Mock-ups

Digital mock-ups

I decided to make some quick mockups of my designs so far to see how the zine/ album cover would look in person. I think this was important especially now that I can't actually print it anymore. The issue with this is that I don't know if I should follow the strict nature of designing for screen printing? I could always make a negative of the design, but there would be the risk of the gradient not looking as good screen printed.

Zine concept

This is the concept that I would have explored by using a zine to wrap around the vinyl cover; the design involves the textures separated on the zine cover and vinyl. This would probably work better if the zine texture was a different colour scheme in order to contrast. This mockup also gave me a chance to consider the sticker design for the vinyl itself; I used the same texture from the album cover. I think this is an area that I need to develop more. Also, contextually, this design would have the type printed on the outer sleeve/ plastic film. 

Crit feedback and development

Peer feedback

I asked a few peers on what could be improved on my previous album cover designs. The main feedback was:

• they preferred my digital typeface in comparison to the hand drawn typeface 
• the colours that I used in my previous designs were too chaotic/ too busy
• suggested that I should use only 2 or 3 colours 
• remove some parts of the gradient overlay; takes away the contrast of the black 

Here is the initial design that is a lot more stripped back; I removed the heavy gradient on the textures, and only used 2 colours (green and pink). I still wanted to use soft colours to reflect the soft, melancholy vocals of post punk, which still contrasted each other to reflect the conflict within the genre. I think that the decision to remove some aspects of the gradient was best as it emphasised the black more; the harsh black texture represents the chaotic and aggressive instrumentals of post punk, as well as the context of rebellion within the genre. I wanted to use these textures to reflect these themes in a more abstract way, as it challenges the audience more and gives freedom to translate ideas. 

Different colour schemes

These designs explore various colour schemes, to test which communicate the genre best. I think that having a pastel/ soft colours is key within this design, alongside tones that could challenge this. I received a lot of positive feedback on the second colour scheme; it uses soft pink hues, which are conflicted with quite toxic greens and yellows; I feel like this communicates the genre quite well. 

Despite this, I feel like there should be a contrast between the a side and b side, as each side should communicate the different bands (Molchat Doma and Buerak). I have already done this with the textures; the a side uses a texture from a blacked out window, to reflect the idea of 'houses are silent'. On the other hand, the b side reflects the 'good times' translation of Buerak, through using the texture of broken glass to communicate a party atmosphere, as well as referencing the aggressive nature of punk in Soviet Russia. I feel like I could distinguish either side from one another with a different colour palette; the design above does so with a contrast between blue and pink, which works quite well and also received positive feedback. I also like how the decision to use my digital typeface relates to the idea of censorship of punk in Russia, as it is intentionally illegible to some extent, especially with the harsh texture. 

Final versions of artist business cards

Back design/ adding type

The next step in the business card design process was to create the back design; these versions used the same texture for each card, and tried to create a consistent design with the same colour scheme. For the type, I used the most cursed type known to man... comic sans. It seemed like the best type to use for an intentionally bad design, and I didn't really want to overcomplicate it with a hand drawn font. 

Adding threshold 

For experimentation, I decided to play around with editing styles by adding a threshold and using block colour. This stripped down the design a lot, and made it look a lot more contemporary and minimal. In a way, I actually prefer this style as all of the cards look more consistent and its less chaotic; however, I kind of want my cards to be chaotic in order to look bad? So I needed a bit of crit feedback. I asked a few of my peers and the general feedback was a 50/50 split between both with and without threshold... so I suppose I need to consider what I personally fits better; I shall do this when I complete all of the other business cards to see what works consistently. 

Alternative colour scheme for business cards (5X5 artists)

Alternative colour scheme

Following my crit feedback, I decided to make some improvements on the colour scheme of my business cards; my peers said that I could try and differentiate each card with a different colour scheme, as previously they all looked a bit similar. Due to this, I looked at each artists instagram and picked out colours that stood out to me; the only one with no colour being Appear Offline as they only work in greyscale. I feel like although this was a subtle change, it made the designs look way better (even though they're still meant to be bad).  I think to further experiment, I could also try different image treatments like adding a threshold? 

Crit feedback for business cards/ stickers

Crit notes

Because of the chaos that is coronavirus, I found myself stuck without feedback on my PPP work, so got a few peers to crit what I have so far online. This will hopefully help me try different things with the sticker/ business card concept, as working from home can often make the design process repetitive. Here is a list of what a few people said:

• I like the bright colours and the texture on the business cards; try differing the colours for each artist to make each one unique, maybe take colours from their work?
• Not keen on the gapping on the business cards of the tex, try different alignments?
• Take the sticker designs further by adding text? Especially to the aims ones
• Try more editing with the stickers e.g. gradients/ halftones
• Could you have each sticker in a variety of shapes that relate to the artists? Make them more individual
• Stick to the WordArt approach 
• Try using some really naff holographic paper effect on the stickers - like the star stickers you get in primary school
• Have fun with it and push how far you can to make it look rubbish
• Take the colours from the artists; but unite them with a motif?

ironically bad business cards - using WordArt

WordArt business cards

In order to make my business cards even worse, I decided to throw in some lovely word art to really show off my design skills. I thought this would be perfect to create nostalgia and irony, and really making my business cards look like a kid has made it in the IT room in 2007. Above are just a few examples of the raw components, but obviously I edited them slightly to try and make good design from it?? I think lockdown has made me go mad. 

I made some nice little flat lays of these beautiful business cards; I actually think they look pretty good in contrast with the black background, and they all look consistent together. 

For each design I added some MS paint illustrations inspired by each artists work to juxtapose the colourful design and to visually reference their work. I also wanted to add a more playful atmosphere, and cartoon style work seem to feature a lot in each designers work; it also helped differentiate each business card, as they all use the same gradient- this could be a possible issue?

Business card developments

Digital flat lays

These are some flat lays of the previous business cards designs I made; I just wanted to focus on on artist initially to experiment with styles and different typefaces.

These designs use a more simple approach, yet still involve the gradient texture used in the previous version; I wanted to add more texture by adding scratches and small lines, which give it a kind of nostalgic/ old school atmosphere. I wanted to apply the same intentionally bad approach to the back, by having the type in a really annoying alignment, with gaps etc. Basically, my whole intention is to throw every design rule out of the window as my own style and the artists style are very unorthodox and don't take themselves seriously - this is obviously the extreme result of that.

Initial 'business card' designs for publication

Type

To communicate my own style and the sense of humour in my 5 artists work, I want to make my business cards for the 5X5 publication intentionally bad; this will help create a witty/ ironic design, and keep it playful to match my own approach to design. Initially, I played around with type design on MS paint, which has the reputation of being old and bad, as well as being playful in its nostalgic sense. I thought this would be pretty funny to write each artists name in.

Business cards

This business card was a bit too boring; I want the business cards to use an overwhelming amount of colour, or a really bad colour scheme. 

I took shapes from the artists work - this kind of star shape seemed to crop up in a lot of the 5 artists work, it worked well as it is kind of reminiscent of old cheesy adverts.  I used a crazy amount of colour to make the card design look messy/ bad, and added a grain to make it look outdated. In a sense, the type for these two versions still wasn't as bad as I wanted it to be; I needed the business cards to actually look shit to make them obviously ironic. 

This is the initial concept for the back of the business card; I took inspiration from Elliot Ulms' inclusion of negative space, yet still framing it with the gradient texture to offer a contrast. I added the MS paint type, which tied the design together by using the same off white/ yellow colour. I also added a half toned image of Seapunch's work to visually reference his design. I think the main issue with this design is that I feel like I could visually reference each artists work in a more abstract way and with my own illustrations.