Uncategorized – Page 3

November 13, 2020November 16, 2020

Design For Real Life – Initial Research

Background Research:

Main takeaways/information from the brief:

19 guidelines outlining to professionals how to teach/share them with mental health sufferers.
Information into psychiatric disorders, what they are etc.
Information into how physical activity can aid a healthy mind.

Outcomes requested:

Short animation explaining who they are and what the guidelines are for.
Booklet/leaflet containing key information.
visuals for social media/presentations etc.

Mental Health in Sphere

I wanted to do some research into the topic and thought where best to look for the scientific information than what was given to us in a separate informative document. I was looking for more specific information into the psychiatric disorders as well as the reasoning behind the guidelines.

Mental health is a state of well-being, in which an individual realizes his or her own abilities, can cope with the normal stress of life, can work productively and is able to make a contribution to his or her community [1]. Good mental health is a critical part of individual well-being, and the foundation for balanced, fulfilled, productive lives.

This idea of mental health and what it is, what it stands for is something really important to the brief in itself in terms of conveying the right messages to the viewers. Everyone is aware of mental health and its problems, but this idea of it being all about someones well-being and being based around a balanced lifestyle is really interesting and something which many people probably haven’t seen before.

Psychiatric disorders or mental illness, can affect anyone at some point in their lives – whether experiencing mental illness themselves, or as a family member, friend or colleague of someone living with a mental disorder

Something which can affect everyone in one way or another, especially recently when the idea of mental health is really prominent, something like this can really change peoples lives for the better, and its important that whilst the guidelines need to be conveyed to the audience, the ‘campaign’ needs to also have promotional information to get across the fact that doing this can positively aid yours or a loved ones life.

Without effective prevention and treatment, mental illnesses can have profound effects on people’s ability to carry out their daily lives and often result in poorer physical health.

Interesting that physical activity can be used to increase healthy lifestyle, and an unhealthy lifestyle can lead to lack in physical activity. Interesting loop?

It’s clear through looking at their information and background to mental health disorders that there’s no cure or remedy for it, its simply that a variety of things, including increased physical activity can start to improve mental health and make someone start to feel better. So it’s important not to tell the viewer that it will suddenly make everything better, but more to inform them how they can start to improve their mental health and what benefits physical activity can have.

According to the latest IHME estimates, more than one in six people across EU countries (17.3%) had a psychiatric problem in 2016 – that is, nearly 84 million people. The most common mental disorder across EU countries is anxiety disorder, with an estimated 25 million people (5.4% of the population) living with anxiety disorders, followed by depressive disorders, which affect over 21 million people (4.5% of the population). An estimated 11 million people across EU countries (2.4%) have drug and alcohol use disorders. Severe mental illnesses such as bipolar disorders affect almost 5 million people (1% of the population), while schizophrenic disorders affect another estimated 1.5 million people (0.3%) [11].

Lots of lengthy stats and pieces of information which are very important and prevalent within the project, however different people will have a different attention span when it comes to this sort of thing, mental health practitioners may be very interested in it all, but will sports coaches and people who work in sports development? Its important to make sure that with such a wide spread of people viewing and using the information, its given in a way which isn’t overwhelming with information.

As I stated previously I think its important that although I put the guidelines and the science over to the viewers, there’s also a very visual side to the campaign which is less overwhelming and factual to keep a good level of pace throughout the response to the brief.

Physical Activity in Sphere

Psychiatric rehabilitation can be defined as a set of techniques and interventions useful for decreasing the effects of chronic mental illness and for actively promoting patient reintegration in the social and work context

Important to understand what psychiatric rehabilitation is and that it isn’t necessarily all technical and complicated.

sport, exercise and physical activity, due to their positive impact on physical and mental health, are one of the most commonly used rehabilitation practices in addition to other approaches such as music therapy, neurocognitive therapies, and therapeutic horticulture

Physical activity and exercise won’t just make you feel better, its something which will come gradually in unison with other strategies, important to make this clear and use persuasive language to encourage them instead of telling them it will make them instantly better.

Several studies [18] have indicated that sport, exercise, and physical activity can positively influence the prognosis of some mental disorders that represent the most frequent causes of mental disability – including major depression, schizophrenia and Alzheimer’s disease

Proven facts and figures which have been cited by many people and many organisations.

The guidelines emphasize a person-centred approach [29, 30] where the patient plays a proactive role in their own recovery, becoming an active participant in the process, aided by the trainer and community

Overriding point that its a person-centred approach and no one is being told to do something they don’t want to do. Although it needs to be persuasive and give all the information needed, the patient is the most important person in terms of how they carry out the physical activity and it has to be mostly on their own terms. Again,. this leads me back to thinking about using persuasive language but making sure it isn’t too informative and full on.

Take-aways:

Probably the thing jumping out to me the most at the moment is that there’s a large amount of information and statistics which are involved with he project. From the guidelines themselves which are very overwhelming upon the first look, to the background research.

Whilst I’m aware it’s mainly the professions who will be the viewers and recipients, the patients will also see the information and something which works well to give to both the professionals and the patients is useful, there isn’t much of a need to create different documents for both when they can be placed together.

Ultimately this means the information and tone of voice within the work has to be easy and useful for all. The information, facts, statistics, guidelines etc all need to be there in abundance, however the challenge is to ensure it isn’t too overwhelming. Creating a sort of campaign which makes use of information design to convey the guidelines and facts (appealing and readable for professionals and patients alike), whilst also still keeping a very bold and visual style which will also be appealing to the target audience as a whole.

I also want to make sure whilst there’s a lot of ephemera which will be very informative, some of it will be less informative and more creative. For example a booklet may head a spread of information design containing the guidelines, with another spread which could be purely visual, just in order to not overwhelm the reader.

Campaign outlining the science and guidelines whilst also creating a creative visual style which stands out
Informative video talking about sphere and the guidelines
booklet/leaflet and other printed ephemera
website/app

Client Meeting

We e-met with the client to discuss all of our interpretations of the brief and the information and to ask any questions we had regarding our initial thoughts.

Clients agreed that it could be aimed at both the professionals and patients as long as all the information is conveyed.
Open to it being very creative and visual, again as long as all the information is accounted for.
Wanted to steer clear of too much black, but other than that there was no objections to other colours/fonts/styles etc.

March 6, 2020June 18, 2020

Penguin Book Cover – Design

After carrying out research into the book itself and previous iterations, I know how I did and didn’t want my cover to look. Firstly, it was important to me that the book took on a new, modern feel and was different from a lot of other science based books out there. I wanted to use some of the same imagery, such as space and the earth which had clearly been successful in the past, whilst trying to put a unique spin on it, something which would keep the idea and style but make it much less cliche.

I started off very outlandish, I took inspiration from the quirkiness of the way the book is written and tried to mimic that in the design, using slightly bolder colours and shapes to make it much more standout, and give it that uniqueness which the book has.

I didn’t feel that either of the designs worked how I wanted them too, although they are both very different, neither of them showed enough of a ‘science’ vibe which was important. There was however a few notable points I took from it, for example the use of colour was definitely something which I needed to look into, as well as the shapes used in the second design, the grid-like images give me a sense of science/physicsand planets in a more contemporary way than photographs.

Taking that feedback I designed a few more ideas taking some of the touchpoint from the initial ideas.

Overall I think the designs were really starting to be much better, they started to give a much stronger sense of science and space, but using a much more minimal and modern angle. After showing lecturers and peers the designs, I looked at fine tuning them which lots of advice. The white doesn’t work as although its cliche, black for space just makes sense. The although the grid shapes being in colour is very bold and striking, I think it takes too much away from the overall design of the cover, the titles and authors name etc. Finally, although I like the idea of the planets on the cover, I think using the actual plants its a touch cliche, maybe using a colours spheres of just circles might work better.

I experimented slightly with the blurb to make it more playful and to fit with the friendly and approachable vibe of the book. I think it works well to make the back of the cover look much less mundane. I then looked at changing the planets to make them less cliche whilst still keeping them bold and hoping to keep the idea of them being planets. I think all of the iterations worked fairly well, however the full circles I think are too bold and stand out off the page too much. The ring designs are far better, they give off a planet vibe whilst also keeping a very contemporary approach which is what I was looking for.

Finally the cover just needed some fine tuning, with the help of more feedback from other pupils as well as lecturers. One of the main concerns I had was how different it was from lots of the other designs of the cover, however different was definitely what I wanted, and I think it definitely comes across to me as a modern take on a science book, giving off space themes with planets without any direct space and planet imagery. I think the typesetting both on the front and back both show off the playfulness of the way the book is written which I really like, however I changed the font to a more condensed font to make it slightly bolder and more stand out. The last element I added was a slight speckled background. I didn’t want the background to resemble a starlit sky too closely, however I think a slightly lighter speckle definitely gives hints of stars in the sky without being too obvious.

February 7, 2019

Placard – Final Development

After trying out my initial ideas I knew I wanted to keep my placard quite simple with large text and a simple colour scheme to make it as easy to read as possible. I sketched out two more ideas in which I have taken phrases from my initial page and incorporated them into a design.

The first idea was using the phrase ‘how many times do you have to see it to believe it’, this relates to our initial manifesto and is about the issue of people hearing about mental health or seeing people with mental health issues all around them, but still choosing to ignore that it is a real issue. I wanted to use the repetition of the word ‘mental illnesses’ as a visual metaphor for people seeing it over and over again in real life.

For my second idea I used the quote ‘I don’t control my own thoughts’. I think using a quote from someone with mental health issues is very moving and will make the audience think as it comes from the mouth of someone who is effected. I thought back to our manifesto and the idea of illusion and wanted to put this together with the idea of using a head that is slightly abstracted and hard to see. A persons thoughts should be inside someones head, yet the idea of not being able to control your thoughts makes me think the words ‘control my thoughts’ should be almost scattered around the head in an abstract way.

I think the ideas behind both of these have potential but I want to experiment more with the layout and colours etc.

September 23, 2018September 26, 2018

Reflection Task

Ever since I was young I have alway enjoyed drawing and painting as well as making things. I studied art at school and love being able to influence and inform people while doing something i love, therefor I originally looked into studying graphic design at university I was excited at the thought of being able to apply my art and creativeness to communicate my ideas and solve problems as I think this is the main purpose of graphic design. I have only studied graphic design for 2 years so I am still fairly new to the subject and look forward to learning more.

Throughout induction week I have taken in a lot of information about the next few years. Although i did a lot of research into the course and came to Cardiff for several tours and talks about the course, I wasn’t aware that so much of the course was about teaching us more about the theory of graphic design and the ways to communicate a message, not just about designing something to look good. This excited me as it gives me options to keep learning and broaden my knowledge on the subject.

Over the course of the next 3 years I’m excited to build on the knowledge I already have and become the best graphic designer I can be. Although I thought initially the course would be a lot less work, I’m looking forward to getting stuck in and starting the course. My knowledge on graphic design is still limited, over the next 3 years I can take everything I can from university and the course and to make me a well rounded graphic designer who will be ready to move into a job in graphic design when I graduate.