I began by looking at what my aims were at the beginning of the year.
I have crossed them all off as I feel I have achieved them all to some extent as you will soon.
I also looked at the techniques I wanted to experiment more with before I finished uni.
The only ones left that I still want to do are hand-rendered type and packaging which I plan to achieve in the coming weeks.
Said from uni work, I have been attending Career track tuesdays and Start-up wednesdays to help improve some of the skills needed after university. Some of the most valuable for me were those that focused on presenting skills and confidence as well as networking. It was great using what I had learnt about presenting when presenting the DBA project.
My external work in a gin bar has been surprising great for networking for my interest in alcohol branding. It came especially in useful when writing my dissertation on the subject of alcohol branding.
Working in the gin bar has given me the opportunity to work on a gin bottle for a client which completely sold out within a week of its' launch. The feedback i received was very positive.
So much so that the Brand director for Portobello Road Gin dropped his Bussiness card into the gin bar so that he could work with me on two of his upcoming projects.
Aside from alcohol branding, I gave digital UI design a go. This was my first attempt at app design. I enjoyed it.
But its not for me. I don't plan on UI design becoming my focus in design. This helps me narrow down what I do want to be my focus.
Again web design was interesting. It was great collaborating with Joe Auckland on the Telegraph brief. But...
I don't plan on becoming a web designer.
I was lucky enough to win the Creative Networks brief. Its been a good experience dealing with clients and ever changing circumstances. The actual events have been great for meeting people in th industry, especially people in editorial that are reporting on the events.
Again, my team were glad to win the DBA brief. It was interesting working as part of such a large team. I found that we took turns being the leader. We discussed ideas very democratically and dealt with conflicting ideas very calmly.
I plan to attend Elmwood for my placement as they are one of the more multidisciplinary studios from the choice. The studio seems like a fun working environment.
I am also extremely interested in a studio called Lo Siento in Barcelona. I plan to contact them. I feel that my ability to speak spanish should make it easier for me to contact them.
Lord Whitney are an advertising studio in Leeds. They're ideals been very much inline with my own. They prefer to make things and do things rather than do it digitally.
Stranger and Stranger have been a huge inspiration to me the last two years due to my keen interest in alcohol branding (which is their focus). I want to do a studio visit next time I am in London, but I am aware that they do not do studio visits without seeing portfolios. So I want to improve my portfolio before I do visit.
My personal branding has been a bit all over the place over the last three years. This year I have been working on some laser cut based business cards. Below is an experimentation, but I plan to do something a lot more simple for the end of year show.
My manifesto for this year has been to just relax more about my work. I tend to worry to much and be quite reserved when showing my work to others. This is one of the flaws that I need to resolve when contacting studios. I have also found that I try to be too formal when contacting studios.
