OUGD301 Evaluation

This module has been tough but definitely most enjoyable. I've really enjoyed being able to focus on our own subject interests and areas of design, and I think this has also had an effect on improving the standard of my work. 


I think the amount of work produced seemed extremely challenging at times but really worth while. I think i've probably produced more work this module than the whole of last year put together which for me is really satisfying. I think the amount of effort put in to try and achieve this has helped to lead to an instant increase in the standard of my work and I feel really happy with all my outcomes. They are all something i'm pleased to add to my portfolio which is an aim I had right from the start of this year. I wanted to be producing a more professional standard of work and I think having this mind set gave me the motivation to keep on working in the aim of improving. 


At the start of the module when I had decided on my 4 briefs, my initial aim was to complete one before starting the next so I could have my mind focused on one thing at a time. However we were advised not to do this and have all the briefs on the go. In some ways this was useful, if one brief came to a standstill I would always have another to move on to and it was good in the sense you could take a break from one brief and do something different with another one. However I did find a downside to this. I feel with brief two 'body shop' brief, I got bored of working on it and felt it never properly came to an end. I think this is probably due to not having a set aim from the start as to what I wanted to produce as well as spending so long on it. When we start final major project I will make sure I am more focused from the start with things such as deliverables and also setting myself small deadlines which I found helped me out a lot towards the end of this module. I started to set myself day to day deadlines which helped me to keep on top of things and always have something to aim for which was a big motivation.


Brief 1 - 'Chop Chop' 
I think this was possibly my favourite brief i've done so far. I was really excited to start it and I just generally had more motivation with what I was producing for it. Although one of my final prints didn't turn out as well as expected I still feel generally happy with the final outcomes and feel it's quite a strong piece I can add to my portfolio. 


Brief 2 - The Body Shop WInter Collection
I enjoyed this brief to start off with but I feel that I never really set myself a target with it and thats why I ended up getting bored and not really managing to finishing it to the standard I would have liked. I think if i had been more specific with setting my own deadline for this I could have got it completed and out the way rather than going back to it every so often because I needed to not because I wanted to. 


Brief 3 - ASDA 'Necessities'
I wasn't sure how much I would actually enjoy this brief as I think re-designing something that already exists is quite difficult and can have many limitations. I think making the decision to do this as a collaboration was a good idea as it doubled the amount of ideas and options to a brief which I thought might not initially have had many available. I believe me and Ellis worked really well together, even though it's not always advisable to work with friends I feel this benefitted us as we had no problems with expressing our opinions and pushing each other to get the work completed. I feel we split the brief really equally yet have still managed to come out with products which can easily stand alone.


Brief 4 - M&S
I feel with this brief I could have got a lot more out of it if I had given myself the time. I feel I dragged some of the others out a bit too long and didn't leave myself enough time to complete this brief as thorough as I would have liked. I am actually really happy with the outcomes I have produced as I feel they would reach the M&S target audience well. I just feel I could have expanded on it and put a bit more consideration into my idea. With this brief being a YCN competition I can still go back and add to it in my own time before submitting it as the deadline for this is not until march. 


I think one thing i've found out from this module is that I definitely made the right decision in having packaging design as my main focus. There was a point where I was worried I was focusing too much on it but I soon realised that whilst i'm on the course I should take the chance to really focus on what I want to do now and this will also hopefully benefit my future. I feel that attempting briefs just to add elements to my portfolio is not a good enough reason to be doing something. I figured this out when I originally set out to do a typeface brief but kept putting it off because it wasn't actually something I wanted to do and so I felt I wouldn't get anything useful out of it. Designing for packaging is what I will continue to focus on however I do want to remember not to neglect other areas of design which I felt I slightly did over this module. Certain things like promotional material for the packaging I had in each brief, I felt I pushed to one side, when really they could have helped out my range of deliverables a lot more if I put that but more focus in.

Brief 3 - Final PDF Submission Boards

Open publication - Free publishing - More asda

Mock Ups

Photoshop mock ups I did to show how the products would look in store against other packaging:

Necessities Range - Photographs

Banner Ideas

Quick ideas for how in store banners and posters could work:

New Ketchup Labels

When printed the text looked too small and wasn't very readable against the dark red of the ketchup inside the bottle so i've created a few more layouts for this with the text at a larger size:

To Do

Where I'm currently at and what I still need to do:


1. Oriental Brief:
- The meal pack for two is a case of getting it printed now.
- I need to do further development on the sushi packaging.
- Expand my range into more proposed products.
- Explore Lorenzo's idea of colour co-ordinating my products somehow
- Get everything photographed
- Create some kind of promotional posters/advertisement for the range


2. Body Shop Brief:
I did want this finished quite some time ago but thats just not happened!
- All my product labels are finished and ready to print which I will be doing this week
- Still awaiting my stock for the outer packaging to come through the post as royal mail have messed up.
- I've come up with a solution for the inside in terms of how the products sit in the box. Rather than using card for the tray I originally created I will using foam instead. This way my products will sit tightly inside the box. My mother is getting me the foam from her work and is bringing it for me this sunday.
- Need to create the brochure which I'm currently in the process of.


3. Asda Brief:
- Labels are being printed tomorrow
- Screen print onto tote bags
- Create promotional posters/banners for the range


4. YCN M&S Brief:
- Currently only have initial ideas and a small amount on context blog
- Going to continue with the above briefs and get this one in full swing in Freds session on Thursday morning.

Labels Ready For Print

We are printing our labels tomorrow afternoon. The documents are all set up and ready. All labels which are going on glass/clear/plastic packaging will be printed onto clear labels:

Labels with the image background will be printed onto matt labels. Once these have been printed we will need to photograph our final products. 

Other things to finish are:

- Deciding on a design for the tote bag and getting this printed.

- Creating promotional material, posters, banners.

- Putting everything into context so mocking up images of our products on shelves, banners featuring in the store etc.

- Creating separate submission boards.

I think after printing, this brief will need one more day maximum.

Final Labels PDF

(add pdf of all final labels)

Final Labels

Here are the final labels for my 5 products:

The labels on white will be printed onto clear labels. These are the products that already appear in see through packaging so the product will be visible through the label. Products which are contained in tin, card etc which cannot be in see through packaging will be  labels with a printed image of the contents to give the appearance that you can see the contents through the packaging. These products will be the tuna flakes (shown above), beans and bran flakes which Ellis is producing the packaging for.

The idea behind this is that the products in Asdas Necessities range are stripped down to bare minimum showing that there is nothing to be hidden in these lower price products.

Final Bag Design

Tote Bag Ideas

I've ordered a few plain tote bags like the ones above so we can screen print onto them.

Thursdays Crit

Feedback from the group crit last week with Lorenzo:

1. Oriental Packaging Brief:

- Needs to be put into context

- Think about photographing products in order to put into context

- Expand on the range...is there more products, they don't have to be produced, just proposed

- Colour scheme within the brand...are different products colour coded

- Create some kind of promotional/advertisement to make people aware of the new brand/products

2. Body Shop Packaging Brief:

The outer packaging needs work

- Currently quite standard form and doesn't really show off my products

- Looks clinical and a bit cold

- Need to explore further ideas of winter and incorporate this into the outer packaging

- Could I focus on the christmas aspect more...produce wrapping paper, gift bags for people buying the products or gift set

3. Asda Re-brand Brief:

- On Thursday I didn't have too many visuals to show on this,  it was mainly idea development and a few on screen mock ups however Lorenzo was happy with the progress being made on this - it just needed continuing with.

I also had a chat with Joe after the crit. I mentioned I was worried about the fact i'm focusing so much on the packaging aspect of my briefs and not much else. He suggested that if it's packing i'm interested in then it should continue to be my main focus however I can just expand on my briefs with other areas.

With the oriental brief Joe mentioned like in my crit that it needs to be put into context and I could do this by setting up a scene and photographing my products and then this could be used as an advert in a magazine. This way I have a photography aspect to the brief and editorial. It was also mentioned adding little elements to the packs such as branded chopsticks, napkins, sachets of sauce etc.
With the Body Shop brief Joe came up with a great solution for the gift box. My products are all different dimensions and although I have created the card piece inside for them to sit it, they are still not very secure so Joe suggested I could use some kind of foam for this meaning they would fit tightly and wouldn't fall out if the box were to be tipped upside down.

More Text Layout Experiments

Experimenting with the layout of text for each different product:

Text Layout Experiments

Packaging Information

We have decided to use the nutritional information of the products as a way to entice customers and make them realise that the cheaper range isn't actually any less quality than other leading brands.


The aim is that having a statistic written in bold type will attracts and intrigue customers as to what it is about.


We have been looking at the nutritional information of our 10 chosen products to see what is the best information for the customers to be informed about (see post here):


This is what we have decided the type will be for each product:


Jam - 
Soup -
Noodle Pot -
Ketchup -
Biscuits - 
Bran Flakes - 
Pasta - 
Tuna - 
Butter - 
Coffee - 




We want to give it a friendly tone of voice

Chosen Logo

Packaging Ideas

More Logos

Logo Experimentation

Not sure if these are too plain? The bottom right also looks a lot like the George logo so definitely won't be using this one