OUGD505: STUDIO BRIEF 2 - An Exhibition of Aston Martin // Planning Collateral and Questions

We had a studio session with Lorraine today, covering some quick exercises to improve our approach to studio brief 2. To begin with, we were asked to write a list of somethings we were unsure of, within this project. Questions we wanted to ask about our briefs, things we needed to know to help us progress forward. I wrote the following;

• Is the scale, and the amount of collateral I want to produce too much or too little?
• Photography of illustration? For the tickets, brochures and other Aton Martin event collateral.  
• Roman of Gothic fonts for the typography? I'm not sure if I should use a traditional Roman serif font, to keep the 'English Heritage' aspect of Aston Martin, or use a modern Gothic font, something like Helvetica, but not Helvetica, probably Open Sans, to bring the brand into 2014, as the company is 101 years old, the technology has moved with the time, is it time to modernise the type?
• I'm unsure of the logo to use. Keep the existing logo for Aston Martin or create a new one specifically for the event? Or should I perhaps use a combination of the two?

Questions others in the group asked (which I think would be useful to me);

• Is my target audience refined to it's full extent? As in, is it specific enough? or is it too specific for it's context?
• What should be my final full range of products? It's important to know this, so you know exactly what you need to create, perhaps planning and rewriting the brief, so you know exactly what you need, would be the way to achieve this.
• What stock should I use? 
• What colour scheme would be appropriate? Research into your audience/content to find which colours work the best for your brief.
• Is all the collateral 100% essential? Figure out what you can do in the realms of possibility. 

We were then asked to get our briefs for this project, which we had written ourselves, and underline the words which were important to the brief, as seen in red above, and the words which were 'fluffy', undefined and unnecessary, words which didn't really have direction.

What's important about this brief?

• 101 years of Aston Martin, sophisticated design and engineering. Celebrating the company.
• The audience primarily consists of 18-25 year old, males. Often with familes, from upper middle class backgrounds. 
• Educational, tasteful tone of voice.
• The scale and location of the event.
• Branding and Promotion.

The penultimate thing we were asked to list was some things we wanted to learn in our final three weeks here in second year. This would form a to-do list of things we need to do before we leave. Something to push for in this project. I listed the following;

• Make some packaging from scratch which looks decent and works, performing it's intended function. Serving a purpose.
• Use a larger range of colours within a project. Too often I'm working with one or two colours and stock, studio brief 1 for example. I want to see how I work with a larger colour scheme, to see how it benefits the design of the event. As an underline part of the audience is families. 
• Experiment with 4D design, time based design, perhaps as part of the promotion within the project, something to attract members of the public to attend the event I will be proposing.
• Use design boards more effectively. Critiques for design boards are essential, and they are the, usually, the only thing the client or competition judges will see, so they have to be impactful and work to communicate the concept, whilst also looking good.
• Time management. Being able to balance the time I have, assuring all the work get's done on time. Even taking time out to relax, some down time to reset your mind, and come back to the work with a fresh perspective. Lorraine recommended working for 10 minutes solid, without doing anything else, then checking e-mails or whatever, and repeat. 

Final chunk I promise. We were asked to rewrite our target audience based on some of the questions we've already thought about. It might not change a huge amount, some small extra adjectives perhaps to extend the definition of who we're catering for.

Eighteen to fifty year old males, upper middle class background, average earners. Often with families with children. Above all, with a large interest in cars, speed and engineering. They would love to own an Aston Martin, or a similar grand-tourer/super-car, however they are unable to afford one. This event is their gateway to exploring and engaging their childhood dream, of driving and seeing these cars.

Based on the tightening of our audience, I thought I should rewrite the desired collateral I would like to produce, and define how the audience would engage with it. Below is a mind map of various areas I would like to explore. Obviously, due to the time constraints which have been placed upon us,  I will be unable to create all of the collateral, but I would like to create at least 80% of it.