Final product

Here, we are asked to complete the final work and document our work with screenshots throughout the production process. Below are some screenshots of my progression of the final design. I utilised Photoshop for the design of the artwork. In step 01, I utilised a stock image of a rock and inserted it into the project file as the main “platform” for the animals. In step 02, I have individually sourced and paid the license fees to utilise stock images of the spotted animals and Photoshopped each into the design, to look like they are standing on the rock. In step 03, I acquired some royalty free images of greenery/junglish ferns and added those into the design, and lastly in step 04, I added the image of the van I had mocked-up complete with the “Spot-On” logo and giraffe spotted pattern.

Below is the final logo and design for the “Spot-On” The Travelling Zoo.

Below is how I presented the artwork to the client, showcasing “Spot-On” as a van mockup and a mockup of a variety of different marketing collateral.

 

Produce a prototype

At this stage of the assessment, we are asked to produce a prototype for the design solution. This can be produced with lower resolution images or less expensive materials, but should work in the way you would like your final design to work.

Interpret and Respond to a Design Brief

In this assessment, we are asked to choose a design brief from the following link:

Why don’t you? 50 project briefs from leading design creatives to inspire your next project

There were so many interesting and out of the box ideas to look through, but I decided on the following brief suggested by design artist Chris Ratcliffe :

Hate reality? Love animals? We have the perfect project for you: the Fantasy Zoo. The concept is quite simple: We give you an imaginary budget of £10,000. You trawl the free ads, local papers and internet to find animals for sale that you can collect to build your own fantasy zoo. Using your very own artistic genius, visualise the zoo in any way you like.

 

 

 

Share your Photomedia project

In this task we are asked to share our photomedia project in our production blog and at least in two other websites of our choice. Encourage peers, colleagues and members of the online community to post feedback and comments. Supply the screenshots and links to your post in your portfolio.

I shared my photomedia project within this WordPress Blog, on the Open Colleges Forum and on the Certificate IV Digital Design Facebook Group.

Below are screenshots of my posts.

Below are some useful feedback made via the WordPress production blog.

“The final image is gorgeous, well done. I would suggest putting up the contrast of the background image slightly as there is a lot of white light. This should make the white text and logo stand out a little bit more too.”

“Your artwork looks amazing! I think if you can throw in a butterfly or something, that’d be the icing on the cake!”

Due to these suggestions, I further refined my artwork again. I added a blurry vignette which gave the image slightly more contrast, and instead of adding a butterfly as suggested, I added an image of a flying bird. I did however change the colour of the bird from pink and white to green and purple. Below are the results.

Final artwork

Final artwork with logo and tagline

Mockups of final artwork

Finalise your Photomedia Project

At this stage we are asked to provide visual evidence of our completed photomedia project. We need to also include a simple checklist to illustrate the completion of any technical requirements of the project for its delivery and output.

Below is the final version of the artwork I designed for Araluen Botanic Park’s “Secret Garden” exhibit. Following the design brief, I have utilised original photographs from the park including their central pergola, botanical plants and flowers, photos of children running (to resinate with “family”) and finally I added some Photoshop filters to give the artwork a “magical” touch.

Final artwork

Final artwork with logo and tagline

 

Mockups of final artwork

Below is the checklist I utilised before final delivery to the client.

Milestone Stages

Managing your development process by creating multiple milestone stages allows you to test, challenge, review and refine your photomedia project in a more organised way. Furthermore, sharing these stages with colleagues, clients, and stakeholders though your production blog provides you with constructive feedback and different perspectives on your work throughout the development process.

In this task we are asked to lay out three of our milestones with a brief summary of each.

Milestone 1: Sketches and mock-ups

Below is a sketch of a word map and draft layout I produced. The word map assisted me in jotting down key words and ideas for the potential design and help stimulate the creative design process. The sketch of the potential layout was a requirement in the design brief. It also helped me visualise where each element would be placed on the artwork. Both exercises helped create a clearer picture and got the creative juices flowing.

Milestone 2: Acquisition stage

Acquiring and choosing the images for the design was a time-consuming exercise. This required some planning and logistics in itself. I planned out the day for the photoshoot in advance, making sure the weather was appropriate and that the time of day was ideal for lighting. I got my kids appropriately dressed and drove for 45 minutes to the Araluen Botanical Park. Once we got there, we walked around the grounds taking photos and exploring the landscapes. After we spent a couple of hours there, we went home and I then uploaded the photos onto my computer for sorting through which was also a time-consuming process.

Milestone 3: Refinement stages

There were quite a few refinements carried out throughout different sub-stages. Below are the four main versions of the artwork. The initial version was designed by using multiple photographs and merging them into one through image compositing.
Here I also adjusted the brightness and contrast of the artwork. In the second version I added the flowers in the foreground and made some adjustments on the colour processes. In version 3 I finalised the colour process, and in version 4 I added the “magical” effects using Photoshop filters, finalising the design.

Specifying a project brief

The previous portfolio tasks allowed us to experiment and test ideas to build viable project concepts. For this task, I am asked to finalise this stage and expand and develop one concept as my photomedia project. I have chosen Araluen Botanic Park to be the mock-client for this task.

Araluen Botanic Park has been a part of Perth’s history since 1929. Thousands of visitors enjoy the streams and horticultural treasures around every corner. With back yards now becoming virtually non-existent for the average home block, Araluen has become a treasure for families to escape to a green space.

Araluen is proudly renowned for hosting iconic events and exhibits all year round. This summer they would like to promote “The Secret Garden” exhibit in their central Pergola. The client requires original artwork to assist in promoting the exhibit over a number of marketing realms. The artwork should contain original images of the Araluen’s central “Pergola”, “botanical plant life” and images that resinate with “children” or “family”. The overall artwork should be colourful, harmonious, intriguing yet self-explanatory, be appealing to families and inspire the feeling of “magic”.

The client requires the final artwork within a 5 day-turn-around. They would like to approve the following milestones before the artwork is finalised: Original photographs to be utilised, and a draft sketch of the design layout.

Some design examples have been provided by the client below. The client would like the artwork to contain original photographs but include a touch of “magic” through effects.

Copyright Thornewood’s “Secret English Garden”

Copyright English Heritage

Copyright Alamy

Unspecified Copyright

Copyright Jango LWP Studio

Copyright Pure-Poison89

In order to fulfil the design specifications, you will need access to a DSLR camera to take the original photographs and you will need a laptop or computer and access to Adobe Creative Cloud to design the final artwork.

The final artwork should be designed and delivered digitally as CMYK, TIF, 300 DPI, 3508 pixels x 4961 pixels (print resolution) / 842 pixels x 1191 pixels (screen resolution), A3 landscape format. The artwork must be appropriately laid out so it can be used on other promotional mediums. Deliver a version of the artwork alone and another version with the client’s logo and the tagline “Come discover the secret garden”. Along with the print-ready artwork files, please provide the client with a digital mockup of the design as an A3 poster, promotional banner and web background for their website.

Image URL Sources:

“Secret English Garden” photograph
“English Heritage” photograph
“The Laburnum Arch at the Dorothy Clive Garden” photograph
“Magical Garden” artwork
“Magic Garden” artwork
“Her Secret Garden” artwork

Refine your ideas

For this exercise, we were asked to share three blog entries with fellow colleagues and students to get some constructive feedback on our designs. I shared my latest 3 posts entitled “Design Principles”, “Image Editing” and “Image Compositing” which showcased my photos and designs for each topic respectively.

I posted screenshots on the Open Colleges Student Forum and in the Digital Design Facebook group and received some useful feedback below:

“Great job on your image editing examples. You mentioned that you used the lasso tool to crop out each image individually. Sounds like a lot of work! Have you tried using a layer mask and brush tool? It usually comes out with a cleaner result.” 

“I absolutely love what you did with this project. If I could only give you one suggestion, it would be to increase the brightness slightly on the kids layer.” 

This feedback was extremely useful and I aim to endeavour to use the above tactic for cropping images in the future. The other suggestion was to increase the brightness on the children running on my photomedia design. Below is the refined image…

Before | After

Image Compositing

In this exercise, we are required to use at least 5 original images and create a totally new image with a specific theme in mind.

I went to Araluen Botanic Park in Western Australia and photographed my kids and the surrounding flora.

My main objective was to take clear, attractive photographs that I could use to create a unique, harmonious design that would represent the beauty of the park, and the fun we had during our visit.

I utilised my Canon EOS 60D DSLR camera to capture all the images and Photoshop to edit each image accordingly. Below is the final design.

Final Design | “Secret Garden”

 

Below are the 5 original images used to create the design.

Photo 1

Photo 2

Photo 3

Photo 4

Photo 5

Image Editing

For this task, we were asked to take three photographs with different themes and subjects and use image editing tools to enhance both the intended purpose of the image and the design elements within them. Below are my three photographs as “Before and After”. In all instances, I utilised Adobe Photoshop as my image editing tool.

Boxer
My idea was to edit an image, worthy for a fitness magazine cover. I took a photo of my husband, focusing on the outward boxing glove. I then opened the image in Photoshop and created a copy of the image as a new layer using the Duplicate Layer option. This was to be my “working version” of the image. I then cleaned up some of his blemishes on his face using the Spot Healing Brush Tool. I then removed the white wall background using the Magic Eraser Tool. This worked quite well, but I cleaned up any remaining rough edges using the Polygonal Lasso Tool. I then placed a gradient grey background as a separate layer under his image.

Before | After

Before

After

 

Field of Dreams
This is a photograph I took of my son running through the fields on our trip to the US last year. It was summertime in Wisconsin and the photo I captured was picturesque. For the purpose of this exercise, I wanted to explore what the sky would look in a different colour. Firstly I created a duplicate copy of the image as a new layer using the Duplicate Layer option. I then opened the Hue/Saturation option in the layers tool bar and played around with the Hue Colour Slider until I found a colour I liked which ended up being +95 (making the sky look bright pink). I then merged the Hue/Saturation layer to the duplicate image layer, creating a flat image. Next I utilised both the Rectangular Marquee Tool and the Polygonal Lasso Tool to remove everything in the image (except for the sky). This essentially kept the image the same as the original, but kept my sky pink. I thought I was done, but then I started playing with the Blending Mode for the Layer option, and after applying the Multiply effect, the sky turned dark purple! I was in love!

Before | After

Before

After

 

Baby Chino
For this exercise, I wanted to see what it would look like if I superimposed my daughter’s cute baby face into my coffee froth. I took a photo of my coffee mug this morning from an aerial view. As with all my image editing, I created a duplicate copy as a new layer. I then used the Adjustment Layer and selected the Black and White option. I played around with it and eventually chose to customise using the Neutral Density feature. This created quite a contrast from the original image and gave the photograph a totally different feel. I then opened the image of my daughter’s baby face in Photoshop and moved the layer over into the working project file. I then simply used the Multiply effect option on her layer, and the Polygonal Lasso Tool to remove the rest of the photograph I didn’t need. Finito!

Before | After

Before

After