Integrate, Customize, Curate, and Make-Believe

Choose meal based on color (Combos: color themes)

Restaurant for graphic designers

Forum that collects wacky artic les- puts a spin on them

Fantasy environment with all favorite cartoons

Indiana Jones on images

Harry Potter fan street fair

Aesthetic bug pizza

Art exhibit that features bugs

Aggregation of preferences based on culture

Make airport fun for kids

Fake woolly mammoth riding around the city- Mammoth facts

Conveyor belt of chicken wings

Trade old costumes for personalization

Ant farm airplane that travels around

Ability to customize social media

Trade personalized costumes

Bar for chicken wings customization

Bar of nostalgic foods from childhood (millennials)

Social media for people with glasses

Virtual reality experience where kids solve mysteries with cartoon characters

Fine tuned control of social media notifications

Some sort of publication(?) about how culture and pizza are related

Scheduling for your week put onto a pizza diagram with your events as toppings

Window display that points out how you are unique

Satirical newspaper that reports from utopia

Kid in need hang out with their favorite cartoon characters

2-way mirror, interactions with people on both sides.

Signage at airports for kids to learn about insects

Monthly Subscription Box for young aspiring magicians

L.A.R.P.-ing on a plane

Charette Reflection

Constraints
There were a few constraints on this project that affected it greatly. The biggest one was the timeframe. Two weeks to decide on a problem, research, create a solution, design it, and document the process was quite a daunting task. Due to the short amount of time we had, I feel like we struggled to balance research and actual design work. I feel like I personally got really caught up in the research phase and did not allow for enough time to actually design. Having our topics chosen for us was another constraint. It was inconvenient that the topic chosen for me was in Durham. But beneficial in that it was something different that I would not have chosen myself, which pushed me to think about new things. Another constraint was working in groups. It was difficult finding times outside of class when we could all meet to do work.

 

Opportunity
I think this project was a good experience for me in many ways. First of all, it was helpful for me to work in this group. I have worked in groups before but usually they’ve been groups I have chosen myself. I think it was good for me to work with new people because I got to see the different ways people think and work through problems. Also, working with a new group of people helped me realize that at times I will have to play different roles in projects. It helped me understand when I need to step up and be a leader versus when I need to step back and take instruction, allowing others to lead.

Application
Though there were some pain-points, I would say that working in a group was overall helpful for productivity, focus and concentration. First of all, I felt more productive due to the sheer number of hands working on the project. Obviously more got done than if I had tried to tackle the project on my own. Furthermore, I was more motivated to complete things in a timely manner because I did not want to let my teammates down. Another benefit of group work was that it allowed me to focus on just one part at a time, rather than the entire system. But at times it was also distracting. Because we were working in a group there was more going on than there would have been had it been an individual project. This made me preoccupied with what everyone else was doing and making sure it worked as a system instead of just focusing on my part. Another issue, when working in a group, was that decision making took longer and there was a bit more deliberation between us. This probably helped us make better decisions, but it certainly took longer as well. Another slight problem was that at times, we all had to wait on each other to finish one part of the project before we could move forward with the next step. But at the end of the day, working in a group definitely helped the quality of our end deliverables. There is no way I could have finished all of that by myself.

Charette Reflection

Constraints:

While time was a pretty major issue, the fact that we had a pre-picked topic and a group of fellow designers was a huge help. The topic at hand was broad enough that we still had plenty of wiggle room regarding the way we approached the project, and having each other to l immediately bounce ideas off of helped us come up with a plan that was both viable and conceptually interesting.

Opportunity:

I think that working in this team was really nice! I enjoyed working with this particular group of people quite a bit. The level of communication was just enough that I feel like everyone was contributing their fair share of work, working off each other’s strengths to complete the charrette on time. However, unless I’m taking little to no other classes then I wouldn’t want to take a two-week design challenge ever again. The time constraint was so stressful, and a good number of the people in my group and in this class (myself included) spent several days staying up very late working on it. This doesn’t mean that I’d be repelled by new ways of approaching design problems, of course, but when me and my peers still have other courses, design and otherwise, pushing ourselves to this limit is awfully detrimental to our health and grades.

Application:

One of the biggest things I think this project helped with is motivation to work. When you’re working with a group of people on a shared goal, oftentimes their portions rely on your own contribution, and vice-versa. Having other people who rely on you really helps the ol’ motivation, because if you fall behind everyone else in the group also falls behind and disappointing people really sucks. Being able to focus, be productive, and concentrate on the project was boosted by this extra level of motivation. On top of all of that, the quality of our final product was enhanced by the fact that we were all there for each other for proofreading and improving our individual creations.

Presentation:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B30lw1n9HFbzeE9rQUNBakRRcms?usp=sharing

Future Recommendations:

I think overall this was a successful project that I enjoyed and learned from. However, as I mentioned earlier I think that only having two weeks was stressful, and adding an extra class or two just to give a bit more time to polish and wrap things up would have been a godsend. I also did not like being singled out to talk when we had already covered everything we needed to cover. It had nothing to do with my group’s project and crossed a line I didn’t appreciate being crossed. If you have concerns about me vocalizing, please speak to me personally about them instead, please. In conclusion, I think that the Charette project was interesting and educational to participate in and was a different and neat way of working in a group project. I give it an 8/10.

Reflection Charette

Reflecting on my experience for this design charette, I feel like my group did well in meeting deadlines and providing an exciting and innovative solution to our problem. The two-week period was nice because it allowed us to come up with a lofty and extensive solution but kept us on track to produce material with little time for major adjustments. It was stressful that our final deliveries involved a giant poster and a video. Both things weighed heavily on myself and my team as the deadline approached, as we had to finish all our content to have things to put in the final deliverables. So, there was a lot of stress and I think my heart rate and mood went crazy as well as neglect for my other classes, but a rude awakening to the Junior year may pay off going into this next 10-week project. I really enjoyed working with my classmates this time around because through interaction with the professors and the ideation process, we were all very enthusiastic about our vision and were easily motivated to collaborate. We could see how much work needed to happen for this to be successful so having a large group was a welcome sight. We all got along very well and there weren’t any interpersonal issues. Everyone had clear roles and work established for them and we all helped curate each other’s work to keep it all “on brand”.

In the future, I will use this experience to choose my team members strategically and try to understand what it is that each member can contribute and wants to contribute. I felt like I always feel going into a group project, and that is that I need to become a leader of some sort. I see the deadlines and the big picture constantly and have no problem telling others what I feel they should do to help the project move towards the goal the quickest. I have tried in the past to take on a more passive follower role and it has been stressful for me because I want to critique and direct other people’s work and not focus on producing content in a silo. In this project I helped art direct, I wrote our directive statements and all the content for the audio, I storyboarded the video so that our group saw what assets the video needed, and laid out the final poster and wrote its text content. My goal was always to design a system that was critically robust and relevant so I needed to hold the reigns and let the creative talent of the group flourish while I nudged people in certain directions.

Design Charrettes are somewhat new to me. I like the idea of a refreshingly quick expression of problem solving. When the problem was presented to us I welcomed not having to look for the problem. I do well reacting to design problems, I feel like it is more aligned with my personality to come up with solutions to given problems rather than seeking out problems that aren’t presented to me. I think this experience will help me problem solve in the future because now I know that a solution with multiple touchpoints needs to operate as a system and not just a collection of pieces. Each touchpoint is an opportunity to integrate functionality and problem solving that is inherent to that medium, so choosing the right touchpoints is key to realizing a design system and vice versa.

Going into the next project I hope I can find a team that accepts my direction and understands that I want the group to function as a team all on the same page. I support as well as lead, so I go where I am needed and understand the strengths of members and let the group know who I think would be best suited for a certain task. It doesn’t mean that I dictate the direction that our group is headed creatively, just that I try get us to that destination as quickly and efficiently as possible.

Working with groups always has me performing and listening the sharpest. I think the social aspect of group projects causes me to produce better work because of social stressors, ego, and artistic integrity. So, I was very motivated to produce good work. The scope of our project meant a lot of work which meant a high level of productivity. Obviously, a group needs to be organized to operate efficiently and get the most out of its people power. So, having individuals focused on certain tasks or having time to work collaboratively and bounce ideas off each other was important. I thought the quality of our end deliverables was great considering the stress we were under. There was a lot of inter group critique and collaboration for everyone’s design implements and a lot of excitement and encouragement. Everyone worked hard.

Overall, I had a lot of fun being presented a complex problem and meeting it with a complex solution. This project redefined the role of graphic designer for me and the importance and reach of branding solutions as well as, restoring my faith in collaboration.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B30lw1n9HFbzeE9rQUNBakRRcms

Design Charette Reflection

Constraints

The time that we were presented with made me rethink the time that I spent on various steps in the design process. The first which was identifying and issue to resolve had to be done quickly with little time for review. Which supported the idea of taking an idea and running with it. Research also had to be cut short for the sake time. Which I believe as a resulted in our information feeling shallow. I felt that the shallowness of our research resulted in half baked ideas. The time constraint made it hard to full flesh out our ideas.

The constraint of having a topic provided to us made us work within a certain scope. Working within the scope of Raleigh made the idea feel more personal. I found it useful to have a topic given to us because it removed one step from the process and allowed us to jump right into the project instead of spending all of our developing an idea.

Opportunity

Working with other people made have to rethink how I operate in terms of ideating and deciding what to move forward with. I felt that the ideas I created had less weight because the approval of my classmates all I needed to discern wether the idea presented was “good” or “bad”. In terms of making things I felt rushed because other people need the assets I was creating for other parts of the project. Which meant my turn around time had to be faster than when I was working on my own time.

When I work in teams in the future I feel that I need to voice my opinion on matters earlier in the process. In the end I felt that there were somethings that I needed to be better that could have been if I said something sooner. After this experience I know that I need to plan my time accordingly and focus more on creating a solid idea. The biggest lesson I learned in this design experience was to pace myself and try to work faster and make decisions sooner. As well as sharing my ideas and point of view to create a large amount of ideas for the group as a whole.

Application

Working in a group motivated me to do better and work faster because other people are depending on me to create the final project. I felt that my performance was vital to determining the overall success of the project. Working in a group also kept me more focus because I had a dialogue with the other group members to keep me on topic. I was also nice to bounce ideas off of my group members. I felt that working in a group helped create a better final product because we were able to divide the work. Dividing the work allowed us to spend greater time on our given tasks and as a result we created a high quality product.

Presentation

Asset and Process Link:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B2nFSH7Ul_DDMGtMTE5uMjB0TW8

Final Product Link:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B03PGHrHU2LkSEdSMU5ielh6czQ

Charette Reflection- Nicole Taylor Ferreira

Constraints

 The last two weeks were stressful, to say the least.  For my group I know that we kept getting caught up and it seemed as if we were falling behind and kept thinking too much about it, rather us starting we kept thinking about it conceptually.  We spent too much time on that and I’m not sure if we were unsure of how to approach the topic or what.  With this in mind since we had five people in our group, that was even more stressful.  Each person approaches the design process differently, which is both positive and negative.  Both aspects definitely made an appearance as well.  Considering all of this, I do believe that our project turned out well considering from where we started.  I did enjoy working with my other four group mates because three of them were in the other section last year, so I have not had the chance to actually work with them before or to really know how they approach the design process, so that was pretty informative.

Opportunity

Well, everyone knows that group work is not always the easiest.  I learned that the hard way during the cardboard project freshman year during FYE.  I definitely did learn a lot from this experience, like trying to make my ideas heard more.  I can sometimes be unsure of myself so I do not push my ideas really which also does not help the group.  I learned to be more vocal and to show more of a presence than to be timid.  In approaching focused charettes, I believe that we have to figure out what we are doing and how we are doing that early on instead of rushing to try to meet the time constraint.  Also, if we need to adjust our intervention in a way, we have to be open to that rather than pushing what we are doing, which may not be the best solution.  It is hard for every group dynamic because majority of the time there is always someone who tries to take control and if you do not know each other well, knowing each others personalities as well as process that can be difficult.

Application

Working groups definitely did motivate me, but it did sometimes do the opposite.  Working in groups, majority of the time tasks are delegated.  When we first started I was really excited about our idea and our intervention, but then we kept having miscommunication where we would not all be on the same page, which did not help.  Also, other group mates would some times try to take over what another person is doing rather than collaboratively working.  Collaboratively working makes the design stronger; that was lacking in some areas.  I was impressed with our brand; it did come together in the end.  Although, one of our critiques was that we needed one more thing to really tie it together, and we did.  It sort of felt unfinished and not as strong as it could be.

Contribution

Ideating for the app and compiling the presentation.

Link: https://drive.google.com/drive/u/0/folders/0B03PGHrHU2LkSEdSMU5ielh6czQ

Charette Reflection: Arianna Slade-Duncan

Constraints:

For the most part, the design charette was challenging but enjoyable. It was an intense and fast paced way to start off the new year. The two week time constraint was intimidating, especially since it was for a group project. It can be a challenge to create a thorough and organized design processes for a project this big in such a short space of time. It can also make collaboration difficult. Different group members having different time constraints can affect the group dynamic and the pace that work is completed. Having a topic assigned was a bit of a relief. This is common in most design industries, having projects assigned to designers instead of designers creating their own projects. However, this took some of the guesswork out of creating a solution since we were given a basic framework of things that we could and couldn’t do. Working in a group can always present a challenge, as I mentioned before. For this group in particular I found myself realizing just how important collaboration and leadership within a group is. At some points it seemed like a lot was getting accomplished and at other points it felt frustrating to not know what was going on and to feel as though some members of the group had more of a voice than others. I  learned a lot about the type of people I work well with.

Opportunity

This experience taught me what type of role I want to take on in a group, and really enforced just how important collaboration between all group members are. In some projects, dividing up work can be beneficial. However I think of a purpose of a charette it’s more important to continually hand off certain tasks and collaborate on others. A charette style project is intense, but provides a useful challenge. With such a short amount of time to work on a project of this scale, learning time management and how to create very focused and purposeful work are both necessary skills for completion. The charette enforced a strict schedule and very focused work. The beginning of a project will always be important for establishing the tone of the rest of the project. Lots of research and establishing a healthy work dynamic should be the first steps taken.

Application

I felt that my motivation fluctuated a lot during the course of the charette. Typically in a group I want to do my best to participate and give as much to the project as I can. However, there were several points where it seemed like certain members weren’t being heard. Although I wanted to participate, it was frustrating to see others taking on more work and not allowing room for collaboration. As much as I wanted to talk to the rest of my group I found it difficult, like I would either be stepping over boundaries or providing unwanted ideas.  I ended up settling into my assigned portion of the project and just focusing on making that portion as good as I could. I feel like the focus of the project was all over the place, and it didn’t seem like the group was ever on the same page. Changes would be made without the entire group being included in the process. Instead of focusing on how the entire project should turn out it seemed like we ended up focusing on very specific bits and pieces of the project. Productivity seemed to go up when people were working together on their tasks rather than working on their own and away from each other. In the end though, the main deliverables ended up being high quality and presentable. I can’t help but feel that they ended up looking like very separate pieces just stuck next to each other.

My Contribution

I took some photos and video during the initial Durham research trip. Most of my work was on the AR screen mockups by researching old Durham history, searching for photos for overlays, and creating a template for the screen mockups. I also did some work on the final poster layout.

Presentation

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B3qkBGkR7RepSUtjTzB0UEVRZ2c

Future Recomendations

For any group setting it’s important to remain flexible and to listen to your group. The most important thing you can do is to step outside of your comfort zone, whether that’s speaking out more or stepping back from a leadership role to listen. Scheduling, collaboration, and focusing on the big picture should all be the main goals.

Group: Allison, Ari, Conner, Logan, Sam

Charette Reflection (Jevon Hodge)

This two week project was slightly stressful but the end result of what we came up with was very rewarding. I believe two weeks is not enough time to fully complete this project  but I was amazed with how much we got gone in such a short period of time. The location we had was hard to create a solid brand for because we did not have much to work with. It was really run down, the water was not accessible and the building were always empty. If it were up to me, I would of selected a location with more people, wide landscape, and better attractions.

I enjoyed my team members during this two week project. Everyone contributed to the brand assets, the deliverables, and the overall presentation from start to finish. I dont mind group projects but we all know that there be some slight constraints along the way such as, availability, lack of communication, or other personal distractions. This is all apart of working in a group; However, I felt like we managed to keep everything in tack while we work on this project.  I was responsible for redesigning the brand logo, sub-brand logo, collecting images for the video and completing the final 36 x 50 inch poster. I definitely utilized my group members feedback to guide me throughout the process, which made this whole experience much easier.  It was very enlightening to see each person’s design process and how they tackled specific design challenges for the first time. They definitely encouraged me to put my best forward and leave a good impression within the group.

Since we had a short period of time to complete this project I was extremely motivated to get a head start on our process work.  I wanted to be an active team player and support my group member if necessary, so I was open to volunteering on certain portions of the project that was not initially assigned to me and  provide feedback to make sure everything flowed together.  I believe we had a focused and dedicated group because everyone was willing to work late hours and work from home to make sure we met weekly deadlines. In the end, we produced a great deal of work and I feel like everyone did their best to make “The Kit” an unique brand that people would respect and love over time.  I really don’t have any suggestion for future design collaboration but I will suggest to other young designers to archive all of your process work because it will come in handy when constructing your final deliverables and even other future projects.

poster

theKit_WallDisplay

The Kit_Poster_Opt

Process Work:

https://drive.google.com/drive/u/0/folders/0B5YOhOxwDkoyN1U4bEJmX0J4MDg

Charette Reflectdion

I think only having two weeks for this project really affected how we had to think through the project as a whole and in our decision making. I think a lot of time was spent ideating and trying to come up with a brand and idea that we thought would best portray the message we were trying to get across about the Beltline Trail itself. After all the time we spent ideating within those first two weeks, the time we had to implement the design aspect of the project was very limited. Having the topic of the Beltline Trail provided to us as a starting point had its benefits and drawbacks. Some drawbacks to this was having to learn really quickly about a location and topic that nobody in the group new anything about. But a benefit to it was not having to spend all the extra time trying to hone in on one particular topic that we all as a group wanted to pursue. Instead, it was just given to us as a starting point. Working with classmates on this project was nice because we all have our strengths and point of views when it comes to design that we could all contribute to the project collaboratively. But a drawback of group projects was finding time within the two weeks that this project took place where all of our schedules matched up to be able to meet as a group outside of studio time to work on the project.

 

I think this project was a great opportunity to get more experience in working collaboratively in groups on a project. Working in a new group allowed me to see different points of views on this project that we were assigned that I wouldn’t have really considered if I was working individually. I think as a group we overcame quite a few challenges when it came to finalizing our project because we went through a lot of different ideas and possibilities that changed quite a bit. I was mainly in charge of branding and that in itself was something that as a group we had to reconsider and redevelop a few times.

 

I think working in a group always helps motivate me to work more efficiently and produce the best work I possibly can because I feel a responsibility to contribute to the team. I think because we worked collaboratively, the end quality of the products we created were really well designed and thought out and each of us were able to put a bit of our own ideas into the project as a whole which made it stronger. Overall, I think our group worked well together and we were able to overcome all the design challenges we were faced with in the best way we could create.

PROJECT DELIVERABLES:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B_EzF6nrJ9b1bl9PbWFYOEVxUkE

Charette Reflections

Constraints

I believe having a time constraint may have actually been beneficial to our team’s progress. Instead of wandering around concepts, we were motivated to immediately begin zoning in on our concept and fleshing out ideas. Although we knew that we were operating with limited time, we were still ambitions and, although we did not use all of our ideas in our final, I believe this helped our project in the end.

Having the topic provided was also beneficial in a way because it allowed us to focus our ideas in the beginning instead of spending hours trying to decide what to do. I felt like our team worked well, together for the most part, but we did encounter some struggles. We probably struggled the most with keeping our brand aesthetic consistent between interventions. Everyone in the group was eager to do their part and even go above and beyond, but, when we came together, we definitely had to spend quite a bit of time, figuring out where to go how to have an interesting brand that is also consistent.

Opportunity

I believe having this experience will help me anticipate conflicts or obstacles while working in a team. In the future, I would like to focus on figuring out how to make brands in a group that are congruent. During this experience, I also learned to think outside of the box and explore all kinds of ideas even if they seem outrageous. Our group benefitted from bringing all our ideas to the table and discussing them freely.

Application

I actually felt more motivated to work harder and do a better job. I felt that there was a lot more pressure on me than if I were working by myself because I felt like if I failed, I would let the whole team down.

Probably the greatest struggle for me, was opening my mind to aesthetic choices that other team members were bringing to the table instead of trying to impose my own taste on everything. It is hard to trust people with your ideas.

 

https://drive.google.com/drive/u/0/folders/0B30lw1n9HFbzeE9rQUNBakRRcms