Branding - Roots

For our branding class, we started by putting a spin on a normal product line, company or service. We then spent the rest of the quarter devising deliverables for our company. The concept I came up with is a spa called "Roots", completely enveloped in wooded terrain, isolated from large town and city life. The feel and execution will be rustic and minimalist, with warm and rural accents (closer to camping, rather than a posh resort). Massage practices will continue the rustic theme (hand churned lotions, pine cone scrubs, etc). The target market will be women, ages 35-60, who usually have high responsibility, well paying jobs, and are looking for a temporary disconnect from their current lifestyles. The spa also includes cabins (or yurts), so guests can make a true getaway out of their trip.
The first deliverable is stationary. This was made from heavy water color paper and stained with watered-down acrylic paint. The idea is that these letters cannot be run through printers, so everything will be hand written. The business card is stained balsa wood, with a wood burned logo, and a lazertran transfer on the back for the information.


The next deliverable was the website.


After that, I created a general mailer for people who had expressed interest in the retreat. The concept is an empty jelly jar, simply labelled "Fresh air". The rear of the label reads, "Just in case you've forgotten what it's like." I used the wavy lines in the logo to create a nice pattern for the outside of the box. For the inside, I wanted to portray something fresh and clean, so I painted a blue sky (also acrylic).




The next was a magazine ad. It would be placed in most outdoor or traveling magazines. The idea is that the more you unfold it, the more you learn about the retreat, and the further you get into the woods.

The next deliverable is a journal that all guests would get as an in-room gift. Because the spa acts as a retreat, this would be a good way for guests to write about their time at the retreat, or vent about any stress back in the "real world". The journal is wrapped in real leather, with wood burned logos, and the same watercolor paper used in the stationary.



The final deliverable is a bath product set. It includes a citrus bath salt, mint leaf massage oil, honey butter lotion, and pine cone scrub. All the the products are delivered in a hollowed out tree trunk with wood burned logo. Containers are acrylic stained balsa, with wood burned icons.

Packaging - Eggs! and Pencil Pushers

Packaging included two assignments for the quarter.  The first was egg packaging.  The objective was to create a container that could hold a dozen eggs.  However, the container could only be made of paper, must be a stackable (but not a basic) shape, had to support 16 pounds on top without breaking any of the eggs inside, and had to be dropped from waist height without breaking any.  I started by analyzing how an egg could be supported, and the simplest way to go about it.  I figured that an egg only breaks if a part of the egg is exposed to excess force or pressure.  By using the intersecting cardboard sheets, it put both even pressure all over the egg, and also kept the egg off the sides of the packaging, while those same sheets reinforced the integrity of the outer walls.

Next was to develop a way for the package to be securely closed for transport and storage.  For this, I cut off the top layer of cardboard, right above the wavy corrugation, on both the lid and main package.  I flattened the corrugation and glued down a piece of chip board to serve as the hinge.  For the closing mechanism, I created another hinge, but instead left the top unglued.  the free piece could then slip in between the corrugation and the top layer of cardboard.   I cut a half circle at the top, so the tab could easily be pulled out.

For the graphics and concept, the packaging would be branded toward kids, for a food line that would promote eating healthy at an early age.  This would be something kids would have fun with, and also be very recognizable and different than anything on the shelves currently.  I also chose to do packaging for medium, large, and jumbo egg sizes.

Eggs - brought to you by beer.

The second project was to create packaging for a small, utilitarian type of product (napkins, staples, batteries, etc.) The packaging we created could only be made of bristol board, and could not have more than 2 right angles in the design, and could only use glue on two parts of the package. If a cylinder was used, it could only have one flat side. We also had to design the packaging around a picture of a target market we randomly selected. My target was a guy in in a business suit, riding a moped, with his briefcase in the front basket. I figured he worked at an office building, and handled a lot of the grunt work. It made sense to design the packaging in a way that stood out, as his work is probably rather dull. I decided to package pencils, but give the package some kind of function. The result was a pencil shaped container...the top cone is connected to paddles that move the pencils around, until they pop out of the front slot. I also decided to do a continuation of the design, the idea being there could be a different pencil holder for all the types of lead (9h - 9b).

Photoshop 1

Our only assignment for the quarter was to use what we learned to redesign a movie poster of our choice.  I've become a fan of westerns recently, so, yeah.  

First post! Woo!

This is going to be a fun one, as I'm going to post everything we did 4th quarter, from concept to finished product.   We took Photoshop 1, Branding, Web Design, and Packaging.  Go ahead, snoop around.