that the winning design would then go on to be applied across a range of products, including bins, bread bins and ironing boards. I therefore wanted to mock up some designs to see how my pattern could be applied.

I picked colours from the pattern that could be applied to a range of products. I wanted to pick colours that wouldn't isolate the male market, and therefore steered clear of using pinks. Therefore the chosen colours were the pale blue and the pale green. I feel that these definitely broaden my target audience, allowing me to appeal to both genders. It also allows the customer to mix and match their items within their kitchen environment, but still have an obvious 'set'.

Above you can see what a difference including the green canister creates to the set of products. The green sets a much cooler and relaxed tone, and is definitely much more suited to a kitchen environment.

The pattern design looks extremely effective on each product, and works well against the other colours. The pattern was scaled in order to cover the items at an appropriate size, so that it wasn't too cluttered or too sparse.

Bins

Canisters

Ironing Boards

BRABANTIA - entering the competition

Here you can see the design that I have entered into the competition. I aptly called it 'Wildflower'.

In order to votes for your design, you had to use a word of mouth method. I therefore let a number of my peers know about my design, and gave them the option to vote for it. I am not sure how I feel about this method, as it it allows those with a lot of friends to simply rack up a whole load of votes. Those with the highest number of votes then go on to a people's choice vote on Facebook. I also feel that this method doesn't let the best design win, however, Brabantia do go on to pick their own favourite design at a later date.

Gaining votes

BRABANTIA - experimenting with pattern

Once my pattern was complete, I could then experiment further with colour. Although the design works well by itself, I decided to look at it with a bit of colour in the background. A standard, clean cream colour was used, as I felt that this was appropriate and relevant to it's environment.

After gaining some peer feedback, it was decided that the second pattern worked best, as the background was subtle but broke up the harshness of the white. 

BRABANTIA - creating a pattern

From my research, I decided that I wanted to create a floral pattern. Although this might not necessarily appeal to a male audience, from my research it is evident that Brabantia is mainly targeting females. In general, it is usually the woman who will be purchasing the products, and would be willing to spend a larger amount of money on kitchenware in order to get better quality. A lot of other brands also target women through the use of colour and pattern. 

As Brabantia is only asking for one pattern design, I am not able to show how this design could be used to target a more male audience. Therefore, I will expand on my designs outside of the competition to create a range that appeals to a larger audience. 

In order to experiment with my illustrative techniques, I decided to create something using my new Turner's paints. Each component was painted separately, so that they could be put together to form a pattern once digitised. Colours that complimented each other were used, and a pale blue and greens were used also that it wouldn't completely isolate the male audience. 

These images were then scanned in, using no auto contrast/brightness/tone as I wanted the original colours to be picked up on. The brightness was increased in Photoshop so that the contrast between the paper and the paint was increased, allowing me to pick up on the illustration with the magic wand tool. 

The problem with the magic wand tool is that it doesn't create a very smooth cut out, so I had to refine the edges of each illustration, smoothing them out. 

 I am extremely pleased with how well the paintings scanned, and how the paint lines are still visibile. This is a really interesting way of creating illustration, and is something I will definitely expand on.

Now I had each separate component, I could begin creating a pattern.

Four mini designs were created, simply from looking at the type of shapes that had been painted. The leaves allowed me to create a similar style within each smaller illustration. I think these look really effective, and have allowed me to use all of the different colours, as well as different components including flowers and leaves. These can then be used in some way to create a repeated pattern.

A simple pattern design was created by alternating each smaller illustration. I didn't want to repeat them too much as I didn't want it to become too busy and confusing. This can now be applied to the canister template on the Brabantia website.