OUGD504 Brief 01 My Design Process Origami Harebell

Because I was considering a three diminutional option for the leaflet design, I thought I would look into some origami shapes. I found this design for a flower along with a great website for other instructions. I thought it might be in keeping with my natural and illustrative style to create something organic and fits well with the idea that my design process is something living and ever changing, as I pointed out in my earlier mind map.

I also really like the way they are almost curved because me design process very rarely includes straight or logical progressions.

http://www.origami-instructions.com/origami-harebell.html

However, I immediately hit up against a problem. The paper I had was far too thick to fold in the delicate ways it needed to. So, tomorrow I will go on to experiment with different stocks and the ways that they can fold and what this will mean for my final project.

OUGD504 Brief 01 My Design Process Folding Research

Out of all the designs I found online, Pinterest mostly, These were the ones that stood out. 

I really love the way the folds of this suggest chaos and slight disorder, while still being practical and usable. This is something that I want to try and suggest with my design, so maybe what I need to do is look at 'bad folding' in a chaotic manner and seeing how content might fit into this frame work.

In lots of last years briefings I managed to completely disregard colour. This time I want to think about it from the get go. The example above in the form of a menu makes great use of simple folding and a limited two colour pallet. It gives a really strong sense of inside and out which is a theme I have been thinking about in relation to my design process. There is the face value of my design process, which can seem quite organised and normal, but really, inside I am a mess of ideas and thoughts all vying for my attention. This is something that I could focus on communicating. However, I need to be careful to limit the direction I am going in so that the message my design conveys is not too mixed.

There is the obvious option of creating a three dimensional leaflet of some description. I wanted to look at a box design because something I always like to do with a brief is to consider what the usual parameters for the brief might be, the proverbial box, and attempt to think outside of it. I would have to be careful to make the box reversible because I would not want to suggest that all my thoughts occur inside the proverbial box. 

OUGD504 Brief 01 My Design Process First Thoughts

As soon as I heard the Brief I started to think about how my thought process would be different, in short its 'unique selling point' that would be the focus of the design. However, I think I could be jumping the gun slightly. I need to go back to basics and start by researching paper folding options, so that I can glean something of the structure that I could be working with.

OUGD504 Brief 01 My Design Process Studio Session Study Task 1

Once we had been Briefed, we were asked to get into small groups and brainstorm as many words about our design process as we could. The image below was our result.

We were then asked to individually transfer this information into a flow chart or diagram of some description. Although we had already done this in some respects, we all noticed the way that nothing really worked in a straight line. There was a constant tendency to return to numerous places in the process. However, we all agreed that this was only a model, when we approach a new brief the process varies. 

We were then asked to create a folded piece of paper to represent the diagram we had just created. This was really difficult because the diagram is very complex and paper folding in its very nature is quite basic most of the time. In a response to this I tried to make mine complex, using the triangular shape as the focus because of its directional component, which is so dominant in the idea of my design process. It is always aiming straight towards the design solution. 

Doing this also got me thinking about the idea of creating a leaflet that folds in to create a finished item in the same way that a design process does. 

We then talked about our results and how they were similar and different. Something that constantly came up was the way that no one's design process was completely linear or very easy to define. So what I really want to set out to do is come up with a meld of the paper folding and 2D design that creates a completely new way of representing a thought process.

OUGD504 Brief 01 My Design Process

During this week you will design and produce a folded leaflet entitled "My Design Process" that describes your understanding of the design process and specifically how you apply this process to your own work. This assignment will allow you to explore the nature of design at an increasingly commercial level while also exploring creative approaches to leaflet design and folding. This brief is only one week long and therefore will be very intensive. You will be given support by your tutors in the form of crits and tutorials while studio tasks will focus on aspects related to constructing and designing leaflets. You will be expected to explore and experiment with paper and card stock: folding techniques and styles; and graphic concepts and communication. Your progress, developments and creative decisions should be documented in your studio blog. At the end of the week you will present your final leaflet design and plan for print to the rest of the group. You will receive feedback and points to consider during this final crit. The full Brief can be found at http://estudio.leeds-art.ac.uk/mod/page/view.php?id=4167  This brief has a different structural integrity compared to those of the previous year. What I find really difficult to comprehend is the way that the audience for this peace of work is...us. This is the way self initiated work is based. So , I guess I need to just have fun with this brief. I want to start with a completely open mind and just do some open research to inspire me. I will look into: folding ideas, alternative ways of telling stories, maps, and ways of presenting thought processes. I want to look into these narrative themes because the content will shape everything else about the design, so I want to find a way of explaining my design process that is not simply a flow diagram.