OUGD603 - Extended Practice Crit

Crit Rules:
1. Bring the brief
2. Bring 5 Questions you want answering
3. Bring Practical work
4. Have a scribe

My 5 questions
Little Art Collection Brief:
- Do the patterns portray their themes?
- Are they unisex and fit the right target audience?
- Are the patterns too flat?

PPP Stuff:
- Does my CV have the correct information? Or is it too formal?
- Are there anything else I should send with my cards?

Little Art Collection Feedback

I showed the group my patterns so far (as seen below.)

In regards to the general theme of all the patterns I was told it should be less blue, as blue is quite a boyish colour = biased. I was told to make the clouds and background paler on the aeroplane and the background on the baking a different colour. Also to make the aeroplane design simpler, removing the text from the stamp as baby grow/jersey material can't hold fine detail that well. The general feedback was good as it is not aimed at the babies themselves - adults buying it, rich adults. I was told to do some more research - aim for M&S, John Lewis. They are high end and would sell products to the target market the brief is for. I asked if I should include a caravan in the camping one, the group said no as it would downgrade it. They said posh people don't use them, people are going back to traditional camping. I need to be aware of the target audience and their hobbies and skills, they're wealthy so a different class. I was told to look at Joules and Seasalt for more inspiration as well as the Paul Smith dinosaur campaign. I then asked if incorporating text into them would work, specifically putting yummy in the baking one. They replied saying that with the baking one this would work and be cute and relevant. Someone suggested that I should create bold single images or scenes to match each theme and possibly make a set for each one. 

Next I showed the group some christmas cards and hotdog CVs that I am planning to send to studios before we break up for Christmas. I had just got the cards printed so couldn't really get much feedback on those but I asked for feedback on my hotdog CV.

I was told immediately to drop the professional titles and to make it more fun and more 'me'. I need to show my personality through the design which is more important than the massive amounts of information according to Alec. I was told that I need to make it a lot more fun, illustrate it more, talk, chat, design but not write. Also I showed this as a print out version and they said that a better paper will give a higher quality finish. There was a really good suggestion that I could illustrate the love and hates bit to include patterns and picture of what I do and what I like. Overall the consensus was that it needs to show me as a designer, what I'm about and what I do. 

This was really helpful as Alec has experience of receiving these kinds of things off people for his magazine. He said he'd rather see what I'm about than a formal CV.