Working alongside Roz and Becky we decided to focus on 'getting people to do something new'. All of the titles to choose from were very broad and still left a big margin for us to decide what we wanted to design and create. Getting people to do something new, I found it quite easy to come up with a range of ideas for this subject because today in the world a lot of people do the same thing day in and day out. Just trying to get people to step out of their comfort zone or timetabled lifestyles is a very healthy idea, an idea which could be developed into many resolutions.
After brain storming many ideas we decided to create a pack aimed at children aged 4-7 specifically to help them enjoy more healthy foods. It is a well known fact that child obesity is becoming a problem. We found many statistics online to back this up as well. There are already existing campaigns to help tackle this impending issue and most which seem quite tired and over worked. We wanted to create a pack which didn't associate food as being 'good' or 'bad' and pushing the idea that all food's are good in moderation and how eating is a fun experience.
Whilst researching we took note of all the ways previously tried and tested, and tips which helped to encourage children to try more types of food.
We made conscious design decisions to appeal to both the parent and child alike. Bright colours and a healthy clean look attract by making the product look eye catching and fun whilst still remaining to look healthy and a helpful product.
I feel like over the time scale given, we have created a good all rounded product. I feel I have worked very hard for this project, but I feel if I hadn't been part of a group my idea wouldn't have been as strong. Having two people to work alongside enabled us to bounce ideas off each other quickly and therefore we worked at a much faster pace and produced a much more well thought-out and flawless design.
I always feel very nervous when I hear that there is a group project around the corner, and needless to say this project has had it's fair share of disagreements, but overall I feel it has run surprisingly smoothly. I feel this was helped by the initial 'lonely designer' ad that we made and replied to.
Our ideas were quite ambitious and originally we were planning to make an advert as well advertising the product. However there just wasn't enough time. If it were to be sold in shops an advert would be more necessary to help promote it, but at this stage it was the least important part of the project.
For this project I found, due to the fast pace we were working at, it was hard to write all of our ideas down. After the initial ideas brain storming session it all seems a blur of quick decision making and basically getting on and doing the task in hand. Regrettably this made my sketchbook suffer greatly and most of the evidence and ongoing documentation lies in experimentation of actually making the product, ideas which had flaws eg. box sizes, robustness and screen printing.
Upon completion of a project you can always look back and see ways you could have improved things. This project in particular left us kicking ourselves when we decided to seemingly waste two days of our time in the screen printing rooms. Only sharing a general knowledge of screen printing amongst the group trying to print our whole project this way was somewhat of a learning curve. A failed learning curve, but still a learning curve. Our designs were quite complicated in relation to our knowledge of the process and needless to say the finished prints weren't to a highest standard. So after two days in the printing rooms we admitted defeat and resorted to digitally printing the designs. Looking back now I feel we should have considered digitally printing before hand as it is a very quick method and still produces the same results. Brushes and textures can be added digitally to create the illusion of screen printed work.
Screen print attempt:
Overall
I feel very happy with the finished product. Our group worked well together and I think everyone would agree that together our idea was much stronger than it would have been if we had worked alone. I feel my time management skills have improved greatly on this project. Partly because when working in a group I don't want to let people down and so I am more inclined to work to my full potential.
When working in groups there are always people who do not share the same working style and therefore personalities can clash. It is important be be flexible and listen to all ideas put on the table. I feel I am a very open minded person and work well in groups and can adjust to situations well. This said I feel the project has overall gone very well and in mainly smoothly.
Final Products
