OUGD406 - Licence to Print Money, Final Decisions

I decided to cut off the left hand side. This fixed a few problems I was having; I was struggling having too much negative space and people complained that the type would become illegible so to solve the issue I made it that it wouldn't look to muddled and instead look like the type is purposefully illegible. This would mean that on it's own each note would work but together they would work as just the planets being aligned. Each features text that shows the average distance of each planet from the sun which again is information you don't need when all the planets are aligned. 

The type has been aligned perfectly aligned all the way up with colonial credits symbol, the amount and the distance from the sun have all been aligned separately to make sure all the notes look the same. One of the things I had to consider with using type on my note was the point size. Screen printing screens will only allow things through up to a certain line thickness and if it is too small you will lose detail. I found some information on this as I wanted my type to not take up too much space so would like to go for the smallest size you can use which turns out to be 12pt. 

http://www.gigposters.com/forums/showthread.php?t=69054 

- Type sizes

I experimented with taking the shape of the note further. My inspiration came from the show Battlestar Galactica where all paper has the corners cut off. I found this feature to be quite a nice touch as it looked as if they had considered even the tiniest details. cutting off one corner of the note may work but two maybe too much, this is a step I will be looking into after the printing process. 

OUGD406 - Licence to Print Money, Currency Symbol Design

The design had to be simple to fit the rest of the note, I also wanted to create something that looked as if it would have evolved from currency symbols we have today. I came up with a name for my currency 'Colonial Credits' It took me so long to decide on a name but I kept coming back to the idea of credits, it just seemed right for space. The colonial side came from the idea that new colonies would be the reason for this currency so it made sense. I started with a simple design that looked too much like the Euro, it evolved into something that looked Copyright esque. I added a line through the design to tie the letters together and as rotated the design it became more and more science fiction and space looking even Star Wars looking maybe reminding me of the Rebellion symbol. I tried the symbol on one of my notes and it seemed to work so the next stage would be taking it through to the all of them for the final design.

OUGD404 - Large Publication Final

This is the final print of my large publication. Like the small I wanted my book to be easy to read and strong. I chose a style that viewers are used to and because the function of this book is not to be sold and to go alongside the selling of my graphic novel I left the cover quite minimal. The pages were put together within indesign and then printed double sided working from the front and back pages to the middle to ensure they were in the right order when bound. I again used a 5 hole pamphlet stitch but this time with a thick gray thread which would stand out on the spine but it again looked clean and kept the minimal look I wanted to achieve. I cut down the book using a scalpel and a rule this can give a clean look but as I didn't hold down my book very well and because it was so thick the second half of the book creeps out more than the first half. I didn't want to try and correct this as it's recommended to cut off no less than 5mm at a time so this is something I should take more care of in the future. 

OUGD406 - Exhibition Group Task, Contract

This is how we split up the jobs within our group, although we all had set roles we still all met regularly and conversed over social media to make sure all the decisions were being made appropriately and to all the groups decisions.

OUGD404 - Small Publication Digital Copy

I have posted below the digital copy of my small publication. I have worked on a very simple grid system, aligning all the images to the centre and all the text to the edge of the page. All the text is top left aligned bar the first two introductory pages which have been made to stand out from the rest. Each page is numbered for ease as this style of publication would most likely be used for some sort of revision or reminder tool so page numbers would be helpful to be able to flick to them. Simplicity is seen throughout the whole book. I have tried to incorporate some of the skills we have learnt over the past year like alignment of text, kerning, orphans and widows. I have used these skills to make the book look familiar to the eye and increase the ease of reading for the viewer.

OUGD404 - Small Publication

I printed two different versions of my small publication one with a gray background and white foreground and the other the opposite way round. I believe the white background works the best with the printing and binding style I have chosen. The gray cracks on the folds which, I don't need to worry about on the white and the orange thread stands out more. The orange was to help the design stand out as there isn't any colour on the front to help the book jump out.

The publication is to work as a little helpful guide on Layouts and grids I took the content from Vignelli's Cannon.

I printed onto 200 GSM matt paper stock as I wanted the publication to last and not feel flimsy to flick through. The binding method I used was a 5 hole pamphlet stitch this was to add a hand rendered method into an otherwise digital publication. The style is neat and gives the reader the ability to view the book without losing any information to the binding of the page. This also means you could create a double page spread without losing anything.

The top (grey cover) publication has been cut down to the same size as the one below but the back has left a white line on one side that I think is a problem that occured during printing but I wasn't able to see it until cut down. I used a scalpel and a rule to cut down the book and surprising worked well as there weren't too many pages to cut down. I have been told that the design looks like it has been printed off centre but as you can see the grid pattern would be able to carry on around the whole design I left one side on the right to lead the eye to open the book.

OUGD406 - Licence to Print Money, Planet Research

I wanted to write some sort of information on my notes so it was more than just the planet and the amount the note was worth. I looked into adding the person that discovered each planet and the year it was discovered to each one from the link below but I realised some didn't have an official discoverer and Earth would be a bit of a tricky one. So the next link I have posted are of the distance of each planet to the Sun. It was hard to decide whether I should do the distance from each to Earth but my thinking was that if I am creating this currency for the colonies on other planets then it might be best to just have the distance from the Sun. I used the average distance rather than any of the others because it made the most sense.

http://curious.astro.cornell.edu/about-us/56-our-solar-system/planets-and-dwarf-planets/general-questions/222-who-discovered-each-planet-intermediate

- Who discovered each

http://www.universetoday.com/15462/how-far-are-the-planets-from-the-sun/

- Distance of planets to the sun

OUGD406 - Exhibition Group Task, Initial Ideas

Above are the initial ideas we came up with for our group task to plan and design the exhibition. We wanted the design to be cheerful and fun, not too corporate and boring. We did explore certain ideas just to make sure that we went down every avenue but it wasn't what we wanted and didn't think it would suit our target audience. The audience we decided to go for was students, young designers and design studios, we wanted our theme to really emphasise this.

OUGD406 - Licence to Print Money, Currency Symbols

I looked into many different currency symbols because one of the comments left on the last critique mentioned using some sort of name or currency for my money. The notes with the numbers alone I think would work as it would be a sort of universal currency so people should know but I would still like to experiment with the design.
Looking at the symbols above I'm enjoying the idea of using a letter or just one symbol not multiple to create my design as I feel it looks cleaner. If you look at a $, £ or € sign then you know straight away what it is nothing complicated is needed.

OUGD406 - Licence to Print Money, Critique 2

As well as the arrangement changes and the size changes I made I also included some further design choices using a border. I asked which people prefered leaving blank designs as well. 

I gained some interesting feedback:

The main verdict was that a border is not needed on the note and still some rearrangement is needed. I think something is needed to fill the negative space on the left so I will be considering that but it looks like a frame is not needed. I think the reason I added them was because on the screen it's hard to see what the note will look like but once they're printed and cut down it will look framed anyway.