FMP (BA): Initial & Developing Sketches

I drew some initial type sketches, taking inspiration from Blackletter type and calligraphy. I'm not too sure how exactly to go about this so I thought that the best way to start was by just writing in my usual handwriting and then adding to it.

I first concentrated on the word "Nevermore" because I might not be able to add in the whole quote, and that's one of the most important word throughout the poem. I was leaning more on calligraphy and tried to make the N as elegant as possible but I got a bit worried that it looked too feminine.
To make it less feminine I tried doing the same kind of lettering as I did for one of my sketches for Moby Dick, but I'm not too sure about this so I went back to trying to make the capital letters really elaborate and entwine so that they form one "illustration". I quite liked how my first version was really sketchy so quickly made a note of it for later before carrying on going down the calligraphy route.

I added in some elements of Blackletter in one of my ideas where everything was in uppercase but I think it's too "strong" for my illustration as I want it to be quite delicate. I then concentrated solely on N because if I find a good style for that I could slowly apply it to the other letters. I quite liked the way Sean de Burca did his swashes on some of his letters and tried it out on some of mine.

APP Words: Author's Signature

[8]

One of the things I mentioned on my previous post was that I needed to add a little signature of the author's name, so I spent a while just sketching out different signature styles before finally deciding that I'll place this on the bottom of the ampersand. I had this idea in mind for a while but actually seeing it confirmed this placement choice.

APP Words: Working on the Final Design

I can finally make steps towards my final design, so the first thing I did was look through my pictures of tea leaves from my Pinterest board "Tea" and did a small drawing, trying to figure out how to do it so that it's like a pattern. I'm going to develop this further in Illustrator as they have an option on how to do patterns (but I need to look at some tutorials first!)

Then I had a look at the Twinings logo and after writing down some notes I tried my hand at drawing it. It went surprisingly successfully, although I'm worried that the type wouldn't work well at a small scale because of how tall the characters are.  

APP Words: Design Development - Teapot & Cup Design

After uploading my two designs I had (which you can see in this post) I was surprised to hear that most of my target market preferred the 'plain' design, saying that the elements of the other one distracted them from the "Never Give In and Never Give Up" illustration. After having a little think about it I've decided to follow their opinions because I realised that the other design might be a bit too "fun" for Twinings. Their designs are usually quite minimalist and sophisticated, especially in terms of illustration, so maybe a minimalist travel mug design might be best for them. [1]

I want to try out my idea again but with a slightly different design. As I was drinking some tea I thought of how tea could flow down the design and form the 'banner' of the Never Give In and Never Give Up. I used my board "Tea" as inspiration. 

I quite liked the look of this idea, and so took it across to a landscape orientation so that I could see what it would actually look like (or near enough) as a travel mug design. After that I made some small annotations on what could be adjusted. 

Conclusion:

Even though I quite like this idea I'm still unsure of whether or not it'll be suitable for Twinings, so what I'll do is carry on with the "plain" version, do it all up on Illustrator, and then figure out what to do next. It'll be easier to just add in a teapot and teacup if I did the plain version first after gathering some more feedback from my colleagues and target market and will be a lot quicker that way. This is because if I do draw from this sketch then... What if my target audience didn't like it? I'd have to try and adapt it onto it's own. It's definitely easier adding then taking away. [1]

[n] Learning Outcome

APP Words: Further Development

With my rough composition now done I can focus on sketching what would be the final design. This means that once I have done this sketch I could then annotate areas of improvement before moving on to drawing everything up on either Illustrator or Photoshop, or by my Inkling.

I'm still undecided on whether or not to just draw the "Never give in and never give up" design on it's own with the Twinings label hanging what would be the edge of the travel mug. Simplicity is always best, but I'm not too sure if it'll be eye-catching enough for my target market. To try and help me out I shall draw this design up on Illustrator/Photoshop/via Inkling anyway with the tea leaves pattern in the background, and place it alongside my other design. For now it's a bit too early to decide on anything just yet.

APP Words: Chosen Ideas Development - Putting Them Together

With my chosen ideas picked I can now focus on assembling them all together to figure out what kind of composition they'll have on the travel mug. I'm hoping that my banner design will be the centrepiece with little doodles floating around it.

I took each of my photos and placed them onto a Photoshop document before arranging and rearranging them. I didn't know my dimensions of the travel mug at this time so just produced a rectangular document. I used a grid to help me out in terms of alignment.

Something was really bugging me about this method, and I got so fed up that I abandoned the idea of doing it all up on computer. Besides, I wanted to change my banner idea (as I used a photo of the older version) and I find it more comfortable arranging them on the table in front of me. [8]

Plus, when I decided to try out composition again, I was able to figure out my dimensions and draw up a template for my travel mug. This made it a lot easier to see what the design would actually look like.

APP Words: Banner Idea Development

[8]

After picking some chosen designs I decided to take my banner idea a step further to try out some different styles for the banner and for the type. This is because I had gathered some feedback from my classmates and from my sister - who would fall in my target market - and they said they really liked my calligraphic writing, so I wanted to incorporate that into my banner design. 

The first thing I did was try out drawing the banner differently, and I took inspiration from both infographic posters and chalk lettering banners for this. As you can see, I spent a lot of time thinking whether or not to try a straight banner rather than a swirling one as it'll be easier to draw up on the computer. 

I then focused on placing the type within the banners and have the ampersand in the middle to connect the two sentences together. This was when I realised that maybe the straight box wasn't good for this layout because the ampersand was very smooth and curvy, so the straight box heavily contrasted. I also wanted the banner to reflect the fluidity of tea, and so went with the curvy one in the end. [8]