Tuesday, 17 May 2011

Reconsidering The Time Allocated To Production

I am going to write a progress update today, as I feel this is necessary in order for me to clear my mind and point myself in the correct direction for making further progress.

Yesterday I focussed on the annotation of my sketchbook work for development. I almost completed this yesterday and have now fully completed it this morning. This includes development of the characters, logo, app, Facebook page, Twitter Page, YouTube channel, website, Safety Bus design, screensaver, mouse mat, story book, corporate clothing – including the T-shirt, hat and sweatshirt, the sunflower competition – including the disc roundel and packet design, stickers and badges, and the blog.

I will now refer back to my ‘aims for this week’, and see which areas I have completed and which I must focus on.

I have completed the photo shoot on location on Friday, therefore this task no longer needs to be concentrated on. Other tasks for last Friday included the ordering of stickers and badges, and the production of business cards – I have achieved all of these and therefore this entry no longer needs to be acknowledged.
My task for Saturday, Sunday and Monday was to annotate the print screens gathered over the course of this week and to print these pages. This morning I completed all of the development work that I am going to now until Friday – where I will consider going back and enhancing areas if I have enough time.

My aims for Tuesday were to complete the development work – there I am up to date, and also to purchase my third folder for this to be placed in – I will leave this last task and concentrate on this on Friday, when I am to get my time log bound and therefore will be venturing into town for this.

I also made a note within my ‘to do list’, that if my personalised folders arrive throughout the week, I should placed my work within these, one has arrived yet I am still waiting on the arrival of the other and will chase this up with a phone call today.

My task for Wednesday (tomorrow) is to sort out my dissertation, arranging all necessary sections and submit this to be printed like a storybook. However, this is my next task for today and I aim to have completed this by today. I need to return home as my report formatting was completed on my laptop, and therefore I will need to view the original file before I can make amendments and convert this into a PDF, however I aim to have this printed and bound by the end of today, so that this is a nice addition to my stand.

It then appears that I am ahead of task, as my aim for Thursday was to consider the production of the actual story book, to include the puppets. However, I have already organised this, and the story book should be arriving on Thursday – the day I was supposed to be creating this. I am very pleased with this story book and it appears to be of a high quality and I have had it produced in hard back, therefore I cannot wait for its arrivial.

This time schedule left Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday for the creation of my final boards. However, I aim to start working on these tomorrow – Wednesday, if not sooner! Therefore I am pleased to say that I am ahead of schedule.

I have also found out that my Lancabot article should be appearing in the Lancashire Evening Post on the Monday of submission. Therefore I will have to wake up early to purchase this paper and leave room within my portfolio to place this.

Sunday, 15 May 2011

Progress on the Story Book and Obstacles to Overcome

Today has been a very productive day for me. First of all I spent the majority of the day working on the story book to be published. I sent this over to the company at around 7pm this evening, and will be awaiting a PDF proof from them tomorrow, so I will have to keep checking my emails.

I understand that the proof will be sent to me tomorrow, and that this takes around four hours, therefore I expect to receive this at around 1pm. I must approve the proof that same day for it to be considered for production the next day.

So, as this stands the book will be ready for production on Tuesday, and then will be printed between Thursday and Friday. This means that it will be sent next day delivery for the Saturday, which means that I should (hopefully) receive this for the Monday. This is worrying me a little as the deadline is very tight!

However, I will not panic and will wait to hear from the company tomorrow. Today I also went back and annotated my development work including the Facebook and Twitter pages, and the development of the safety bus.

From this I have created a further list of items for me to complete tomorrow:
Annotation of development of mobile phone apps.
Annotation of development of YouTube site (this has already been started).
Annotation of development of story book – simply print screen each page and help to describe the narrative, also copy and paste the narrative onto a word document for inclusion into the development folder.
Annotation of development of the T-shirts and other corporate clothing
Annotation of badges print screens
Annotation of sunflower competition.

If I complete all of the above by the end of the day tomorrow then I will be on good track to finish my work before the deadline – if not then it looks like I may be in trouble.

Regardless of my achievements by the end of the day tomorrow, I will cast the development work aside, and then start working on the formatting of my final boards, to be included within my portfolio. From Tuesday I will start working on the formatting and annotation of the standard boards, of which I believe there will be around ten.

I understand that I may be able to group some of the forms of promotion together, for example SMM, and the mascot handler with the uniform, so on and so forth, therefore I will put great thought into how best to achieve the final outcome to the best possible standard, and without being immensely time consuming. Therefore I must remember that whatever my progress by the end of the day tomorrow, by Tuesday I will move forwards to the formatting of the boards. I will then give myself until the end of the day on Wednesday to review this progress and to decide how to move on from here.

Friday, 13 May 2011

Regarding the Graphic Stand

I have not posted a blog update in a couple of days, however – this does not mean that I have been unproductive in that time – quite the opposite. The last week has been very hectic for me, finishing off bits of promotion, for example making small changes such as positioning and alignment to perfect the document.

I have also been concentrating on Lancabot, considering how best to implement him into the final stand to give him the credit he deserves as a main force in promotion. I therefore conducted an indoor photoshoot with Lancabot, and also included the production design so that the person viewing the board had an idea that the costume was to human scale and not a cuddly toy – like The Cell Crew.

My board format works well as the Lancabot head, arms and feet are within the margins of the board, this therefore acts as a header, footer and borders. I have literally just finished putting my board together, and am now waiting until the submission of the graphic stand .This is such a nerve-wracking moment, mostly due to the large scale of the stand – if there are any mistakes these will be very obvious.
Today I also had a photoshoot with Lancabot for the Lancashire Evening Post. I am very excited to see this printed, as this is a form of press for the Lancashire Science Festival, an example of PR, which is effectively free marketing within the local community of newsreaders.

What next? After the submission of this graphic stand tomorrow I will concentrate firstly on my development work within my sketchbook, as I believe I can get this completed within three days, leaving me with a full week to get my boards completed. These boards will be simply, as I am keeping the same consistent look and feel of my campaign as generated by the graphic stand, therefore I may continue using the header, footer and border combination.

I will also ensure that all entries for this timelot are printed to successfully document my time management. At present I feel very confident about the outcome of this campaign.

Post Mascot Photo Shoot

This morning I completed my photo shoot with Lancabot on location. I dressed up in the Lancabot mascot costume and had photographs taken at a series of noteworthy locations, including: Preston high street, outside of St George’s shopping centre, the famous row of telephone boxes, Preston outdoor market and Fishergate shopping centre, along with shoots in other places such as bus shelters and benches.

My conclusion is that these photographs are the most successful out of all three shoots. Since looking at the images, I have rotated them all so that they are upright, I must now make it my task to choose around 5 from the studio photoshoot – these should be classed as product shots and should be the photographs which best help to communicate the type of personality which Lancabot has. I must then also choose five ‘on location’ shoots. These will be presented within my portfolio. I must consider how to present these – should these be individual photos, presented as a college, or laid out methodically with annotation.

This will be my next task for today; I will then also start working on imagery for the business cards I am to order, and also the badges. I will update this blog once I have completed these two tasks. I will then create a set of instructions for myself, relating to how I can move this project forwards.

Thursday, 12 May 2011

Plan of Action

I must come up with a plan of action of how I intend to spend the next week I have left to complete my campaign, therefore I have listed a timetable below, and will work (very strictly) towards this.

Friday – on location Lancabot shoot in the morning, order stickers and badges, get business cards produced with appropriate number in the evening, and print out time log entries to date. The business cards can include any illustration of imagery creative throughout this course.

Saturday – annotate print screens gathered over the course of this week – print these pages

Sunday – annotate print screens gathered over the course of this week – print these pages

Monday – development work – go through work and decide which elements need further development and which ones I can call complete.

Tuesday – development work, aim to complete this by the end of today. I should also have purchased my third folder for this to be placed in.

(Throughout these dates, if my personalised folder arrives, I should rearrange the original folder to suit this).

Wednesday – dissertation sort out all necessary sections submit this to be printed like a storybook.

Thursday – consider the production of the actual story book to include the puppets.

Friday – development board x 2

Saturday - research board x 2

Sunday – Timeplan, media plan and campaign plan.

Monday – Submission.

When working from the above it becomes clear that I do not have enough time to get all of the work I have planned to complete, completed. Therefore, I must work ahead of schedule, completing half of the work for the next day too. Something which I have no mentioned above is that I must produce boards which demonstrate my promotion, and that these must contain the imagery and then the annotation.

What next? I was planning on taking this evening off as a little ‘welldone’ for submitting my work today, and to the standard that I desired. However, I will now look at producing business cards as I believe that these are the items which have the longest lead time.

Wednesday, 11 May 2011

Graphic Stand Construction

I have not posted a blog update in a couple of days, however – this does not mean that I have been unproductive in that time – quite the opposite. The last week has been very hectic for me, finishing off bits of promotion, for example making small changes such as positioning and alignment to perfect the document.

I have also been concentrating on Lancabot, considering how best to implement him into the final stand to give him the credit he deserves as a main force in promotion. I therefore conducted an indoor photoshoot with Lancabot, and also included the production design so that the person viewing the board had an idea that the costume was to human scale and not a cuddly toy – like The Cell Crew.

My board format works well as the Lancabot head, arms and feet are within the margins of the board, this therefore acts as a header, footer and borders. I have literally just finished putting my board together, and am now waiting until the submission of the graphic stand .This is such a nerve-wracking moment, mostly due to the large scale of the stand – if there are any mistakes these will be very obvious.
Today I also had a photoshoot with Lancabot for the Lancashire Evening Post. I am very excited to see this printed, as this is a form of press for the Lancashire Science Festival, an example of PR, which is effectively free marketing within the local community of newsreaders.

What next? After the submission of this graphic stand tomorrow I will concentrate firstly on my development work within my sketchbook, as I believe I can get this completed within three days, leaving me with a full week to get my boards completed. These boards will be simply, as I am keeping the same consistent look and feel of my campaign as generated by the graphic stand, therefore I may continue using the header, footer and border combination.

I will also ensure that all entries for this timelot are printed to successfully document my time management. At present I feel very confident about the outcome of this campaign.

Saturday, 7 May 2011

Receiving Lancabot and Formulating a Plan of Action

Yesterday I received Lancabot in the post – this was so exciting for me to finally see my character brought to life. However, I soon began to realise the urgency which surrounded this situation in ensuring Lancabot was recognised as a valid part of my final campaign.

I therefore contacted the LEP, who agreed that they would run a story on Lancabot and arranged a photo shoot for him this coming Monday at 4.30pm. This was great as it ensured that I would have access to some photographs of Lancabot to use within my report. I have also booked the photography studio for 5pm on the Friday; therefore I will use this and take pictures of Lancabot in action. I will make a collection of these for my portfolio, whilst also putting some of the most inspiring photographs on my final board.

This will be fairly time consuming, as my lecture on Monday requires me to spend a couple of hours working on the format and layout of my final board. I have presently placed the forms of promotion which I have completed, or nearly completed on this. However, I am aware that I will have to go back to these and make amendments.
I feel that the best way forwards is to continue working on the promotion and the placement of this on the board on Sunday and Monday, and that by the end of day Monday, I should be in the right place to make amendments to these promotions, ensuring that they are to the highest standard, quality and finish by submission on the Wednesday.

Submission day is very close, and although the thought of this is absolutely petrifying, I feel that I am at the correct pace and am pleased that I have already placed a lot of the promotion of the board, and that I am content with this. I am also pleased that Lancabot has arrived in time, and now must start working on the photo shoot for him.

My 'To Do List' by the end of today is:
Web portal blog
Story book and puppets
Badges and Stickers

Once these have been completed I am satisfied that I will be at the correct pace for submission on Thursday. I will show Paz the layout of my boards on Monday and see if he agrees that everything is to a good scale and that nothing dominates. If possible, I will get this printed on A2 size paper, so that I can see if any of the art work is pixilated, and this will put my mind at rest. This will also allow me to see if the placement of items is correct, or whether there is too much blank space / some areas are too over-crowded.

Thursday, 5 May 2011

To Do List 05/05/2011

I have written a ‘to do’ list, and aim to have each of these items completed by the end of today.

These are as follows:
Send off stickers to be produced.

Send off for badges for be produced – rethink the text to be included on these
Produce or illustrate trading cards.

Send off for Lanyard to be produced, or buy a lanyard which is the most suitable colour for The LSF.

Phone app – design this and use print screens to show development – to be included within research file.

Game – design the game for the LSF, show at least three screens for the different levels of this.

Cup/mug – send off for this to be produced on vistaprint – this will be distributed as a promotional giveaway at the ‘ meet and greet’ sessions with Lancabot.

Magnet – also to be distributed at the meet and greet with Lancabot.

Set up a Facebook and Twitter page, print screen the development of these or use the template.

See Dave regarding the photoshoot with Lancabot, and also about filming.

Consider a press pack to be distributed one per school . This could be a mini school back and could contain a disk, this would minimise costs of printing and is also carbon neutral – this could contain the ‘grow your own sunflower competition’ within.

I must also order one more primary research folder so that there is continuity amongst the presentation of my research.

What next? I will update the blog post at the end of the day stating whether the above has realistically been achieved.

Wednesday, 4 May 2011

Decisions and Revisions Regarding Promotion

Today has been a very productive day for me. Firstly, I have communicated with Claire Fearnley regarding the productive of the Lancashire Rose to be made out of felt for Lancabot. This will complete Lancabot’s appearance and will ensure that his identity is well grounded in the region.

Moreover, I have also been working on my development work. This includes documenting the development of the promotional postcards, as well as the LSF webpage. After revisiting the LSF webpages for the first time in a few week, it gave me a different perspective on the webpage. Ultimately, this enabled me to review it and make changes. One of the changes included changing the backdrop colour from black to navy blue, this is only a minor change, yet it made a huge difference on the overall impact of the webpage.

Moreover, I have also been developing an Iphone app, using the downloadable templates to ensure that all gesture buttons and icons are legitimate, authentic, and also have the professional final outcome needed for my final campaign.

I have also been buying components to insert within my research file to ensure that this is interactive and up to scratch. I have decided that I am nearly completed with regards to my research, I just need to scan in and annotate another couple of pages – and this can be done right before submission if necessary. I do, however, need to purchase another primary research file as I am currently using a standard folder and this is not in-keeping with the rest of the folders, and I wish to maintain continuity in this respect.

Finally, today I received the Lancashire Science Festival promotional hoody – to be worn by the Mascot handler. It states “Ask me about The LSF”. This is a crucial part of the promotion as the person who is going to be assisting the robot must wear this, to ensure they look professional, as ultimately they are the person who is going to be asked about the event.

What next? For now my main priority is creating the promotional items. This includes a Facebook and Twitter account, I must also create an Iphone app and continue with the development and annotation of this, as this is an important part of my promotional range.

With regards to three dimensional forms of promotion, I have considered producing a bag for life; however, I am not really sure how necessary this is, as there are no items available for purchase at the LSF. I am also considering producing promotional mugs as these can be given away as freebees as the Lancabot meet and greets - this is also true of the magnets. Moreover, I will produce badges and will ensure that I purchase these tomorrow; I must take into consideration the lead times of these items. I also need to communicate with Dave Schofield regarding the photoshoot with Lancabot and also the photoshoot of the corporate clothing.

Monday, 2 May 2011

Today I have been working on the promotional postcards to accompany my final campaign. I have been having some difficulty in getting these to the correct size without cutting off the logo or supporting text.

I have eventually managed to complete this and have an accurate template for a portrait and landscape orientation which I will use for the rest of the designs. I chose to purchase 60 postcards as opposed to 20, as I had more than 20 different designs, this enabled me to produce a couple of each design, also allowing me to place additional cards in my sketchbook as part of my development work.

Today I have also received photographs of Lancabot the robot mascot I have designed. This is very exciting and Lancabot is everything I hoped for and more, I am so pleased with the final outcome and cannot wait to hold a photoshoot and also a video session documenting what type of movements the robot would make.

I will email the mascot company tomorrow and make sure that the robot will be delivered on time, and ensure that I can book the photographer out for this day, the mascot actor and also the studio and venue.

What next? Tomorrow I will keep on top of my emails and ensure that I am up to date on all progress being made at this company. Tomorrow I will also finish uploading all of the pictures and will purchase these tomorrow.

Sunday, 1 May 2011

To Do List 01/05/2011

Below I will include a ‘to do list’ for today, to ensure that I stay on track over the last three remaining weeks of this project:

Firstly, I must ensure all blog posts are up to date.

Secondly, I must print off all pages for my development and sketchbook and must annotate these, this includes the pages from earlier this week – the development of the development boards.

I must also send off my postcards for printing to moo.com, this will ensure that I am completely up to date with all form of 3D promotion. Once these are printed I must enquire about attaching 3D elements to make these more interactive than standard passive postcards.

This will include a sachet with sticky googly eyes and small foam pads. I must enquire about purchasing the sticky googly eyes as I am aware that some do not have the sticky feature and consequently are difficult to attach. I must ensure that a warning is placed on the reverse of these postcards stating that they are not suitable for under 4 years old, and must ensure the correct logo can be included to support this, for health and safety reasons.

I must enquire about the production of a jacket to support the other uniform I have purchased for the LSF, I will enquire about a jumper as opposed to a hoodie as I believe that this will be a shorter production time and much cheaper in price, this is also akin to the uniform which they wear at theme parks around the UK, and consequently it then has a more ‘leisure day out’ feel.

Once I have purchased the above two items, I will ensure that I have a consistent form and layout for the pages to be included in my portfolio. If I have enough time today I may go back and revisit the media plan, campaign and time plan and make these more interesting visually, this is important as these must be included within my portfolio, and consequently must have a creative look and appeal which is consistent with the rest of my designs.