Typography and photography

Rave magazines were weird in that some issues would include the a different font for the 'Rave' logo. They would only do this if they were releasing a exclusive edition or if they had someone very special on the font cover. I found this to be quite odd, and in my eyes did not really make a whole lot of sense. I really like how they gave the text a bit of depth and would sometimes put parts of the text behind the main person on the cover. I will be doing this for my own magazine. The cover of most of the magazines did not include a lot of pugs, I do not know why, this ended up making the cover quite bare and boring. It also does not provide the user with a lot of information on what they should expect to find inside. Some of the 'rave' magazines also included a '!' in their logo, I think that it did look better with the '!' however I think they could have just made the text upper case allowing it to be a bit more explosive and eye catching.

Looking at the double page spread below you can see that the text is laid out quite well and makes for an easy read. I feel like the text is left out and that the image is the main focus for the article even tho it may not be their original goal. If I want to create the authentic feel that we are meant to achieve then I will have to make sure that I do this when creating my double page spreads. Colour was also very expensive back then and this is the reason why these images do not include colour. Once again I will have to incorporate this into my work. 'Tremultous' is drawn to look very wavy and bubbly because that was a cool thing to do back then that appealed to people. I like the way how the text flows around the people and how it is used as a title to the main article.

In many magazines there were errors in the way the text was laid out. This sometimes resorted in bits of text looking a bit odd and different to one another. This might have been due to technology and the cost of getting it all printed again being too large. I might want to do this when creating my pages so that I can get a better authentic feel.  

Photographs used in magazines back then were very professional looking. The people in the photos however always looked very different to how you would see people in magazines now a days. Their clothes were very extravagant and eye catching to fit with the style back then. Using product in mens hair back then was very out of the ordinary so most mens hair would be very bushy and untidy. Not all photos were cropped and altered the same way, as you can see in the image below for the big image they cut around the singers and did not use the background when taking the photo. While the other includes a background, this may have been used to add a bit more to the bland black and white that people were probably use to seeing on magazines back then. When creating my pages I will have to do some of this myself. 

Almost every photo looked like it was from a photo shoot people in the photos were not trying to give off a vibe like they were just doing their own natural thing. Quite a lot of images were drawn back then as well to cut back on the amount of money it would cost to print a picture and shoot it. This also meant that drawings could be used to make the page look a little more interesting than just plain text.

Research (Moodboard and Sketchbook work)

Today we were given the brief for our new project and were told a little bit more information on what we could do for our projects. I decided to choose music for my project because I find 60s music to be very interesting and I believe that it had a very big impact on the culture back then. When we went to London and looked at the 60s expedition the other day, I felt like I learned quite a lot on how everything was presented back then and I think that I can do something good with this.

So I decided to look at some of the magazines that were music focused back then. One of the most well known music magazines was the magazine 'Rave'. It was quite costly for their times however it included about 60 A4 pages with quite a lot of the pages coloured. This was out of the ordinary back then due to magazine run costly a fair amount of money, especially A4. The front covers to the 'Rave' magazines really do show how high quality they are, the photos all look very professional with almost all covers trying out new techniques in design. I also like how the pictures used are not psychedelic, It looks like the magazine is trying to prove a point and not follow society, once again this shows how high quality this magazine really is.

I think when I create my magazine I will definitely follow the same sort of design that is used in 'Rave' because it works well and  can do a whole lot more that what a psychedelic drawing could ever really do, for example allowing the audience to be able to connect with the singer by using a picture of the singer looking at the camera.

Museum Trip

Yesterday we went on a trip to London to visit the Victoria and Albert Museum. We went there to find out more about the 1960's for our upcoming project. The show was quite long and touched on many things from fashion to Martin luther King. It was very interesting learning about all of the culture and how the 1960's had such a big impact on the world. We also got a chance to look at the media that was used around that time, I found all of this very interesting. 

I think one of the most interesting things about the 60s was the festivals. Festivals at the time were a new idea and everyone was not sure on whether people would find interest in them. However they were quite quick to pick up and a lot of festivals around the UK managed to get around 500,000 people, when only expecting to reach around 50,000. I am very interested in how the word got about, and how so many people managed to hear about the event. Clearly posters paid a big part in this and I would like to have a further look into how the posters would have been designed, and how the were appealing for that time frame.

Fashion was also a very big part of the 60s and a lot of the trends back then were quite wacky and wild. Almost everything that people wore back then included something that appealed to the person wearing it, it gave everyone there own type of look. The radicle patterns were also very popular and a lot of them tried to look like the sorts of patterns you would see while getting a hallucination. You can see to the left that the colours on the clothes are very different to what people would wear today. I believe that people back then use to love expressing themselves are were not afraid to make a point. This was not only apparent in their clothes though, the many actions that people did back then were also very wild.

Where are you at now and what are your next steps?

For my last few months at college I just want to gain a good idea on what I want to do when I leave. I want to also have lots of experience in this section as well, so that I am prepared for that sort of job when I leave. I want to have very good skills in the adobe suite because I believe that I may need them when I go into my job of choice. I also want to try and get the best possible grade I can at the end of the year to feel like I have left on a big high. All of the things I learnt last year have influenced what I wanted to do this year, and I do not regret my decision at all, I believe that what I have learnt so far this year will help me in the future no matter the job I go for. I also want to do things that I have not covered in the past as well to see if I enjoy it, therefore giving me more options for the future. Literacy and spelling is also an area that I want to improve on, I want to get better at writing and I want to expand my vocabulary for the future. 

My product

My idea is to create a service that gives people a helping hand with making their own home appliances. It will be web based but will include animations that show the user how to make their appliance of choice. This is because it is quite common that people do not understand the instructions given to them and can spend hours making something that is actually very easy. The website will include a forum where people can discuss problems they have experienced and ways around the problem. They will also be able to vote for what animations will be made and will feel like they are doing a good thing for others. Animation will be short and sweet and will clearly show what to do throughout the construction of their product.

Business Service Idea

I am going to create a website that is all about helping people with building instructions. When building something for example a bed or a desk from certain retailers. There can be certain parts that people can struggle with achieving due to the still images on what to do. This website would use animations to portray the still images shown in the instruction books, to make it easier to understand.

Common problems that are not explained in the instruction book will be put into smaller animations, for example having to hold up a piece of wood to be able to put a screw in with ease. These will be put on the same page as the product below the full animation. Each product with an animation will include a rating on how hard it is to build the product you have bought. You can also use this rating system however to check before you buy the item to see how much stress it is going to put you through.

Problems that people run into on more than one product will not only be on the specified product page, but will be put onto a page called, ‘Common Obstacles’. Allowing people to quickly access tips without having to navigate for a long time around the website.

There will be a forum on the website that allows people to submit their own strategies that people can upvote / downvote. There will also be a third option, this option is called, ‘R&U’ meaning read and used. People will also be able to comment on animations and forum submissions. If posts on the forum get enough ‘R&U’, animations (50) they will have an animation made for them.

The animations will be simple and easy to understand. It will be paced well aswell, it will be quite slow so that people can pace themselves alongside the animation. The actual artstyle will be clear black and white and animations will only shows colour if needed. 

The website will be quite stylish but will not look complicated. This is so people visiting the site can feel welcome and not feel too overwhelmed by everything, this is a website based on making things simple and easy after all.

Logos

Most of these logos are quite complex and thats what I like about them all. Simple logos to me just seem boring and unattractive. Logos that usually incorporate something into the logo that relates to the name / brand I find quite fascinating. 

For my logo I tried to add a bit more than a bit of text. I decided to add the resize margins that are usually around objects from photoshop, illustrator ect. I did this because I really like designing things and I thought that the margins would make it very clear in what I am interested in and what my logo maybe linked too. I also decided to not make the text symmetrical because I wanted to once again give people a clear indication that I design/make things. However I might change this if I believe that it would look better symmetrical. I choose purple because it is my favorite colour.

Target Audience

My target audience is going to focus mainly on the 20-40 age range. This is because this is the sort of age range that shops at home appliance places and constructs their own appliances. They are also an age range that have good enough skills to use the internet to be able to access the website. Almost anyone can find anything difficult but I believe that this age range, especially the 30-40’s will benefit from this a whole lot more. The gender of my audience will be male but women should definitely not be taken out of the equation because like I said earlier almost anyone can run into problems when it comes to construction. 

I think the main areas of people the website will cater too will definitely be students who are maybe at University or just moving into their new home. People like this usually have very little knowledge about making things and may find it hard reading instruction. Mainly they will be constructing objects that are quite simple to make for example desks but maybe confused about the little things described on the instruction book.. The other area will be parents of families, these people may have a decent amount of knowledge when it comes to construction and reading instructions but will be building quite large objects, for example bunk beds, wardrobes that will challenge even the most experienced home appliance builder. Places like ‘Ikea’ sell items that are quite low budget so I will be appealing to the middle-class/ slightly lower class region.

Looking at a website, https://www.ifixit.com/ that is a website about finding parts for electronic devices and including a board where people can help each other with problems by simply asking questions. This may not be exactly what I am doing but is very similar. I managed to gather a lot of helpful information. I found out that it is key to organise your website so that it is easy to navigate and easy to understand. Some 30-40 year old will benefit a lot from a website that is easy to use. Big buttons and a simple but stylish design works very well for this. A big search bar that works very well is also key due to how important it should be to quickly find have access to the information you need. Images are shown to be big and clear on the website and this is something that I will have to make sure I replicate when producing the animation and the pictures for the products. Clearly stating the product name and the model number (furniture equivalent)/ version (year produced), needs to be used on my website. 

Having a forum/ board is almost essential when making a website like mine because it allows people to talk about their own problems they may be having. A website that only features problems that the maker runs into can almost mean nothing to other people so allowing people to discuss between each other is idea for the website to do what is advertised. 

I have designed this little sketch on how I would like the homepage of my website to look. I really want to capture the simplistic look while at the same time looking as good as possible. The search bar is going to be the thing on the site that people should and hopefully will use the most. It will allow them to navigate around the site quickly and stress free. The homepage will feature almost everything the site has to offer so that people who are not a member will get a chance to look and see what they are missing out on. The forum will also be shown on the homepage so that users can quickly look at the trending topic floating around the community. 

I think the most important thing to get right when creating my website has to be the animations and the forum. What makes the website so unique is that to makes things that people struggle with easier to understand. Animations almost fully achieves the goal I have gone out to set but having the forum alongside the animation allows for it to be complete. 

I asked my dad whether or not had had struggled with constructing his own home appliances in the past. He believed that the instructions given to him were not 100% accurate and would sometimes skip parts of the assembly or not give parts of the assembly the full recognition leaving him very confused and having to go back steps to see what he had done wrong making him very angry at times. He would also finish assembling something and still have many parts left over thinking that he had forgot to screw something or missed out a part feeling like the appliance he had made may not be safe. He also sai that at times it was not clear enough on where the certain instruction was pointing to in the appliance and this would also leave him confused at times, this could also be down to the manufacturer however (Hole in the wrong place / not big enough).

I also asked my auntie and uncles to see how they feel about constructing home appliances. My auntie said she had run into trouble before, she tried to make a desk from Ikea, she said that it looked very simple and she thought that it would not cause her a lot of trouble. However she ended up getting stuck while trying to fit in the drawers, she spent many as she would put it, 'excruciating' hours trying to figure out what the problem was and had realised that the parts she was given were incorrect and were not viable for the construction of the desk. She has not tried to build her own home appliance since and said that she will not be returning any time soon. I will have to include a feature in my website that allows users to find out the parts required for their build so that they don't run into the same problem as my auntie did.