Client project - First deisgn attempts

Just an update on what the group have done over the weekend. We all agreed to go away at the weekend and come up with some ideas to try and get a mixture of ideas. Below are the designs that everyone brought in with them.

My Designs




When I created the two designs above my main aim was to try and create a design that was different yet also relative to the original site. One of the main ideas that I thought Paul was bringing across was that he wanted to keep the 'Art' the main theme of the site. On the first design I reflected on his idea and created buttons that were specifically examples of the artists work.
For the second design I tried to bring across a stronger impression on what an artists profile page could look like. Keeping to the artists theme I used the artist as a background to really emphasis on the work.
I was going for a simplistic look but I feel that went to far with this idea. If I were to do the designs again I would definitely experiment with colour more, I feel that I stuck to the same colours for two reasons: 1 - Trying to stick to the original colours, 2 - reflecting on the site name 'gold' factory. Maybe when trying to rebrand the site the colour can be worked on to really give the site a new and fresh image.

Jacqui's work





When I first saw Jacqui's work the first thing that I caught my eye was the words "past,present,future.." Its simple yet I like the way Jacqui set it out, with the full stops in the positions that they are gives me the impression that the words are a continuation of something.
In the top design I really like effect of the bricks in the header. It adds a good use of texture and, different to the original design. At first I agreed with Jacqui on the colour and wasn't too keen however the more I look at the design colour the more I feel it works.
For the bottom design I love the Jacqui laid out the images, with the past image smaller and the future image bigger it straight away gave me the impression that the site was growing, creating bigger and better things; Paul also liked this idea but pointed out that there is more past work then there is future. I can see his point and as the site is only just picking up again this idea could work but we may need more examples of work to work with.

Vikesh's work





When me and Jacqui first saw Vikesh's designs we were very impressed. When I saw his design I did not see the gold factory site that we were given but a brand new, slick design that was completely different to any of our designs.
My preferred design was the top design, I really like having an header designed with strong images (straight away focusing on the artists work) The orange and black compliments each other making both colours stand out, giving the design a modern image. This would make a great home page.
I feel that the second design would work well for an artists profile page. From the design I think Vikesh has the artist profile to the right and a news section to the left. This could possibly be an archive section for each artist, it would allow individual fans to see what each artist is up to i.e. exhibitions coming up.

Vikesh also designed a new logo idea, again very modern and vibrant but this has given me inspiration to do more logo designs. We are going to continue doing more designs but try and move away from the original site design and create a whole new look for the gold factory name.

Goldfactory - logo

When talking to Paul in our first client meeting we suggested rebranding the site such as the logo and, as he said that he was open to ideas I thought that I would have a little play around with the logo. As you can see the original logo above is very simple, I wanted to stick to this idea because I liked the look; below are some of my ideas that I thought could work well for a new logo.


For my first idea I did not want to change the logo much, I wasn't to keen on the block white square in the center but I wanted to find a way to keep the white within the logo. As you can see to the right I have created a white strip so rather then a plain square I have made the general layout a bit more symmetrical. What I found difficult about this design however was joining the 'G' with the blocks of colour. As you can see the letter 'F' I have been able to merge it with the top and bottom blocks of colour but I struggled to do this with the 'G' letter.


Because the first design attempt was unsuccessful with the 'G' I thought that I should try and focus on a shape that would work well with that letter; hence the circle shape. When I tried to keep the 'F' the same size it didn't look right so I minimised it so it would fit in the restraints of the circle. I liked the look of this idea however looking at the design now I think that I should have maybe centered the letters. I thought that having the letters positioned to the left would look more effective (making the curves look like they flow more) but I am not too keen on this now looking at it again.


I always had an idea of a factory whenever I heard the name 'Goldfactory' so I thought lets scrap the old logo and incorporate the ideas that I think of and I really like this idea when looking at others. I liked the idea of the 'F' being quite close to the letter 'G' so I tried merging them together and it looks good; I managed to find an image of a factory and stuck that on top of the 'F'. I think that it looks quite catchy as it is a simple design yet its quite querky because there is a 'Gold factory' incorporated into the design.


So I messed around with the logo shape, the font size and the illustration so I thought lets have ago with change the font. I had a little research around contemporary fonts but when looking for some I could not find any that really stood out so I chose the font that you can see to the left. Again a very simple design, I had to edit the letters to make the 'G' stand out more otherwise it looked more like the letter C. I like the look of how the letters flow well together, I think some may perceive the font as being quite messy but this is something that I could easily change.



Even though you cannot see in my above designs I did experiment with a range of colours but it seemed that none of the colours that I used worked as well as the original colour and so for that reason I am sticking to the original colour. I have started sketching some ideas out for the site image but I thought that I would experiment early with the logo just to add something to our group work.

August Art

I came across this whilst browsing for ideas and I feel that this a perfect example of what NOT to do when designing a site.

When I first opened this site I was greeted by a bright and colourful advertisement, which I at first thought was very promising however it turned out to be a preloader. From the bright loading page I was sent to the main homepage; dull and grey it was completed different the introduction page.

I liked the general layout page however when I clicked on each page the colours would change, but only on some pages. I found the colour scheme very topsy turvy, some pages had a grey background with white text and others with yellow text, one page was purple and had no relation to the other site. I am unsure whether there is a hidden reason behind this colour scheme but personally I think it looks very unprofessional and quite messy.

They have used a standard font making easier for viewers with bad eye sight. If I was to change the layout of the sight then I would center it more. There is alot of blank space that swamps the main content; I feel that if the page was centered it would make the site generally more appealing.

A big negative about this site is the navigation. When clicking on the buttons and being sent to another page rather then scrolling down to view the information the user has to scroll across; this is more difficult to view because if the user wanted to read an article they have to continually scroll back and fourth. It does not look any neater or different and I would have preferred it if the text was a scroll down.

What this site reflects on is the artists work. This is what the main aim of exhibition sites is about. I like the way they have put examples of all of the artists work giving the viewers a taster of what the exhibition will hold.

Another part that I do like about this site is the archives. They have kept the archive page very simple, the user just has to click on the title to view the whole article. This idea is something that I would consider inputting into my designs for the goldfactory site.

First Client Meeting

Myself, Jacqui and Vikesh are really eager to start with the designing of our site so we wasted no time in arranging a meeting with our client 'Paul Matosic' We were all quite nervous because we didn't know what to expect but I think we were pleasantly surprised.

Paul Matosic is an artist himself featured in the Gold Factory website, he was very laid back and was open for suggestions; he listened to our opinions and ideas and I think that Paul would be ok for us to work on all aspects of the site including looking at the branding. I took down some notes whilst we spoke to Paul to get a stronger idea on what we can work with:

- Two main projects on the front page.
- Keep the artists profile pages.
- Possible rebranding?
- Have a search for external links (will need advice on this)
- Clean up the archives/news
- Maybe include an updates page on artists exhibitions etc.
- Add an archive for Goldfactory's events.
- Have a forum/comment system.
- Keep the main focus on the 'ART'(the public doesn't know that they want art until they see it)

These were the main points that Paul quoted and feel that he has been very lenient on us. We have all gone away for the weekend to come up with some design concepts as we all have different ideas. From doing this we will be able to gather a range of ideas that can hopefully create a design that we are all happy about.

New Art Exchange

Because Gold factory is based around contemporary artists I thought the ideal place to gain some ideas would be around other art websites.

I got the idea of the New Art Exchange website when we went to visit the museum early on in the year. Like the Gold factory site it has been kept to a very minimal design however you are immediately welcomed with a strong image that clearly shows the viewer that the website is based around art.

Rather then sticking to a white background they have used a light gradient that is subtle yet makes the background stand out but not take the focus away from the images. They have unusually used two striking colours (purple and pink) for the titles but it works well, with the light background. They have kept to the light background/bold titles throughout the site, what I found interesting was that the background tone change with the colour of the title i.e. when the title turned turquoise the background to a light gradient turquoise.

The designers have taken the users into consideration by looking at the text. Even though they have used a grey font (which may be hard to see with some users) they have given it a bold look, using a simple and easy to read font. I feel that having the font bigger has used up page space, making users scroll down the page more; it is not a big problem however internet users do not have a very big attention span.

The photography used really brings out a strong impression of the museum, they each show different aspects of the museum giving the user a strong idea on what the museum does. The images are clearly the main focal point and I get the impression that because they used such big imagery they made the text at a larger size. I think that the imagery was the best part of the site, it could be a smaller size but maybe having the image at such a large size really makes a strong impact on the viewers impression on the museum.

They have put two navigation bars placed at the top and the bottom. It has been laid out easily enough so the user can click on the link and be shown sub links, they have all been labeled easily so the user knows exactly what page they are being sent too.

The site is a perfect example of what a contemporary artist web site should look like; with its simplistic look and easy navigation, not to mention only inputting the information that the users are looking for. They do not completely give away what the exhibitions are about, giving the users a taster of the artists work leaving them with curiosity.

Goldfactory "All that glitters is not sold"

As we have only just started this brief I thought that I would give everyone a brief intro on what 'Goldfactory' actually is. It is a site dedicated to the artists that go beyond the borders, creating cutting edge pieces of artwork.

From what I can see the website is aimed to "bring the cutting edge artists and the public together" What I don't see is the actual appeal of the website itself. When the user opens the site they are greeted by a very plain web site that shows very little art work, I did not know what it was until I searched the site. The site as a whole gives out no inclination that it is based around artists work.

Another part that I intend to look into more detail is what the difference is between the 'artists' and the 'research space artists' the site has no order; for example when the user scrolls down to the bottom of the page they are greeted to a second part of the site, which I believe to be blogs of the different entries that the research space artists have created. I like the links to the other artists pages as it gives the users more depth on what the artists are about.

The structure of the artists pages I think is user friendly and works to its need as the user simply navigates to the artists page and the information is provided including links to their own personal website, this is something that our group has to work on, I feel that having a structure to this website will really benefit the site; making it easier to use.

In my opinion the site needs a whole redesign, the main focuses would be on the general design (imagery, possible re-branding) and the structure (move the blog to a separate page) but I feel that the font and colour's should also be taken into consideration. I think that if the aim is to be appealing to the public then we need to design something that will appeal to them.

We still need to talk to the client as of yet but I feel that these are strong ideas that I can suggest to put forward.

Mock Client Website

The Brief

In teams of three design, implement and evaluate a website that demonstrates your understanding and expertise in all pathway module areas.

Students will be expected to submit a full joint report on the proposal, design, implementation and testing of this website. It is also expected to give a presentation specifying their progress and specific roles in its construction, client liaison and deployment.

Learning outcomes

- Demonstrate effective group working skills including negotiation and collaboration.
- Demonstrate an understanding of your own emergent professional direction.
- Demonstrate the ability to acquire and apply visual and technical skills in the context of developing and applying specific multimedia solutions.

The (best) team

In today's lecture we chose our groups and I am quite happy with the outcome. Jacqui is our group leader with myself and Vikesh working along side her. I feel that we have quite a good mix of design skills between us. I know that Jacqui has a good understanding of flash, php and dreamweaver skills and has very quirky design ideas, I am not too sure how strong Vikesh's skills are on programs however after looking at his blog I can see that he has very strong design ideas that I think look very interesting; as for myself, I have skills in all parts of the applications, though not as strong as Jacqui but I feel that I am quite confident to talk/present work so maybe that will come into use with contacting the client.

As this is only the first day I felt that I should write a brief summary on what we had to do, I am going to research into different websites that would perhaps relate to our brief to give us a clearer idea on what we need to design.