0UGD603 / PPP3 - Self Branding: CV + Mini Portfolio.

OUGD603
SELF BRANDING
CV + MINI PORTFOLIO

Today I began working on my CV design of which I was mostly inspired by the invitation image I sourced during my initial stages of research. Alike to the invitation I want to section my cv out clearly, and alternate between purely type sections as a form of communication, and some simple illustrations. I think that a combination of this will help it to connect with the branding I have so far, but also help to communicate the type of work I like to create. 
I began by making a list of information I think is crucial to put on my CV. 

- Logo
- Contact details 
- A small statement about me as a designer
- Education 
- Technical skills
- What type of design I love to do
- Traits 
- Languages 
- What I do outside of designing 
- Lets make Gold together. 

Statement:
Hi, im Sarah Goldthorpe, a graphic designer with a love for branding and packaging. I create experiences and touch points for humans to interact with, love and enjoy. 

Education:
Queensbury school
11 GCSE's A* - C

Queensbury school 
3 A levels  A - C

Leeds college of Art
BA HONS Graphic Design


Technical skills:
- Adobe illustrator 
- Photoshop 
-Indesign 
- Adobe After effects 


What kind of design I love to do:
- To create experiences
- Tactile 
- Concept driven 
- Illustration 

Traits:
- Go getter attitude 
- Positive thinker 
- Likes a challenge 
- Reliable 
- Professional 
- Confident speaker 

Languages:
- English and Spanish 

Alongside designing:
- Eating Mr. pretzel 
- Going to gigs 
- Travelling everywhere 
- Visting the zoo


I think its really important that I try to come across as an all round individual on my CV and speak about elements of both my personal and professional practice. Visting professional Tony Broomhead from Architecture at sheffield commented upon how quite frequently job positions can be handed to people, and the deal can be sealed due to something personal on the CV that captures the attention of the employer, because they find it interesting, or it is something they themselves enjoy as well. 

Using the list above I will cover not only my abilities with Graphic design, but also my work ethic/ mindset and personality. 

Using the invitation as inspiration, I came up with a grid to separate all of the information above, placing them into sections where I thought they were most relevant to each other and read more fluently.

Overall im really happy with my CV design, I think that it communicates all the necessary information needed to know in a simplistic and clear way. Whilst the gold details adhere to the theme running throughout my branding, in keeping with the brand personality, the white dominated colour scheme with black and gold details help the information to be 100% readable. 

I also tried to take Tony Broomhead's advice on board when writing my CV in reference to the information such as 'Alongside designing' in which I tried to be unique and really personal with my responses. 

To send out with my CV I also wanted to produce a mini portfolio encompassing three projects that I've done across my time on the course which I feel really represent my practice. I want the publication to be short and low cost to make offering a 'taste' of my work as a designer, in a format that won't break the bank to produce a set. 

For the front cover continuing with the theme, I've come up with the phrase 'Show me the Gold' in reference to the gold being my work. I was worried that this phrase might sound too overly confident, however on my studio visit to the Archipelago, they said something they admired about me was the confidence I had speaking about my work. Its always good to see a Graphic designer who believes in themselves and what they produce.  
As the publication is meant to be a mini portfolio, I want to have the piece mainly dominated by imagery of my work and supported by only small pieces of text. 

The works I have chosen to include are John Lewis, Bradley Sykes and Beckett Beccari. I wanted to show my ability to work towards different kinds of work including A design competition creating packaging for a large brand, A live brief creating outcomes for a single person, and the ability to create a range of branding for a luxury company. 

The mini portfolio:

To finish off my self branding I wanted to also produce a folder to house my business card, CV and mini portfolio, and a front cover/first sleeve for my full size portfolio that attaches it to my self branding.
I created the portfolio cover and folder to match for clarity and consistency. The only change I made to the folder cover is that I introduce myself on the folder front cover to try and create a friendly and warm but strong introduction.

Folder front cover:



End products:

OUGD602 / PPP3 - Self Branding: Design development.

OUGD602
SELF BRANDING 
DESIGN DEVELOPMENT

I found a really great slim typeface 'Raleway thin' that I felt has both the elegance and simplicity I am looking for for my branding. I tried having a bit more of an experiment playing with solely my last name in gold foil, however I felt that by taking part of my name away from the design I was taking away part of my identity. 

Plus I really feel like the business card is something that is exchanged to 'remember' someones name and details, therefore the business card should serve this function and the information presented should be clear. Therefore I will endeavour to use my full name. 

I added my full name back in and started playing around with the size:

I felt that the font was the right kind of minimalism and simplicity I was looking for, to further enhance the ability to read the logo, I played with the kerning to space the letters out a bit more.

I swapped the design to left aligned in order to make it a bit tidier. I also then played with scale a bit more to accentuate the 'gold' theme of my branding. 

I am really happy with the front of the business card design and think it is something that both represents me as an individual playing with colour and finishing in reference to my last name, but is simplistic enough that it was support my portfolio without overcrowding it with extra design.  

I moved onto the back which I wanted to keep just as transparent and clean as the front, however I also wanted to use this space to get some of my personality across also. I won't always hand out my business cards with my other printed branding and so it is important it communicates everything I want it to by itself. As with my last 'temporary' business card I used a bit of word play on the back of the card in hopes of getting those viewing it to warm to me a little. 

Whilst working on my current branding I came up with the idea of 'making gold' as a reference to making better than amazing, on point design. Here I came up with the phrase 'Lets make gold together', I thought that this would be great in that it communicates both to a potential employer and any possible clients I may have before I secure a job at a studio. 

I then listed my details in a simple and readable format adjusting the kerning again to make the design appear even more clean and clear. 

 

OUGD602 / PPP3 - Self Branding research + development.

OUGD602

SELF BRANDING

RESEARCH

I started looking at other branding that played will gold foil for some inspiration how how it could be used, and to see within what kind of designs it looks best. 

 

There are a couple of designs that I really liked from what I had found on my search:

Here I really love the simplicity of the ultra light typography combined with the clean and polished black ink. Although it is something I would normally think of to do, I think the minimalist nature of the type would really work to support my portfolio of work rather than fight it for attention. 

I also found an invitation design that although isn't branding really gave me a few ideas about possible layout. I felt that although the invitation design was very much text based, it had a very illustrative focus due to the use of different typefaces and fonts as well as point sizes.  I also liked again, the simplicity of separating the text via small lined sections and the use of a consistent white background colour pallet with black and gold details. 

Firstly I began playing around with my logo / business card:

My ideas began quite illustratively and I started playing with the visual theme of gold, almost like a sign of something special and magic. However I felt that i might be falling back into my overly illustrative roots again and so I tried stripping back the design a bit more and subtracting the illustrative elements. 

However after subtracting the illustrative elements I still wasn't overly keen. I think this is due to the bold text, it is not as elegant as I would like it to be. 

I tried the design with a typeface I thought might be more elegant, but i still wasn't happy with the design. I went back to the drawing board to see how I could make the design more minimalist and powerful, whilst still being welcoming.  

OUGD602 / PPP3 - Self branding update.

OUGD602.
PPP3.
Self Branding update.

This year I have really thought about how I want my branding to represent me and how my branding will work alongside other elements such as my portfolio. 

I think in past years I have tried much too hard to create something that is visually engaging and experimental with all the bells and whistles to grab attention. Both my first year and second year self branding were very illustrative based and often when looked at alongside my work, would fight it for attention. 

I'm not happy with the branding that I did at all last year, and for this reason I want to start all over again and create something completely different. Last year I was very much swayed by a lot of the projects that I had done and enjoyed. Towards the end of the year I was really interested in and really enjoyed children's design, and I think this was very obvious in my self branding, so much so that I lost myself within it, and it became all about children's design. 

However this year I have found on a journey through branding briefs that branding and packaging is really what is best and most enjoyable for me as a career path. For this reason I want to create something completely different to my previous branding. 

I want to:

- Shed the children based image.
- Create something minimalist and simple that wont fight my work for attention. 
- Use neutral colours that are not over powering. 
- Really think about what elements I need and not what I THINK I need. 

I also want to really consider format. Last year I created my branding to go into a little wooden box but I understand that this is not appropriate or realistic, especially if I need to send work out to studios. Therefore simplifying the format and creating something that is feasible to post out will also be a main priority. 

I think I was ultimately still quite lost and on a journey of discovery when I created my previous branding, whereas now i am much more sure of my place within graphic design and what my branding to communicate. I want my branding to simply put a name to my work almost as when people say put a face to a name. I want my branding to support my work rather than detract from it. 


I felt like with my temporary business cards which I used when out on studio visits, began to communicate the type of brand I wanted to be represented by. I wanted to have my self brand communicate a little bit about myself that was special to anyone else and play upon this - my temporary business cards played upon my nickname for the front logo, and on the back a create a nice bit of word play in hopes it would help potential employers etc warm to me. 

I still really liked the idea of playing with my name, but my temporary cards worried me a little because the term 'sass' can be taken in a range of different ways, including being a bit brash and outspoken. When speaking to one of my friends from outside university (I often ask other people about opinions as it is a hard task to brand yourself) they suggested playing with my second name 'Goldthorpe' using a 'gold effect' (foil) to play with the first section of my name. I thought it was such a simple way to still communicate something about myself, but also gave the opportunity to keep the design quite minimalist and still avoiding the same overboard aesthetic of last year.