Jonathan Barnbrook

Jonathan Barnbrook visited the college and spoke to the students about his work and how he has worked in the industry for 20 years. He has worked alongside David Bowie on his album cover Heathen. Listening to Barnbrook talk about who he works for shown that he will not work for any company that asks him to lie for them. " Designers stay away from corporations that want you to lie for them" (John Barnbrook) I see Barnbrook as a bit of a rebel and designs what he wants to design for based on his opinions and what he believes. Barnbrook is also designing the LITFI identity which I thought would be brilliant for my work, however Barnbrook did not talk about his work for the LITFI which I found disappointed. He also recommended we start on our own so that we can work for who ever we choose as an individual and stay away from some design work thats less enjoyable.

Studio Vibes

When visiting the design agencies in Manchester I noticed there were different vibes within each studio.

Creative Spark was a favourite of mine, the studio had plenty of books used for reference but it also had a bright interior with the use of yellow and black which worked well together. The designers were chatting and helping each other. The studio appeared friendly and fun to be in.

Pixel 8 was also a bright studio painted in bright orange with the desks laid out with the designers facing each other. The studio was also filled with books. The studio was very quiet but busy and hardworking at the same time, which made me feel like I was being too loud and in danger of disturbing them, the atmosphere was peaceful.

Dinosaur had many random objects set around the studio which I found interesting and also inspiring in some way I cant seem to understand yet. The sight of lambs and grass in the middle of the studio is fantastic. The studio was very quiet with only one member of dinosaur there at the time I visited but it seems like a fun and friendly place to work in and I enjoyed every minute I spent in there.

Come Design With Me

Come Design With Me was an evening of food, drink and also the opportunity to speak to graduates from last year and also graduates from a few years earlier that have made it into the industry but also some that are still trying their hardest to find themselves a work. At the beginning of the evening we started with a tombola exercise where an individual picked a question out of the tombola to ask the graduates. Each question was answered in turn. The questions were mainly based on their final year at university and also how they made good impressions with other designers.

I especially enjoyed listening to good advice the graduates gave us whilst we are in our final year and what we have to do in order to ensure we have great contacts after we graduate by keeping in touch with designers we have already spoken to and shown our portfolio's to.

Sarah is a graduate from two years ago and she told me how difficult she found speaking to the professionals and keeping in touch with them, which she realised was a big mistake when she came to graduate with no contacts and also no direction of what to do next. Sarah worked in a few placements some she really enjoyed and others were less enjoyable, however Sarah soon found her feet when she landed herself a job with Adidas designing for them and also working to give other students the opportunity of work placements and the chance to learn how the design industry works. The design industry is completely different to being a student.

portfolio Visits

Design Symposium gave me the opportunity to get some feedback on my work. I explained the briefs for each project and answered questions. The feedback I received was on my good presentation skills and how professional my portfolio looked by using a box portfolio. Also it is clear through my work that I enjoy working with typography, Matt especially liked the typefaces I designed in my 2nd year (Leaf, Pacman,Buzz). I was given ideas on how I could improve how the typefaces are shown to make a bit more interesting by using quirky quotes that relate to the shapes used in the designs. I enjoyed Design Symposium because again my confidence grew stronger.

Portfolio Visits

Creative Spark was the first agency myself and lisa visited with our portfolio's. We spoke to Neil the director of creative spark and asked for five minutes of his time to look at our portfolio's. Neil gave us 40 minutes which we found was very generous considering Neil and his team were very busy. Whilst looking through our portfolio's we were asked questions based on our work and how certain projects came to be. We were also given advice on how we can further develop some of our projects to see how far we can take them. Overall we were given some really good advice to take way, because this was our first visit of the day, I found that because Neil was friendly, helpful and willing to look at our work, I had a lot more confidence for the rest of the day, which allowed me to visit other agencies within the Manchester area. We continued to visit other agencies we were both interested in, however due to the agencies being very busy we were unable to get a second opportunity for our portfolio's to be looked at.