Communication through art and design evaluation.

The title of our latest brief is ‘Communication Through Art and Design’. On this brief I was asked to produce an advertisement or a packaging for a product and a 250 word written essay comparing and contrasting two different brands. Then we had to present our ideas to the group.

I researched into seven different brands, Kenco, Tiffany, Lancôme, GHD, Ralph Lauren, Coca-Cola and Timberland, to analyse the message each brand was conveying. I then created critical thinking questions to help me analyse the brands. I found this very interesting because each brand was unique as they all had different identities and diverse ways of promoting and advertising their products.

I then wrote the essay comparing and contrasting two brands, Kenco and Tiffany because they are completely different and are aiming at different target audiences.

I experimented with a variety of techniques I had learnt in other units to re-creating packaging, such as collage, also PhotoShop, which I hadn't used before. I also researched the psychology of colours to understand their meaning and what colours are associated with.

The product I was given was a pair of tights. At first I thought, ‘how am I going to make packaging or an advertisement for this?’, but I researched different types of packaging specifically for tights, including highstreet and designer. I then created a customer page which represented the customer I was aiming my product for, asking myself questions such as, where does she/he live?, what is her/his hobby? I decided to produce packaging for the tights because I am very interested in making things, rather than using media. I sampled ten varieties of packaging in my sketchbook, looking at origami boxes and bags, then chose the colour palette by looking at the psychology of colour, especially colours that would represent my target audience. The colours that I chose were purple, white, silver and gold. These colours show that my target customer is wealthy, fun, sophisticated, with a strong character and a warm heart. I designed my own logo for the tights packaging after I had looked at different font styles for the logo.

Using PhotoShop and developing packaging were both new experiences for me. I enjoyed this assignment because I had fun sampling and producing the packaging. I was happy with the outcome, but I know that I could have produced the packaging to a higher standand because I did not leave enough time for the manufacture of the final outcome. If I was given a similar assignment again I would change the materials I used on the final outcome as I feel that the material I used was not strong enough. I could have also made the packaging more sophisticated.