The week of January 6th

WELCOME 

This morning we’ll be going over the quarter’s schedule, deliverables, and the final presentation template. Afterward, there will be a lecture introducing the brand process, how a brand is developed, how to create a simple mission statement, and how to build tonal territories.

Read Content and Watch:

Design Studio: Airbnb Redesign (videos)

 

Do:

Part 1: Finish up your 3 character traits & mission statement from class — to be handed in next week.

 

Part 2: Working as individual designers or in your teams of 2: build your tonal territories.

 

Use the tagged images from your Brand Character Exercise (Who am I?) and complement those images with an image search for your brand.

 

Start to find images (both related and not related to your brand’s industry) which fit the 3 character traits of your company.

 

Do the same process for color(s), typefaces, patterns/textures/glyphs/lines for your tonal territories. (Use the supporting words and phrases from your in-class sprint and set them in a typeface and/or color that tonally reflects the umbrella word).

 

Letter Shaping Game

The Bézier Game

Plotting Vector Points with Jessica Hische

Letter Building: Scaling & Shaping

Horizontal & Vertical Bézier Handles

Lettering Tutorial

Vector Lettering Techniques

 

The week of January 13th

*Hand in homework from week 1.

 

Today we’ll be covering brand positioning & brand promise. Afterward, we talk about the different categories for trademarks. As a class we will take a sample trademark and deconstruct the mark using everything we know from design history influences & gestalt principles to use of typography and color theory. Then we’ll use a couple of design techniques to generate inital marks and/or wordmarks.

 

Brand Attributes, Position Statement (why your company is different) and Brand Promise (what the company will strive to do in order to make the brand positioning statement and brand attributes come true) Exercise. (pdf)

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Trademark category #1: Monograms, Initial Marks and Lettermarks

Random classmate name draw. Use the Brand Deck to help determine your classmates visual language.

 

Then do a brain dump of 15–20 sketches exploring letter combinations for 1-2-and/or 3 initial lettermarks. The first 5–10 sketches will probably be your normal sketching process.

 

For the second 5 sketches you could use descriptive adjectives about your classmate to explore ideas, e.g. edgy, whimsical, childlike, etc.

 

For the last 5 sketches try out the “Forced Connections” technique, where you take their 3 interests (e.g. hiking, baking, fishing) and make a list of visual attributes that can be combined with their initials to make an initial mark. For example, fishing = fish hook + the letter A

 

*OneLook.com (site)*

 

Choose your top 3 and transfer them to a new grid. Show all of your sketches to your classmate. Have them pick their top 3 choices and transfer them to the new grid next to your chosen top 3.

 

*Iteration_TweeningMatrixSample (png)*

 

Then create another 10 –15 sketches experimenting with an iterations/tweening matrix in style/tone between the logo options. Choose your top 3 and present them to your partner. Narrow choice down to one option.

Read:

More brainstorming techniques for trademarks (pdf)

 

A sketch checklist for when you run out of ideas for modifying letters/words. (pdf)

 

Lynda.com: 3 minute video for iterating wordmarks (video)

 

Time sheet to log hours

 

Do:

Part 1: Either working solo or with your team member, generate at least 40-75 sketch ideas for your logo (40 – 50 ideas if you are working alone and 50 – 100 if you are working on a team).

 

Try using the 5 trademark categories and short, timed sprints to generate a variety of approaches to your trademark.

 

If you have a partner, trade your original sketches and iterate off of their ideas/sketches. Bring in all of your sketches next week. (estimated time ~2–3 hour per person)

 

Part 2: Finish your brand positioning, key benefit and brand promise. Let me know which territory your client primarily inhabits.

 

Print this information and hand it in next week for me to read over/give feedback. (estimated time ~30 minutes total) 

 

Part 3: Finish your tonal territories. Make sure you showcase photography, color pallettes, typeface(s), line quality/glyphs styles (e.g. bars, frames, rules, dingbats, icons), textures & patterns. (estimated time ~90 minutes total)

 

Part 4: Log your hours: Click here and save your own copy of this time log sheet (google sheet link)

 

The week of January 21st*

In class we will be doing a sprint for Trademark category #3: Abstract marks. We’ll be taking stacks of post-it notes and thick sharpies, to sketch iterations for a given topic.

 

After the sprint we’ll be discussing the difference between inspiration moodboards and concept boards. As a class, we will review/deconstruct sample tonal territorries and the process to generate concepts, a library of assets, and a visual approach for an entire brand. This exercise will help you to create your own concept board with visual styles/applications for your client’s brand.

Do:

Part 1: If needed, make the final revisions to your brand character & mission/purpose, your brand promise & brand positioning statements. Print out one copy for the entire team to be used for presentations to alumni next week.

 

Part 2: Review your own tonal territories and create one work-in-progress concept mood board direction from your tonal territories (photos, colors & type)

 

Part 3: Choose your top 1–3 trademark sketches you think have potential for your brand. If you think you have not found something that would would, try your hand at sketching a few abstract marks as well and see they might fit with your chosen sketches. Bring the chosen sketch(es) into the computer and iterate on your design choice(s). Print the best of your digital roughs for your strongest trademarks. These are works-in-progress to showcase ideas and get feeback. Don't strive for perfection, strive for clear direction.

 

Print: 

Next week some alumni will be here. They have offered to do the first look at/review your work. They know everything will be in a rough draft phase.

 

Please have the following printed out and ready for review:

your concept moodboard

your tonal territories (just in case)

your work-in-progress logo(s) and bring all of your sketches (just in case).

 

(Print out one copy of your brand purpose, promise & positioning for the entire team)

 

The week of January 27th

This week we’ll be meeting with alumni to review your work-in-progress. After lunch we’ll spend time generating your quarter timelines for touchpoints/deliverables.

Choose potential deliverables and create realistic timelines to achieve them. Don’t forget to include your style guide as a touch point/deliverable. Hand in your timeline by the end of class with team due dates. BE REALISTIC!

 

Click here for a sample of brand deliverables:

Chobani Rebrand

Library of Congress Rebrand

Dunkin‘ Rebrand

Weight Watchers 1 Rebrand

Weight Watchers 2 Rebrand

Coke Rebrand

Do:

Part 1: Refine and finish your logo designs based off of feedback from the alumni. Make a vertically stacked version as well as a horizontal version of your chosen design. Scale your designs (both large and small) to see potential problems.

 

Part 2: Begin developing your touchpoints/ deliverables according to your timeline.

 

The week of February 3rd

This class will be devoted to the key components of a style guide. There will be lab time to work on brand projects and setting up a brand style guide in an InDesign document.

Read:

Basic Parts of a Style Guide (pdf)

 

Basic sample of a logo guide book. (pdf file)

 

How to Build a Brand Bible & Visual Style Guide (the basic elements in a guide book) 

 

How to start your basic brand style guide (defining your colors and buffer space) 

 

Do: 

Part 1: Continue developing your brand.

 

Part 2: Start pulling together the key components needed for your style guide. Set up your master pages in Indesign and begin filling in client history, brand purpose/mission, positioning & promise information into your guidebook.

 

The week of February 10th

 

The week of February 17th*

Lab time to work on brand projects.

Sign-ups to meet with Jill.

Peer-to-peer reviews.

Do:

Continue developing your brand.

Continue designing and revising guide books. Revise and refine brand touch points.

 

The week of February 24th

We’ll spend the morning looking at Pantone books and working with color across media channels.

 

Sign-ups to meet with Jill.

Peer-to-peer reviews.

Continue developing your brand.

 

Continue designing and revising standards guide books and deliverables.

Content for Accordion Panel 2

Books:

Designing brand identity

Building better brands

The brand gap

Zag

Brand Bible

Logo design workbook

Logo design love

The logo brainstorm book

How Brands Become Icons: The Principles of Cultural Branding

Unbranding: 100 Branding Lessons for the Age of Disruption

 

The week of March 2nd

 

The week of March 9th

There will be a brief discussion on  your presentations: timing, content & deliverables.

 

Lab time to work on brand projects.

Sign-ups to meet with Jill.

Peer-to-peer reviews.

To be handed in:

A PDF of your presentation

 

Presentations:

Presentation order (pdf) 

 

The first person/group within each client category will be discussing the client background research, audience, character, promise, positioning, & attributes. After the first person/group, everyone else in that category need not repeat this information.

 

You will have about 5 minutes for your presentation. When you present you will be focusing on your point-of-view for your client, your concept board, and your touch point deliverables.

 

The week of March 16th

To be handed in:

A PDF of your presentation

 

Presentations:

Presentation order (pdf) 

 

The first person/group within each client category will be discussing the client background research, audience, character, promise, positioning, & attributes. After the first person/group, everyone else in that category need not repeat this information.

 

You will have about 5 minutes for your presentation. When you present you will be focusing on your point-of-view for your client, your concept board, and your touch point deliverables.

Project Idea for Special Topics

Please fill out evaluations for Branding

 

Resources, Case Studies, & Books

 

Sites & Trends

 

Seattle and Beyond

 

 

Branding