Evaluation

For my final major project my initial aim was to create a product on the topic of shark conservation, with the intention to educate a younger audience to be more aware of how dire the subject is and why action needs to be taken. As I expanded upon my initial ideas of what I could create for my fmp, I decided on making an infographic as my main product. I chose this as not only would it expand my design skills- being a product I haven't made before- but an infographic would allow me to present vast amounts of information in a visually appealing manner in order to catch attention and spread awareness easier than a small poster or magazine would allow me to.

My success in creating these products and preparation for my presentation at the exhibition have exceeded my expectations, as well as showcasing my new understanding of codes and conventions, trends, and audience theory in order to grasp the ideal demographic. It also reflects my use of utilities and materials available to me throughout production by the products I have made. These all come back to my research, looking through to find the best results in production and my final piece. I believe I have succeeded in making a professional product, especially when I reflect upon the feedback of my infographic received from my peers. This has instilled confidence in me that I have more than achieved my initial aims in what I aspired to create for my fmp as I only planned to create an infographic and one kind of product to sell, completing this project with my infographic and three products alongside donating the proceeds to the Shark Trust charity.

My primary research developed my fmp aim as it led me to find several charities devoted to shark conservation, which gave me the idea to create additional, easily replicable products to sell at the exhibition in order to raise money to donate to their cause. This in turn also sets an example to my infographic’s audience as it follows one of the suggestions I put onto it on how to help conservation yourself, and assists in adding an element of communication into my design. Part of what helped me achieve this in my design process was following the AIDA model.

The core purpose of my project was to spread awareness on shark conservation. I wasn’t sure entirely on what information I wanted to include in order to do this, as it’s such a huge issue with many different sectors I could focus on. In order to solve this I looked into the biggest cause of killings in order to bring attention to that main problem. This turned out very well as it’s allowed me to showcase the harshest facts and figures in order to shock the audience into realising how big the need for conservation is.

A major part of my research for this project was finding existing infographics to gain inspiration for my own. This included infographics on or alike the subject of shark conservation as well as those on topics completely different in order to look at the differences in design between them, for example the use of colour and shapes. I believe that this is reflected in my final design as it is a mixture of the two kinds, the purpose of which coming from my desire to create an infographic unique to those already made for my subject.

Another section of my research that blended together were my audience research and colour theory. This is because whilst I specified my ideal target audience to be young- aged 16 to 15- and unisex, I purposefully use blue as one of the prominent colours in the design of my infographic due to several reasons. One being that not only does it show and link to my research of existing inspirational conservation infographics, second that the colour mixed with yellow, orange and white gives my infographic the atmosphere it needs to reflect, and the third being that it reflects my research into colour theory, specifically Joe Hallock’s colour preference survey. The results of this survey show that blue is the preferred colour of all ages and genders, allowing my infographic to still appeal and be suitable to those outside of my chosen audience.

My time management, whilst being successful in guiding me to completing all of my work on time for the deadline, could have been better. This is due to problems rendering me unable to follow my action plan, such as falling ill, arriving late to college and being put down to work extra hours at my job. I could have lessened one of these problems by giving away those shifts to allow me to stick to my production schedule. Another way I could have improved my time management was to drive to college, which would have prevented me from catching a late bus.

I've successfully learned and developed various skills during the course of my final major project, the first being that I've researched into the codes and conventions of an infographic which has improved not only my initial design skills but my research skills as well. Creating my infographic led me to finding new Photoshop techniques and allowed me to improve my methods of digital art with a graphics tablet to create illustrations.

Looking at the feedback my peers gave me for my infographic, I feel positive that my work was successful in the eyes of an audience. An improvement I've had suggested to me from one of my peers was to have a more noticeable difference between the colours of the yellow shapes and the font inside, as they would be hard to distinguish from far away. Taking this feedback into consideration if I were to change these parts of my infographic I'd darken the colour of the font to make it more readable and legible.

Consistent evidence of me following codes and conventions through production lies in my final product. When drawing up my initial sketches I had a brief idea of how I wanted to lay out my infographic. Similar to those I used for inspiration, I wanted to create an infographic that led your eyes through the entire design via a pathway, taking full advantage of the canvas. A bright colour palette is important to an infographic, as it's what grants it the most visual appeal besides illustrations. Looking at the inspirational infographics I found on Pinterest on the subject of shark conservation the most common colour was blue, so to link my own to those I used it as a primary colour of my infographic. In my design I also incorporated recent graphic design trends from 2017 and those anticipated for 2018. I did this as it makes the design of my infographic modern, incorporating some of the latest most visually appealing concepts and hopefully attracting my target audience. The trends I used were a gradient- used as the background for my infographic- and hand-drawn elements- the digital illustrations I created- but unfortunately due to the design of my infographic and the subject I wasn't able to incorporate any other specific trends, which is something I will be working upon in future projects.

To ensure that I had minimal disruption to my progress throughout my FMP production I created an action plan of the work that needed to be done. This included what needed to be done by specific dates as to make sure I did enough work each day to stay on track with my production and keep up with deadlines. A problem I encountered with this was that due to personal and technical problems I still fell behind my initial action plan. I had to do more work on days to recover my lost time, however it hasn’t affected me too much as I’ve still met the deadline.

When using the college computers, sometimes I couldn’t download brushes or fonts. FontInstaller was also a problem as it often failed to start up on the computer so I couldn’t use my chosen fonts when creating my infographic at college. To solve this, I’d either type everything I needed in a standard font and change it when I got home or I’d bring my laptop to college and work on my production from there.

To concentrate as I worked both at home and at college I wore headphones to block out any possible noise distractions that could prevent me from production. I also did my work away from others in my own space at home to prevent any disruptions they could cause.

During this unit, I feel that I have developed many of my pre-existing skills, especially those that will be beneficial for me to have and use in the future.

Firstly, I believe that my overall design skills have improved. This is due to creating a product I’ve never done before, as I’ve explored and researched all the codes and conventions that make up an infographic and how to use them to create an effective product and make it appeal to a specific target audience.

My organisational skills have also been developed as I kept to a schedule to ensure that my production was on track as well as rearranging my action plan after encountering problems to have all my work done on time for the deadline.

Working on this product I had to create images to add to my infographic as to include one of the codes and conventions- illustrations. This allowed me to expand and develop my artistic talents and methods, as well as adapting to and learning skills on other programs available. To create these, I used a digital paint program that I was already familiar with called MediBang Paint Pro and Adobe Photoshop to apply them to my infographic and assemble the designs for my products. These skills will be incredibly beneficial to me in the future as they are mandatory for animation.

Linking to this, I feel as though my Photoshop skills have improved as I explored different techniques in the programme as I was creating my infographic.

Another skill that I’ve developed through my FMP is communication, as throughout production of my infographic I relied on feedback from my peers to produce the product to the best of my ability. I also gave thorough feedback to others on their products as well to improve their own work.

Lastly, I’ve developed my research skills as in previous units my research was taken solely from the internet and minimal first-hand surveys. For my primary research I made a few surveys to gather unfiltered opinions and experiences to do with my topic. For secondary research I branched out further than I have before with projects, using YouGov for assisting with my target audience, diving magazines for experiences and existing conservation awareness, various websites for finding inspirational products, books for research into theories, etc.

After the completion of all of my products and work for my final major project, I’m very happy with the overall outcome. Previous to this project I’d never created an infographic or a product this big, so I didn’t anticipate how I’d adapt to creating something like this from products smaller in scale like a poster or magazine. However I exceeded my expectations on this; learning and researching codes and conventions, common existing designs, experimenting with different ideas and expanding my overall creative knowledge. From this I’ve vastly improved in many of my skills, mainly design and problem solving, which I’ve developed on the go.

Unlike last year where I chose a topic outside of my comfort zone in order to challenge myself, this year I chose shark conservation as my fmp subject as its a cause I’m incredibly interested in, close to, and motivated to help and promote. Another reason I chose a subject already in my interests is that I felt that already having an in-depth knowledge about the subject would motivate me to be more emotionally invested in the project, strengthening my creative desire to make a professional product with a purposeful impact, which I believe it has. I’m incredibly proud of my achievements in my final major project, and although it didn’t challenge my abilities in creating a product in the concept of a previously unknown genre, I do believe that my choice has worked out for the better.

If I were to do this project again however, a main point I would develop further would be the side products I would produce. While badges, t-shirts and bags were ideal products for my audience to be tempted to buy and thus donate to my chosen charity, products suited towards advertising and spreading words may have been a more suitable solution in correlation to the core purpose of my final major project. As my purpose was to educate my selected target audience on the global issue of shark conservation it may have been more beneficial to create flyers, small booklets or business cards that people could take away for future use or for others to see.