OUGD502 - Studio Brief 01 - Ted Talk - Kelly McGonigal: How to make stress your friend

I recently watched a Ted talk that explored how changing how you think about and respond to stress can make you healthier. Thinking about stress as a positive reaction from your body, such as your beating heart preparing you for action can encourage a positive physical response from your body. When you view stress in this way your body believes you, and the actual structure of your arteries into your heart change, replicating the physical respnces associated with courage.  

Stress also makes you more social as it releases the hormone oxytocin which fine tunes your brain's social instincts. Oxytocin makes you crave physical contact with friends and family, increases empathy and makes you more compassionate and caring. Oxytocin is a stress hormone. It helps you notice when someone else is struggling and encourages you to support each-other. Combining stress with empathy is a built in mechanism for human resilience. 

When you choose to view stress as helpful it creates a positive response from your body and can actually make you healthier. Through level 5 of this course I have felt a lot of stress when it has come to juggling tight deadlines, often having multiple deadlines in one week. However viewing stress as a positive influence on my body and embracing it will hopefully have a positive effect on my work and social relationships with my friends, family and peers.

Full Ted Talk here:
https://www.ted.com/talks/kelly_mcgonigal_how_to_make_stress_your_friend

OUGD502 - Studio Brief 02 - Designing the creative reports

When it came to designing the posters I started by picking out quotes that would make good slogans for the front of each poster. I briefly reconsidered my original idea of using advice and swapping it to the mottos of each studio:

Peter&Paul: 'Ideas Makers'

SidebySide: 'Just do good shit'

Tonic: 'Making dreams a reality'

However I realised that this wouldn't be as relevant or helpful for the young graduates that these posters were aimed at. Therefore I started picking through each interview to find relevant quotes that I could us. 

Peter&Paul

'have a better awareness of the whole process'

'not get so hung up on the output'

'have your eye on the ball'

'learning about new things and trying new things'

SidebySide

'Stop comparing yourself to other people'

'That is the perfect polished world and it's not real'

'We go through stress, we go through pitfalls and it's all a part of life learning'

'As a younger designer think I wish I'd known that designers can be dicks'

'In general, 80% of the designers I've met are fucking dicks and then it's so easy to get disheartened when you're a young designer sending off your portfolio and not getting responses and stuff like that and that's usually because everyone is just a fucking dick'

'You put all these designers on a pedestal and treat them like they're rock stars when in a matter of fact they're just normal people.'

'Everyone has to start out somewhere.'

'Designers are dicks apart from us.'

Tonic

'Be really confident'

'(Interviewers) will probably respect your confidence and your ideas more (rather than the outcome)'

'If you have the thought behind it and interest and passion for design I think it really comes through.'

'Don't do any work for free.'

'Get real world experience'

'Don't just look for people who are advertising'

'Blanket emails are so obvious'

'Go after the jobs you want with intention.'

From the list of quotes and pieces of advice, my favorites were:

P&P: Don't get so hung up on the output 

SBS: Designers can be dicks (apart from us) 

T: Don't do any work for free

I chose these 3 because they all focussed on a different aspect of design but are all equally as relevant. I feel like they also reflected the tone of voice of each interview well. Side By Side's is quite cheeky but I felt like it reflected their personalities and their work as their interview was very informal and we had a laugh. I also feel like it is something they would put up on the wall of their studio as they don't take themselves too seriously. 

OUGD502 - Studio Brief 01 - Creative Report - Ideas Crit

After successfully completing all 3 of my interviews it's time to actually start making the physical creative report. As the interviews went down a different route to the one I was expecting - originally hoping it would be a publication highlighting the opportunities Sheffield presented to young designers, I don't know whether a booklet will be appropriate now for the content I have gathered. For this reason, I took part in a crit with a few members of my class to discuss and go through ideas.

Idea 01:

My first idea was to create a small book/publication/zine, splitting up the 3 interviews and showing examples of the studio's portfolio's, the studio's space and the designers themselves. The book would talk a bit about Sheffield as a city first to make the questions asked in the interview relevant and highlight how it was a book on an interview with Sheffield's up and coming design studio's. 

However, once I explained the problem to the crit group about what the design studios said about Sheffield's design scene being lacking, they all agreed that maybe a book of this nature wouldn't be appropriate. 

We also agreed that the design studios featured wouldn't be that bothered about having a copy to keep as the would have known what they had said in the interview and the advice from the other design studios wouldn't appeal to or be interesting to them.

Idea 02:

My second idea is to create a poster series showcasing the interviews on the back with, quotes of advice from the design studios on the front. This would be beneficial as ultimately the interviews would be read by young graduate graphic designers as a lot of the questions I asked covered how the designers started off in the industry, their way of working and any advice they would give to younger creatives. 

Everyone agreed that this idea seemed a lot more relevant as the Designer's/studios that I interviewed could put the posters I made up on their wall, as a thank you gift for taking part in the interview and it would also be a good token to remember me from. 

The posters could also then be sold to design students and graduates as pieces of advice to have up on their walls to look at when designing. Then when they wanted they could take the posters down and read the interviews on the back for more advice and put it back when they didn't need it.

Idea 03:

Create an Instagram to showcase the interviews. I could make it in a really stylized way zooming in on particular quotes, using different styles of typography and featuring images of the studio's work and office spaces to make a really digitally interactive platform to showcase the information. The content gathered from the interview could also be written in the captions of the posts, keeping the main feed visually bright, bold, eye-catching and engaging. I could also tag and link in the studios and it would be a good way to keep in touch and regularly update the account. Some of the images could connect to make larger scale photographs. 

This idea could lead on to conducting more interviews and developing the Instagram which more studios both inside and outside of Sheffield with the goal of informing young creatives and sharing advice and ideas - building a large support network.

Idea 04:

Finally, a blog. Similar to the Instagram idea I could create a blog to showcase the interviews. However doing this idea would mean I wouldn't have anything physical to send back to the studios as thanks for doing the interviews. 

Feedback

Feedback given from my peers stated that they liked ideas 02 and 03 the best. A lot of people stated that for Idea 02 having a poster series would succinctly link all 3 interviews together and it wouldn't matter that the questions asked about Sheffield weren't as in favour of the Sheffield design scene as I had hoped, as they are their honest opinions and it doesn't affect the advice they gave for the quote on the front. 

It would also mean that I could give them a copy of the poster which they could put up in their studios to remember me by. This would be good as it would mean I had successfully branched out and started networking with creatives in the Sheffield area and if I ever needed help on anything in the future they would know who I was.

There was also a lot of positive feedback about Idea 02. People said that they liked the idea of having an Instagram building a support network for young designers through interviewing experienced creatives. However, you wouldn't be able to give the studios you interviewed anything physical. 

After the Feedback, I have decided to go forward with Idea 02 as it is the idea that received the most positive feedback and the one I think will be most effective for what I'm trying to achieve. 

OUGD501 - Studio Brief 01 - Responsive module Evaluation

In many ways I have found the Responsive module one of the most challenging yet rewarding parts of the course to date as not only has it been my first taste at live briefs in the real world but I have had to work to tight deadlines, learn to self-initiate my working process and prioritise my time to ensure all projects were handed in on time. Being set briefs by large clients such as Penguin Books, The Royal Opera House and BEAR has required me to think at a more critical and professional level to produce commercial work that would be appropriate for production on a mass scale in the real world.

The first brief that I chose to undertake was the Children’s Category of the Penguin Book Cover design competition. Designing book jackets is something that I have always had an interest in and the Children’s category provided me with an excellent opportunity to combine that with my interest in illustration. This competitive brief required a range of design ideas which were slightly out of the box to ensure my design would stand out against the thousands of other entrants. Therefore I had to consider a range of different approaches varying from obvious to extremely ambiguous, keeping in mind the whole time what would be engaging to a younger target audience. The approach I went for was a bold and eye-catching design that would attract the attention of children but would only become apparent what it meant once you had read the book. Working around tight guidelines in terms of content and size acted as a template to apply my creative thinking to, and provided me with the challenge of communicating the information in as engaging a way as possible. This brief highlighted the importance of a strong concept, as without that it wouldn’t have been possible to create an appropriate eye-catching and unique design which would resonate with the target audience.

The second brief I undertook and the first of two major briefs was the YCN BEAR brief. Again I chose a brief that was both aimed at children and would allow me to further explore my interest in Illustration combined with Graphic Design. However, I soon discovered that the most challenging part of this project would be producing a range of illustrations that I was happy with. The most time-consuming part of the brief was drawing and redrawing the same illustrations in different styles, formats and layouts until I was happy with an outcome. Collaborating with an Illustrator would have definitely been a much more time effective approach to the project as I soon became bored and frustrated with my own style of illustration, despite receiving positive feedback. It was extremely rewarding however when I finally finished the illustrations and produced layouts that I was proud of. The brief also presented the additional challenge of making a ‘Collectible mechanic’ to go with the cards. This gave me the opportunity to explore my digital design skills further and create consistency between the printed cards and the digital app. An improvement I could have made to my submission would have been to display how the game worked visually by animating it in after effects and adding sounds however this was difficult to achieve within the time constraints. If I was working collaboratively this may have been possible and would have produced a more rounded outcome for my submission. Overall I was really happy with my outcome, especially the way the cards looked when I professionally photographed them, however, if I was ever going to work on such an illustrative brief again I would definitely find an illustrator to collaborate with.

That being said another smaller brief which I undertook for Studio Brief 01 was for the Papyrus colouring Book brief. Although illustrative in nature, this brief gave me the opportunity to explore a completely different style of illustration, merging drawing from life with the creation of patterns like ‘zentangle’. Although I was extremely happy with the outcome I produced, I hope to push myself further in future projects by perhaps exploring digital illustration and vector drawings.

The final brief I undertook for studio Brief 01 was my first experience of paid client work. I had 10 hours to produce a poster for a new science programme being set up by the Worker’s Education Association. I had to create a design which subverted people’s perception of science as the Poster was aimed at a target audience who would otherwise think science was ‘boring’ and ‘not for them’. This brief gave me my first experience in liaising with the client, making adjustments and completing the business side of design such as invoices and payments. This was a huge learning curve for me and although the client was absolutely lovely, the pressure of knowing I was being paid and it would actually be used in the real worlds was extremely nerve wracking, in case I let them down. Luckily the client absolutely loved it and the whole team was really happy with the final design. The flier had a really positive response and the programme saw a huge influx of new participants to the scheme as a result of it.

Studio Brief 02 provided a completely different way of working and discovering how to successfully collaborate with a partner. Although my group was small, deciding to work with only one other person allowed communication to be straightforward and easy and planning to meet up was never an issue as we could easily reschedule if one of us was busy. The only downside to working as part of such a small team was having the same amount of work with less people to do it, which was reflected in the final outcomes. A bigger team with a wider skillset would have allowed for a more rounded project with more potential outcomes such as a video or an app etc. to go with the poster and banner series. However, I was proud of the work myself and Megan produced. Having an illustrator as a partner allowed me to step back and experiment more with the editorial elements such as layout and gave me a chance to explore a more typographic approach. Working as part of a team, you have the added pressure of not wanting to let someone else down, which meant the work got done faster as we had to deliver on the agreements we had set. The brief taught me that I enjoy working collaboratively as it enables you to bounce off of one another’s ideas and that there are equal benefits and negatives to working in both big and small collaborative teams.

OUGD502 - Studio Brief 01 - COP module Evaluation

During this module I have been more relaxed about the process of writing an academic essay and combining it with a body of practical work. In terms of the academic research and written side of the module, Studio Brief One, I compiled a large body of research before I began writing my essay to ensure I had enough content for a broad and varied research project. The topic I chose, the relationship between form and function in packaging design, is something that continued to inspire me throughout the project with a wide range of theories and design practitioners that I could embed in my work.

Natural progression within a project is a process that I am still learning, but I have tried to embrace this approach in the module. My essay covered a large range of relevant topics in relation to the question including the psychology behind the form of a design, the history of form follows function, trends within the packaging industry and cultural aspects within society.

Through further reading and research, I feel my understanding of the topic and what defines form, function and aesthetics has greatly improved. Despite studying English Literature at A-Level I have sometimes struggled with the essay side of COP, particularly the use of triangulation. This is something I have tried to improve on in second year. I have also tried to build my awareness of multiple theorists, finding less predictable sources and trying to push my writing to be more interesting and critically aware. I feel like my writing still has much room for improvement, particularly in regards to Level 6 of the course, however starting my essay early and staying on top of deadlines made the process a lot less stressful this year.

In terms of the practical side of this project, having a diverse essay with lots of relevant theories and topics made brainstorming ideas for studio brief 02 a lot more straightforward than I had found previously in Level 4 of the course. Having relevant research theories to back up my design decisions made it a lot easier to make informed choices on how I wanted the practical side of the project to look. This subsequently led to feedback that reflected my original aims and ambitions for the brief.

One criticism I would give myself is that my practical work is quite safe and I could have explored some more innovative approaches and actually had my designs physically produced. However, one thing that I am really pleased with is the synthesis between my practical work and the essay, with the inclusion of quotes taken from my essay effectively communicating the relevance of my practical research.

As usability was a key feature and driving force behind my practical project, feedback was an integral part of the design process, ensuring I was constantly seeking the advice of my peers to ensure my designs were relevant and appropriate. This has made me increasingly aware of the importance of gaining feedback and above all documenting this.Overall I am happy with the progress I have made in Level 5 of this module and hope to progress further in Level 6. For my dissertation I have chosen a research question that is entirely different to anything I have investigated before in the hope that I will be able to generate lots of fresh and interesting content, and produce a varied and dynamic thesis.

OUGD502 - Studio Brief 01 - Five Centuries of Fashion at Chatsworth

Dowager Duchess of Devonshire & Stella Tennant, Chatsworth House, British Vogue, 2006 © Mario Testino

Today I went to look around the highly anticipated 5 Centuries of Fashion exhibition at Chatsworth House which has been sponsored by Gucci. It was a truly stunning display of historical fashion design dating back across the last 500 years. Despite the clothes being the main attraction I was really impressed by the staging of the exhibition and various examples of set design and graphics used to display the items in the most effective way possible.

The exhibition was six years in the making, and was curated by various big names in the fashion industry such as American Vogue editor Hamish Bowles and set designer and art director Patrick Kinmonth. The grand rooms of the house had been filled with couture designer dresses; tiaras and headdresses; christening and wedding gowns; coronation robes; livery and uniforms along with a wealth of ephemera from some of histories' most famous women.

Kinmonth, the polymathic set designer and art director oversaw the creative direction and design of the exhibition with art director Antonio Monfreda, with whom he worked on Valentino: Master of Couture at Somerset House in 2012, among other exhibitions.

'The idea for House Style began when Lady Burlington, the current daughter-in-law of the Duke and Duchess of Devonshire, was searching the Chatsworth textiles archive for a christening gown for her son, James. She found hundreds of boxes in storage, all filled with clothing and textiles amassed over the centuries, she invited Hamish Bowles, to take a look. After a number of years, it was decided that the collection was worthy of its own exhibit. The exhibit was also curated with creative direction and design by Patrick Kinmonth and Antonio Monfreda.' - Forbes

These were my favourite parts of the exhibition: 

One room feature life-size cut outs of old black and white photographs - blown up and printed onto clear vinyl with light shining behind them to illuminate the ghostly figures. The photographs were taken at a fancy dress party hosted by the Duke and Dutchess of Devonshire at that time. I thought it was a really clever piece of set design as it filled the room with amazing images of the elaborate costumes which would have each been worth thousands of pounds. Each cut out was accompanied by a smaller version with the accompanying information, allowing the figures in the room to take centre stage. 

Beautiful silk gown with embroidered animal and fish print. 

Antique floral embroidered dress. 

Floral embroidered dress by Gucci. 

Ball gown worn by Georgiana, one of the most famous Duchesses of Devonshire.  

All in all it was an amazing exhibition. It also showcased how graphic design and set design are an important part of any exhibition, displaying and presenting the work and in this case fashion pieces to their maximum potential.  

OUGD502 - Studio Brief 02 - Interview Reflection

After conducting all 3 of interviews, 2 in person and one over the phone I am really happy with the content i have gathered for the report. 

The first interview was with Peter&Paul's creative director Lee Davies. The interview lasted for about half an hour and I got to have a look around their studio. It was a very bright, open space in what I believe was a converted school which they share with a few other business. They showed me their ideas wall where they stick inspiring material for current projects that they are working on. I had a really nice chat with Lee and he gave some really interesting and in depth answers to my questions. He kept emphasising that these were his own opinions and he couldn't answer for the studio as a whole as they were all different in terms of their creative approaches. 

When it came to asking my questions about Sheffield it gave me my first indication that the content of this publication might not go as expected. He believed Sheffield didn't have that many opportunities for young designers and that as a city sheffield was falling behind a bit in terms of design when compared to larger cities like Leeds and Manchester. 

All in all it was a really inspiring chat and I got a lot of great feedback and advice for entering the industry. 

The second interview was with Dave Greasley and Oliver Booth, co founders of SideBySide studio. When I walked in Dave was clearing a load of burnt grapes off of the table as a result of an experiment which they had been doing for an on-going project with Grimm & Co. This was my first insight into the fun and experimental approach they had with design in the studio, constantly trying new things to create unique and interesting outcomes. 

Again, their opinions on Sheffield as a city for design reflected those of Lee's from P&P. Stating that a lot of investment was needed in Sheffield to create a design scene to rival Manchester's. They did however believe that when it comes to working creatively in a studio it doesn't really matter where you are as long as you do good design. Their belief was that you could be in London but if you're work is shit you're only going to be getting the same amount of work, with a lot higher expenses for living there. 

Finally, despite not being able to go in and meet Emily in person and look around the studio, we conducted a really eye opening and thorough interview over the phone. It turns out that Emily and I have very similar interests, both with a passion for illustration and hand rendered typography. Emily gave me her opinions on illustration compared to graphic design and the elements she liked from each discipline. Being a female designer she gave me some helpful advice on ways to break into the industry and life after university. Emily really impressed me and is a really amazing role model. Considering how young she is, she is already the main designer and creative director at Tonik. This has inspired me to work hard, never give up and have confidence in my work. 

As the theme of opportunities for young designers in Sheffield didn't go the way I had planned I decided to aim the report more on advice for young designers, from young, down to earth industry professionals. 

I chose these 3 studios in the first place for their innovative and up and coming portfolios. The fact that they were all young meant it was fresh in their minds to remember what it was like looking for a job in the industry when they were first starting out. This I thought would work well for the new focal point of the reports, tying them all together nicely. 

OUGD502 - Studio Brief 02 - Interview with Emily from Tonic

B) What is Tonics motto?

E) Well, I think probably the nicest thing about Tonic is that we're not a massive design agency, we're quite small so we don't charge ridiculous prices so I do think we kind of help people realize their dreams a little bit. A lot of the companies that we have worked with are startups and they're always based on personal experience. So a recent example is a project we've worked on, Tiny Feast, is a lady from London who wanted to cook her child nutritious meals when she got home from work, but she didn't feel like there was a lot of baby food out there that had a nice transition from children's food to adult, eg. they didn't get introduced children to the textures etc. and it made them quite fussy eaters once they got weened off the baby food so she wanted to start a company based on that. So we came up with all the visual language and built a website etc. But the point I'm trying to make is that usually, our clients are people going about their daily lives, who have this problem and then think of a solution, and we help them not only with the branding but bringing the business to life because we're cheap enough to use for their startup branding so I'd say helping people realise their dreams is kind of our motto but that sounds too cheesy so I'm not gonna say it (laughing) it's more like bringing the ideas to life so it's kind of starting as an idea, and then we send out a branding questionnaire which asks them what their 5 year plan is etc. and then we can give a proposal back based on what they want to do with their business, which shows them what we can offer rather than just being like 'here's a logo' we like to think about how it works as a system. When we have our projects in the studio we like to focus on that one project for the week. We do have quite a storytelling mentality.

B) So would you say the storytelling mentality would be your usual approach to design? Having the story first? 

E) Yeah but when I first started design I don't think I thought of it in that way, I just wanted to make everything look pretty, whereas now we think more about the functionality of it and how it would work as a business and all the little things we could put together to make it a nice experience. Feel good design. 

B) What type of project would you say you enjoy working on the most and why? 

E) I most enjoy working on projects where there is a genuinely good product involved. We do loads of food and drink and if something tastes amazing and you feel like it's not working in harmony with it's current branding but the product's actually amazing it's nice to create something that compliments that. So the best projects are when you're working with something that's genuinely really good. So then it's benefiting all ends because we (as a design studio) don't want to do really good branding for something that's probably not great. But I would really really love to do the branding for a cinema because I quite like vintage inspired design and I would love to do like old cinema tickets and popcorn, basically the kind of design which would create a whole experience rather than just being like 'Oh it's  logo for this and that' I'd like to work on the entire branding system. So if it was something where you could design the programmes for a cinema and the tickets and packaging I'd love that. 

B) Because you've done quite a lot of interior design haven't you for a few places? 

E) Yeah and that's really nice because it ties the project together.

B) What's been your most satisfying project to date? 

E) It's probably one of our most recent projects for, Forge Osmosis, where we designed all the packaging and it's all been copper foiled and then theres really nice detailson the stickers that look like old stamps and the branding's been painted on old vintage cars and we've helped it grow right from the beginning until it's become this old vintage world with all these props and it seems like once it's all been printed which will hopefully be in a couple of weeks that should be the best start to finish that we've done. 

B) Is there anything that you're currently fascinated by and how is that feeding into your work?

E) I love going on the website Yatzer and they post a different design related quote every other day and at the moment they've got Milan's Design week highlights on there and they've got a load of really nice tones which are really warm like dark pinks and copper so I think it's just nice to get inspiration from websites which aren't other design agencies' websites because then you're not accidentally imitating them or competing with them too much, and their ideas aren't feeding into your work. 

B) Can you remember the first images or events that made you think of becoming a Graphic Designer? 

E) Yeah, I did illustration at university and I thought I wanted to illustrate children's books and then in my second year I had this tutor, and I actually had books that he'd illustrated and he said that he sometimes enjoyed doing a few advertising briefs and there was a competition for Nescafe Dolce Gusto to design an advertising campaign to make 16 -25-year-olds invest in cheap coffee machines and before then I was always focussed on trying to tell stories and thinking in more of a commercial kind of thinking and I felt it gave my work a real focal point but I still did it in an illustrative way. I made the campaign like 'where will your cup take you?' because they had Marrakesh style tea and chai lattes so I drew all these little cups being taken over the cities on little hot air balloons and then ended up winning that campaign and then I was like 'oh I really enjoyed that way of thinking' and my work after then felt a bit aimless (without a set brief) and there was loads of pressure to have an arty kind of feel rather than being like oh I really enjoyed that structure and then I interned briefly at a couple of design agencies in London and they were structured, I sent my portfolio out and it just seemed like a really natural progression in a way that it still had that illustrative style but seeing my work in the real world, but illustration seemed like it was too much of a long winded process and that it would probably be quite lonely in the sense that you work on your own a lot, and the pressure of being freelance actually stifles your creativity, whereas if you're working in a studio with people you can be more creative and talk through your ideas and there's a lot more variety and it's a lot more interesting. 

B) Is there anywhere in Sheffield which you enjoy going to for inspiration or just a favourite place to visit? 

E) I like visiting the botanical gardens I think they're really beautiful. We like going for breakfast before work sometimes and having a bit of a chat.

B) What do you hope for Sheffield as a city in the future? 

E) I go to Headlam Market, Once a month, it's in a big Warehouse in Kelham island, and when I've been there I've felt that there's quite a sense of community and loads of new businesses starting up, with so many food vans and people that go and that's when I've kind of thought that it would be good if there was something like this every weekend. A big open place with lots of independent shops and food stalls could gather. Because that's one of the really nice things about Sheffield that if you wanted to do something in London the rent of pop-up shops and stuff like that is ridiculous so it's probably quite accessible for people who have nice little business ideas, it wouldn't cost them the world and creates a nice sense of community. A lot of new places are opening all the time but if Sheffield just got a bit of a move on and made more stuff like that. 

B) What do you know now that you wish you'd known when you were starting out?

E) I think the hardest thing is getting a job in the first place. This week we got an email for ladies that 'design on wine' and they wanted to do a monthly meet up and speak about females in the industry because about 70% of people who do graphic design and illustration at uni are female but there's only about less than 20% in the industry who are women. But they say the reason that happens is because men are way more confident about promoting their own work and when they talk through it, they're a lot more self-assured and I think because they're are other men in industry and they're normally the ones doing the interviews, you just have to be really confident because you might not have the strongest portfolio when you come out of uni even if you're happy with the progression you've made, because they've been designing for years they probably won't think wow this is amazing they will probably respect a bit more of the confidence and your ideas (rather than the outcome) and the first time I did an interview I didn't come across as very confident in my work and didn't justify it or sell myself well. But through freelancing and interning, I built my confidence up and talking through my work got easier. If you have the thought behind it and interest and passion for design I think it really comes through. 

Also, I think don't do any work for free. If you're going to do it, go and work for a design agency with a really good reputation and get that on your CV, and actually all the best design agencies if you get there will actually pay you a token salary anyway. But if you can go down to London at the beginning I would. As smaller design agencies can't afford the time to take on an intern and nurture you because they're so busy and haven't got to the level where they can spend loads of time with you. Whereas some of the bigger agencies have 10 -15+ people and have schemes set up for people who want to do internships and they will pay them a bit. So if you can go and get real world experience in a design agency I think that that's a massive foot in the door. When I was applying for jobs in Sheffield and Manchester people got back to me straight away whereas before when I was just like 'this is my portfolio people weren't interested'. 

On top of that don't just look for people who are advertising, I've never got any work from anyone who's just put an advert out. If you want to work somewhere then send them your work but make it a bit special and taylored to them. Blanket emails are so obvious, if you want to work somewhere you have to explain why you agree with their design philosophy etc. and do the research. you want to work somewhere where you actually want to be there because then you will do good work. If you're just working in a very corporate design agency and you love illustration you probably won't be interested in improving your work. Go after the jobs you want with intention. 

OUGD502 - Studio Brief 02 - Interview with SideBySide Studio

B) Could you tell me briefly about the evolution of SidebySide studio and ow you came to work together?

D) I've know Ollie since year 7 so since we were 11 and we did school together, became friends, did college together and did university together and went off to work for different studios in Sheffield, then 4 and a half years ago we came together and decided the time is right to give us a shot. We had kind of reached a ceiling at where we were working before and got a bit fed up of working for 'the man' and people who wanted to dictate how we worked like sales people and got a bit fed up.

D) I worked in a low end design company just knocking stuff out for you know builders and plumbers and small businesses who just wanted business cards and flyers and stuff and so we just got to the point where we were sick of working with that sort of client who didn't really respect design all that much.

B) How did you find starting out on your own?

D) We weren't as scared as we thought.
O) We just jumped in pretty much, we planned it out for a few months and kept our jobs.
D) Ollie got sacked. So that pushed us a little bit quicker and then the first few months were all about getting out there and meeting poeple secretly trying to tap up our old clients from the other places and sell them the dream and that worked so we've been on a gradual upward road ever since.
O) We keep having to remind oursleves why we set sidebyside up and when we get a bit stressed or fed up or something happens we can do it the way we want to do it which is a good position to be in.
D) And we can say no to some stuff that doesn't seem as interesting. So we have the control. And that's why we've been burning grapes and stuff.
O) It's a nice position to be in, we get paid to do something which just feels like you're messing about with your best mate which is good.
D) We're happy that after 4 years we're doing something which is exactly what we'd want to be doing. We're not struggling and we're not taking on crap just to pay the bills.

B) Have you always been in this building?

D) Yes we have. In the first 6 months we were just working in kitchens on tables. Until we found this place that had just been renovated and we got in early doors and got nice cheap ass rent and we expanded into this room. Because as a couple of 25 year olds we needed something to give clients a good impression that we weren't just two young lads messing about.

B) How do your skills compliment or contrast with each others?

D) We have a very similar mentality in terms of end product and the sort of level that that should be at and how we get to that end product can sometimes be very different, i've not really ever considered how we compliment or contrast.

O) No we don't really necassarily have a set of different skills we just try it. try anything. You kmow Dave didn't do a degree in burning grapes but we are grafters and we're open to try anything and try new things.

D) We get oerly excited by a lot of things which just keeps spurring us on really. Doing things we've never done before is what interests us and then moving onto the next thing really, so we don't really want to try and become into a certain style we just want to try lots of stuff.

B) Have any projects changed your outlook on design?

D) Possibly the Grimm and Co. Project that we worked on because it showed us that design can be more than just selling things. Grimm and Co. is a charity that helps young peopel learn how to write stores and its a really inspiring place and what they're doing as a charity is amazing. And that was just quite a humbling project to be part of because it wasn't about just selling stuff or making an accountant look better.

O) It was design for good. you read a lot about how design can cange the world but that's the only thing that we've really done that made us feel like it could. Humbling was a good work for that one. Good project.

B) What's been your most satisfying project to date?

D) I think in a way it's always like the last project because we're always trying to better ourselves and even though Grimm and Co was amazing at the time that was a year ago now so we'd probably do something different this time if we not visited it.

O) But we never really finish do we?

D) No it's still ongoing, this is what we're working on today a little project for them and that's a great project for us because it's real end to end branding from the identity through to the products through to thr interiordesign of the place down to what the shop smelt like and the sounds in it so it was a really imersive experience for a brand so that took us to the next level in our career I guess because we started to see things on a bigeer picture. SO yeah that was a real nice one.

B) Does sidebyside studio have a motto?

D) Just do good shit. That was a bit of a motto that came around about 3 years ago in the first year when we found the best way of winning new work was to just do good shit because if you do good shit other good shit will happen.

B) If your studio had a mascot what would it be?

O) Thats a curve ball isn't it! erm.....gonna have to have a think about this. What did other people say?

B) You're the only people I've asked this

O) Do we look like the kind of people who would have a mascot?

D) I was looking at the stereo because music is an important part, we always have the stereo on. And the coffee machine.

O) If we had a mascot it would be a musical coffee machine. That is the answer!

B) What music do you usually have on?

D) We listen to far too much music to the point where we've completed music.

O) We've completed music.

D) We've listened to everything and that is the plus and the minus point of having spotify. It ruins your musical excitement. You don't get excited anymore. But er yeah a real big variety of stuff. Hip-hop wednesday. We don't have pop on that's probably the only stuff we don't listen to commercial pop. We have throwback thursday so give it 20 years and that stuff will probably be throwback.

B) What sort of opportunities do you think Sheffield as a city has to offer to young designers?

O) Very little. We didn't settle on sheffield. We're from Sheffield. We've lived here and we've never moved away from it. We never went to London. I don't know why? Its a very long way away.

D) I couldn't be bothered.

O) But in Sheffield it's easy to make yourself a big fish in a small pond as opposed to down there you're a small fish in a big pond.

D) Yeah, so there is the opportunity to make a name for yourself.

O) And everything is on the internet these days anyway. We get people coming to us from al over the place. Not because we're in sheffield but because of our online presence. Like at the moment we have this guy from America who wants us to do some stuff. Has nothing to do with where we are.  We just like Sheffield as a city, we live here, it is a great city and you don't really realise you just take it for granted. Like we go to somewhere else and we go ahhhh when we get back. It's quite nice to flirt with other cities but Sheffield is nice to come back to.

D) It's all opportunity and opportunity is what you make of it like there wasn't a particular opportunity here for us other than to stand out from quite a lot of average studios.

O) The further you look, it's deeper than you think, just with a bit of fluff.

D) There's a handful of studios doing it right or they want to do it their own way. It is what you make it.

B) So basically it doesn't matter where you are as long as you get your work out there?

D) Well it depends, you could be in London but if you're doing crap design you're going to be in the exact same position. But it's much more expensive.

B) Where is your favorite place in Sheffield to go to get inspired?

D) We go down to Victoria Keys a lot, don't we?
O) We do yeah
D) That's just over here on our end.
O) It tends to be the grottier areas of sheffield aswell that we go to. We did a project with street words which were graffiti, little words, and phrases people write. And you tend to find those in the less affluent areas which is what we quite like. It's a great city theres lots of character, theres lots of amazing buildings and places we've never been in Sheffield so there's loads to get from it and then you have the peak district and all that kind of thing, but I'm not gonna make out that we're walkers because we're not but yeah we like going down to the keys and trying to get away from it. See the canal boats. Think of another life where you could just own a boat and sail away. Yeah there's lots of cool little places.

B) What do you hope for Sheffield as a city in the future?

O) That it gets people who are a bit younger and enthusiastic making some decisions and driving it forward.

D) yeah. Other business owners that are..
O) Want to push it and not just be stagnant and go for it. It's exciting when you see someone come up who wants to do that.

D) It would be nice for clients with slightly bigger budgets but that's only gonna come with bigger investments.

O) When sheffield win the premier league.

B) Looking back is there any advice that you would give to yourself as a young designer starting out?

O) Stop comparing yourself to other people. Especially these days it's very easy to look on Instagram and see what someone else has done and what other people are doing. 'we need to be doing that' and we've done that ourselves loads. So the realisation that that is the perfect polished world and it's not real. We go through stress, we go through pitfalls and it's all a part of life learning. So that's something that I personally have realised.

D) and as a younger designer think i wish I'd known that designers can be DICKS. As general people I'd sy that 80% of the designers I've met are fucking dicks and then it's so easy to get disheartened when you're a young designer sending off your portfolio and not getting responses and stuff like that and that's usually because everyone is just a fucking dick. And I wish someone had just told me that so i could take everything with a pinch of salt and not that I'm doing something wrong.

O) Yeah I think that's the old school mentality when you put all these designers on a pedestal and treat them like they're rock stars when in matter of fact they're just normal people. And everyone has to start out somewhere. Designers are dicks apart form us.

OUGD502 - Studio Brief 02 - Interview with Lee from Peter&Paul

B) Does Peter and Paul have a motto?

L) That's funny because we do but we're trying to shape up at the minute exactly what it means. The thing we always talk about is that we call ourselves idea makers, we're bringing in everyone's opinions and what they think it means and we're trying to identify common themes that everybody believes. But to me I think my own personal perspective is that idea making splits into two different meanings. The idea of creating a conceptual piece of work is really important from the standpoint that nobody really gives a shit about what we create and noone cares about it. People don't want to see this thing that we're trying to sell. Be it a campaign for a music festival or an identity for a product etc. Nobody really cares so the only way I feel to cut through that distraction there is is to create something that has a very strong concept in there and demands attention. So that's the idea part. The maker part for us is that we all come from a creative background and the making part is to try and translate the idea that gets through the distraction and start making it quite early with quite an industrious sort of outlook. In our studio we all work really hard and I think that it's quite a Yorkshire type quality to want to work hard, but it's about not letting the idea that phase of the work live in the strategy but getting to making it early because making is the best way to test an idea and see if it works. So idea making is the motto. How we all interpret that at the moment (as a studio) may be a little different from person to person but we're doing a piece of work at the moment to understand how we all see that. 

B) How would you describe your approach to design?

L) A conceptual thinking and the most important thing that we do everyday is that whatever we make has got to stay with whoever is looking at it so I think that that has always been the centre of everything we've ever done. It drives quite a different approach to what the output is because if I go this absolutely has to be a film about a guy carving a piece of stone then that has to be what drives the output. Whereas if it's a book that's a very different output. So what I think you get with a conceptual starting point is a very diverse way of making. 

B) Is there any kind of brief or project that you enjoy working on the most? 

L) For me personally, I think the projects that I've enjoyed most are the ones that have posed a number of challenges at the first stage which we've managed to almost give answers to with a piece of creative. That can be an ad campaign or it might be a piece of brand identity work. With brand identity work it differs really as it can either be massive or small. Someone can come to you and be like we need a new logo and I've got a budget to do that and someone can come to you and be like we've lost or way a bit and we need to rebrand but we also need to reposition as well and it's those slightly bigger projects that I like more because what you find is you get involved in a project quite a lot further back than you would do if you were just designing a logo. So more design thinking has to happen because you have to challenge how people see the organisation and how they see themselves. And the piece of design you give back to them has to answer those questions. They're the briefs that I think we do best at called 'end-to-end' where the starting point really is the start and the piece of Graphic Design that happens at the end is the full picture. Anything that has a smaller budget or less time frame than that we sort of slot into the middle. They can be really good but you never really feel like you've gone through a completed piece of work. 

B) Is there anything tat you're currently fascinated by and how is that feeding into your work? 

L) This will probably be different for everyone again but the thing for us is that we all kind of act like we're part owners, even though we're not, which kind of comes from not having a massive team, but everyone is interested in different things. Personally, in recent years, I've gotten quite interested in weirdly behavioral psychology, and understanding what drives what people do and why people do it. There are different things which are happening in your mind which kind of drive decisions be it a logical one or quite an instinctive one so there's all that kind of thing which has fed the work in like a simpler work as to say will that work? will that actually reach the people it is supposed to reach and does it speak to them at all? And it's not always very easy to get that right especially when you're trying to manage that against quite a conceptual pice of delivery. But for me I think the thing that I've become quite interested in is the context of the work, who it's for, what they're thinking, what do we want them to think, and how can we change that? And that can be down to anything really from just something as simple as trying to brand somebody and what do they want to do with that? It's the understanding about what drives decision making. 

B) Well that's a major part of graphic design in the sense that you're never designing for yourself you're always designing for someone else so it's important to have an understanding of what they're thinking. 

L) Yeah and that's the major dichotomy of that because you are designing for someone else but you are kind of doing it for yourself aswell. It is a piece of your output which is where it can become difficult sometimes when you're showing someone a pice of your work and they don't like it. Because it's a part of you and you've put yourself into it, you've made the decision and you think it's right and sometimes you do get people coming and saying I don't like it, it's not right for us and that's a bit of you. Alan Fletcher's mantra was design you do for other people, and art you do for yourself. And I think that's probably right really and I got into design because I needed the brief to start thinking. I was like not somebody who could self direct because it's that trigger point of the brief which drives what I do. I need something to answer or a problem to solve. The formal creation of design, eg. colour, binding stock, we've been around long enough to achieve that so it's making us think outside of those areas. It's not just the physical aspect, it's how it's going to have an emotional aspect. even with digital design it's how to create an emotive experience and response on screen. Like weirdly a 2 year old will instinctively know how to work an iPhone within a few seconds, and I think that's because the design of it is connected to an emotive thing. So when we come to design websites they're like interactive online experiences. Really good ones make you want to stay there, it's not just about the home page and menu etc. it's about wanting to walk around it. 

B) Can you remember the first images or events that made you think about becoming a Graphic Designer? 

L) Yeah definitely. It was because when I was a kid I was obsessed with drawing and it was the only thing I could do well really. I really loved comics and things like that really and I was obsessed with this comic book called Calvin and hobbs. And I used to really love the way it was drawn and get really into it and kind of try to find out what pens and stuff the guy who drew it used and try and emulate that and I think it grew from that. Then you get to school and arts the only subject you really like and then you end up on  graphic design course whereas really I didn't know what graphic design was, but I knew I wanted to do something creative but it was definitely that early love of drawing. I loved Garfield and comic strips and I loved cartoons, hated anything with people or live action in but loved the way things were drawn. Because you read these interviews sometimes with designers and you often get that thing where they say that they were really into record sleeves and I'm just sometimes think what a load of bollocks! I think it's like a cool thing to say but you were probably just drawing Garfield like everybody else was. I just don't believe it. I used to record things on VHS and then pause a scene that I liked and sit and redraw the scene. And that's the thing that got me into it. When I was 16 in college I think I began to realise that drawing and graphic design wasn't the same thing and I had a really inspirational tutor who was from a contemporary art background who got us more interested in that and how to use photography and how to use image and word together. And having moments of thinking to yourself 'God I don't understand this' but it was from that point that she was getting us to open up to more contemporary conceptual ways of thinking that after that then you go to university and then you start by drawing but eventually you become to realise that it's ypur style of drawing isn't going to be appropriate for everything. Like if I was an illustrator it would be totally different but 90% of the things you're gonna have to do it won't be appropriate. That's quite a big epiphany when you're 17. 

B) What opportunities do you think Sheffield presents to young designers?

L) Not a lot. I think there are a lot of design studios I think that not all of them are great. I think as a city it's probably one of the quieter ones. You're more likely to find more in Manchester and Leeds. You're certainly going to find tonnes more in London but the Sheffield scene as I know is quite a shallow pond and there's not many fish in it. I only know a handful of agencies really. There may be more that I don't know of but I think it's like personal taste but it may be do you want opportunities that are really great opportunities or do you want ones that are just there because they're there? Because Sheffield has designers Republic and the heritage that has come from that and then it's got like us, Cafeteria, Field, Dust and there's some big ones like J wing, Uber and places like that but certainly it's not Manchester who have advertising agencies, proper ones and they've got small design studio's aswell. We don't really have that here. a lot of the good designers here are freelancers but there's not the studios where yo can just go and hoover up a job. 

B) What do you hope for Sheffield as a city in the future? 

L) I think that Sheffield as a city, from being here for 15years, I feel like a lot of people talking about Sheffield and how it hasn't yet reached it's potential. I feel like sheffield has an identity but doesn't know what the good parts of it really are. Not talking about city branding, I don't really think that that works, but I think that Sheffield is a good city to be in but I think that it feels like it's not really realising it's potential. I don't know what that would be so I don't really know what the hopes of that are but everything would have to change, infastructure. Because if you were gonna brand Sheffield, then the centre of it would have to come from what's actually happening and so like whatever  we think we are as a city, being something good, then really the infrastructure has to support that. What would be amazing is if we were really progressive as a city. It's said a lot that we're the greenest city in England, so why don't we have a really amazing electric run bus service then or buildings that aren't highrise and are more something at one with the landscape, (well we don't have that because it wouldn't be very good economically and we need to make money) but that's the thing for me that when we have an idea about what the city is but the nucleus isn't there. And that comes at all sorts of levels like the council. If you were to flatten the whole of Sheffield and start again you wouldn't build it how it's built. Fargate at 7 o'clock on a Sunday evening is desolate. If you go down any other main high street in any other major city there are people everywhere. There's just no action there. You've got the Moor and Fargate and it's really badly planned out. It feels like a Camel (a horse that's designed by committee) Sheffield's a bit like that for me, there's no vision. I would like the city to appear more progressive but the work that would have to happen for that would cost billions and billions of pounds. 

B) Where id your favourite place to go in Sheffield for inspiration? 

L) It's probably more the surrounding area like the Peak District. Culturally Sheffield is a bit behind other cities as well like there's no amazing art gallery because Sigh Gallery and Millennium Gallery are never as good as you're hoping them to be. The theatre is really good as well but do you ever really get as inspired by going to those places as you do when you go to Lady bower reservoir or somewhere like that? The different experience is what 'inspires' you rather than inspires you to do design. Not being in an environment where you're having to make an opinion about art can be more beneficial. so again sheffield isn't really that inspiring. You go to the places that you like eat and drink but I wouldn't call them inspirational and then gigs and stuff like that but probably the surrounding area is a bit better for that then what the city delivers. 

B) What do you know now that you wish you knew when you were starting out? 

L) I think that when you very first start out you think you're kind of slightly in love with the idea of being a designer. I think you probably think it's a slightly different thing to what it is like a bit more glamorous, but I don't know really because it's so easy to forget. You know like when you meet yourself about 10 years ago in your mind you think you're the same person but if I was to meet myself when I was 24 I'd be quite surprised about the things that I don't know. But I just can't remember what those things are. I think probably a better awareness of the whole process and to not get so hung up on the output. But maybe you have to be dead into the final output when you're younger as otherwise you might make a load of really shit work and not have your eye on the ball. I think that I wish I'd pursued a bit more illustration work when I was younger and had that as a bit more of a thing that I'd done and also normalise and understand a bit more about just how big the world of being a designer was because I think I would have been a bit more fluid and open to learning about new things and trying new things.