Also, I am trying to gain a deeper understanding of branding as a whole and why it is so important. There is a wealth of information out there to look at and listen to. I have always been a great believer in the self help approach. It's always nice to have someone there to get feedback from and give you general guidance along the way but so far as learning new skills and broadening your knowledge is concerned, there is so much information at your fingertips that there is no excuse anymore. I get so annoyed when I hear young people moaning about not having a job and having nothing to do. If they showed a bit of initiative and set about educating themselves better instead of plugging themselves into the playstation, they might get a bit more recognition.
I know I am going off on a tangent slightly but it is relevant. When I first started down this route, what seems years ago now, I couldn't understand why student designers were expected to work for free on placements. Surely that couldn't be right, why should I have to work for free? At the moment there is a huge outcry about the governments plans for getting young people into work. Basically it's the same thing that design students have had to do for years to get that first job. What amazes me is the backlash that the proposals have received.
In reality, you are not working for free. What you are doing is being trained at great expense to the company concerned for free. Unfortunately, the country is a different place than what it was 10, 15 years ago. There are fewer jobs for unskilled people and therefore it's up to the individual to train themselves to a certain extent. If you are unemployed there are countless training opportunities for free. Now this might be a stretch of the imagination for some people, but there are these wonderful free places called libraries where you can learn about anything that you desire. Some of them even have careers advisors in them to help you even more.
When I left school, I had been interviewed for a place at Stafford College on a BTEC Graphic Design course and got offered a place. But, me being too young and unappreciative at the time to take the opportunity given to me, I decided that I wanted to get a job and get some money. Of course without any real skills, this was difficult but I managed to find a great YTS scheme running in Birmingham for engineering drawing. This was before computers came along so it was all draughting by hand which I absolutely loved. Plus you had placements at local engineering companies which were amazing places. Some of my most interesting working experience was in that first year. I was working alongside engineers who were nearing retirement but their knowledge was fascinating to listen to. Again, there were no CNC machines like there are today and every tool had to be made by hand. For all that hard work, I was paid the amazing sum of twenty five pounds a week! But, the knowledge that I gained in that first year and the wisdom passed on to me, has never left me.
I have to admit to forgetting this when trying to get some placements recently. In one phone conversation with an agency who will remain anonymous, I asked if they paid anything towards travel and possible acommodation. The backlash was quite startling as they went on to point out that they had to assign a paid member of staff to be a mentor. The training that I would receive would cost a small fortune if I had to pay for it and I shouldn't expect to get paid as I wasn't a qualified designer. Now I can understand their reasoning but as a more, shall we say, mature student, I haven't got the bank of mom and dad to bail me out.
Right, where was I?..........
Ah yes, the cocktail packaging. So I noticed this competition running for a possible placement with JKR, who are one of my favourite design agencies. The first prize is a paid placement with £500 and there are runners up prizes of paid placements. They are only for two weeks but it would be a great experience to work in a top packaging design agency. Then I realised the deadline was the 1st March, which at the time gave me 7 days to complete the brief. The brief in question was to look at cocktails from the 1930's and choose three to design the packaging for, that could stand in todays market.
I wanted to incorporate the patterns somewhere but not on the bottles themselves as it has been done before, so left that to the outer packaging. The labels started off very different and just a basic cliche of the 1930's with over embellished type and illustrations. So I got the background pattern from the hood ornament above and relied more on a conservative typeface that still had a historic look and feel to it.
The menu idea was quite a last minute idea which took over a day to design, make and photograph in the end. My least favourite element is the bottle itself as I was struggling to make it look more convincing. This is one area that I am hoping to improve upon in the near future by being able to create more convincing packaging prototypes on screen. The finished designs are shown below and as a whole, I am quite pleased with the results but know that better work is to come with more practice and a deeper understanding of designing packaging.
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