FMP Reflections.pptx

1. FMP Reflections

2. Week 1: Contextual Research
For the first week of FMP, I started out with contextual research. Throughout the week I looked at 3 designers; Saul Bass, Aries Moross, and Henock Sileshi. Whilst
researching these designers, I looked into their background and how they made their start in graphic design. After that, I discussed their design process and common
themes that are shown amongst their products. Then, I presented some of their popular designs and created a bibliography for each artist. This research was important
as it allowed me to find out further information about different designers that create similar things to what I would like to for my FMP. Finding more information about
these designers will also help me get inspiration for my design style for this project, it will also help me with existing product research as I have a variation of select
designers to further look into their products. Over the weekend, I then did further research into a production company that focuses on stage design and planning for
tours, award shows, etc. As I am planning to create a tour concept and visuals for my FMP, it was helpful to look into the designers within this company and how their
design process works. This research week went well for me as I learned lots of information about these designers and their work. I didn’t know many graphic designers
previously so I’ve learned lots of new information throughout the week. Specifically, the artist Aries Moross has really helped inspire my idea for FMP and I found their
design choice to be very eye catching and something I would like to take inspiration from in my own design style. If I have spare time I would like to look into more
designers that have worked in a variety of areas so that I have more of a range of people that have worked in different sections in media. Now that I have completed
this research, I will be moving on to my contextual statement next week and completing my proposal.

3. This week focused on writing out a contextual statement and proposal. For the statement, I wrote about the topic I am planning to create for my FMP (a tour concept)
and what products that consists of. Then, I described the overall tone and feel of my project and how it will be appealing to my target audience. After that, I wrote
about the inspirations behind this project. This is why my previous contextual research was beneficial as the designers that inspired me to create this project were
discovered whilst completing this research. It is important for me to write about the inspirations behind my project as it demonstrates that I have an understanding of
some of the design process and I have looked into designers that have previous experience in this industry. In addition, I also discussed how my previous projects
throughout the two years have influenced this project and how the skills developed throughout will help me through this final project. However, this was more of a
brief description as I went into more detail in the rationale of my proposal. My contextual statement went well overall, in the future I would possibly like to add more
detail to it that I have missed out in my proposal rationale. It was important for me to complete this statement as it helps introduce my project to the audience and
how I am planning to make it. After completing this, I started working on my proposal. The proposal is the document that explains my final idea for the project and
how I am planning to make it. For the rationale, I went into further detail about the previous projects I have worked on throughout the course and how this experience
will help me, I also discussed how these influenced what branch of media I would like to work in throughout second year and after college. I’m my project concept, I
listed the products I will be making for this tour, the skills and software I will be using to create these, and what research I will need that will benefit me in this project.
To finish off, I described the ways I will be evaluating my work, these reflections are an example of one of the ways I will be self-evaluating throughout each week of
the project. To finish off, I completed a bibliography and a brief schedule. The proposal went well overall. This is important to complete as it is the final overview of the
project concept, it explains to the audience and examiners the process I am planning to follow to complete this project and the skills I will be using.
Week 2: Contextual Statement and Proposal

4. This week I started off my research with looking into existing products. As I have less knowledge behind stage/tour design, I felt it was most important to look into
these products first. To start off I looked at the Reputation Stadium Tour, mainly focused on the main stage design and looking at the visuals designed for the screens. I
learned that for this stage design, the floor was made of LED video screens and had an LED wall. Visuals were then made and displayed on this screen throughout the
show. I also learned that the lighting changes throughout, along with the visuals, helped tell the story of Swift’s journey to get to Reputation. Another product I
researched was the Starboy World Tour. For this, I looked into the overall branding of the album release, and how the aesthetic influenced the stage design, posters
and briefly discussed merchandise. For this I learned that The Weeknd also wanted to base his tour around a story, but this time it was the story of his album and the
character he is portraying throughout that era. Es Devlin’s work on the stage design was very interesting to find out about as he designed a piece that can fold into
different shapes, such as a plane, throughout the show. I found that his branding was very consistent throughout this album release. From the album covers, music
videos, promotional posters and the tour, they all followed the same theme. This will help me in my project as I have been able to see an example of consistent
branding throughout an album release and tour branding. Finding out about the designers for that project has been helpful in inspiration for my project and will help
me remember to be consistent throughout my branding and make sure the tour matches the artists aesthetic.
Week 3: Existing Products Research

5. For the second week of research, I started exploring more into my topic. I have mainly been focusing on the artist ‘The Weeknd’ as I will be creating a tour concept
based off of his latest album. It is important to do this topic research so I can develop a deeper knowledge and his journey throughout his career, this will help me
create a body of work inspired by this that is also consistent with his latest album aesthetic. To start off, I researched how The Weeknd started out as an artist, then I
went into each album release since. I wrote briefly about the music genres throughout his career and his lyricism, but I mainly focused on each aesthetic the albums
had individually and the world he created within each album era. Looking into the promotional material for each album and noticing the contrast showed me that I will
have to maintain that consistency when creating my own promotional material for Dawn FM as he has a very clear consistent theme throughout his albums that
separates them and makes them recognisable. After that, I started looking into his tours throughout the years, his visuals and stage designs. This was beneficial to
research so I could look at the different styles this artist has made and how his stage design has improved as he has developed and become more known as an artist.
This helped me gather inspiration for what I would like to create for my own visuals, it was also beneficial to learn about the process that goes into making these,
because although I am not building a physical stage, it is still important to have knowledge and understanding into the process of how the final tour comes together. To
finish off, I made a bibliography of where I found my information. This research went well overall and I learned more about my chosen artist, I also got to explore his
different album eras throughout his career and how he got to his newest release. Next, I plan to explore this artists target audience and what appeals to them.
Although I briefly mentioned audience appeal in my existing product research, it is important for me to explore my target audience in detail as the products I make will
be designed to appeal to them.
Week 4: Topic Research

6. This week was for problem solving and experiments. I started by looking into the various issues that could go wrong throughout this project and production. I wrote a
list of practical/technical problems that would affect my production, and theatrical problems that are more external issues. As my project is fully digital and I am not
needing to film anything or take pictures, I found that I didn’t have many issues that could go wrong. However, I discussed possible problems with the computer and
how I would prevent or resolve this issue so I have a contingency plan in case things go wrong throughout. After that, I looked into printing costs for some of my work.
My project is almost entirely print based as I am designing promotion for a tour. So, I looked at various websites and compared their prices for a fanzine, and also A3
and A4 posters. I found that with these websites it was more expensive to buy one singular print. Although I would be paying more to buy a bulk amount, the cost per
print would work out to less. But as of right now, I don’t think I will be printing any of my work, but it was good information to research as I would have to know this
knowledge when working in industry. After that, I started working on some experiments to help me develop some new skills I can use in my production. My original
plan was to make an alternate album cover for Dawn FM to help me gather inspiration for my production, but Photoshop was quite glitchy that day so I had issues
trying to get anything to work. Instead, I started working on After Effects as I am less confident in my skills in this software because I have less experience. The first
experiment I wanted to do with this project didn’t go well as After Effects kept closing, I always wasn’t able to download a song to match the animation to because it
was blocked by college Wi-Fi. I ended up working on a text animation that I could use in a similar style for my tour announcement if I decide to make it. Overall, this
week was quite successful, I think it would have been more productive if I didn’t have software issues. In future, I would prepare and download songs from home so I
would be able to go through with my original experiment plan. But it was still helpful to create the text animation and build my confidence in using After Effects.
Week 5: Problem Solving and Experiments

7. This week was for finishing off experiments and starting planning, but because of the technical issues I had last week I mainly carried on working on my experiments.
Firstly I finished off my Dawn FM text animation experiment and wrote about my process creating that. I found this experiment was successful and helpful as it helped
me work out how I would deal with technical issues during the production stage. If I was to incorporate this in my project I would use an alternative font and text as I
feel the overall result looks quite blocky or crowded in some areas, but I did complete the tutorial successfully I would change some aspects to make it flow better. The
second experiment was another After Effects text animation which I was a lot happier with the final result. This allowed me to experiment with the different effects
and presets to give different shapes and movement to my animation. It also gave me inspiration as I would like to incorporate this animation into my concert visuals,
but replace the text with song lyrics. For my final experiment I worked in Photoshop on an alternate album cover. Although I completed the tutorial successfully, I
wasn’t fully happy with the final result as it wasn’t my style and I also thought it didn’t look very professional. This was still beneficial to experiment with, because I was
able to experiment with gradient maps to recolour the image into more neon shades, I was also able to experiment with text layouts on the cover.. After that, I started
working on my planning. I started creating mood boards to show my inspiration for the concert visuals and wrote about how these inspired me and describe the look
and feel of the visuals. During the weekend, to catch up with my planning I will make mood board for the other products I am planning to make and start working on
flat plans for each product to give a general feel on how I want my products to look and how I plan to make it.
Week 6: Experiments and Planning

8. This week consisted of planning ready for production and figuring out how I am going to make the different products. First, I started writing about the concert visuals
and what songs I will use for them. I will be making these in After Effects so I also wrote about the effects and presets I will use to create the animations and described
the process of creating each of these. After that I made a colour scheme and described the connotations behind each of these and it’s effect on the audience. I decided
that it may be easier to make all the animations on After Effects and then put all the clips together on Premiere Pro in line with the song. I followed this same process
when describing my tour poster and other products. Along with showing pictures of my inspirations for these products, I described how mine will look and how I will
make it. I plan to make all the other products in Photoshop. Then, I went on Dafont, and tried to look for the same font that was used for existing After Hours branding,
as I wanted to keep a consistent theme with the current visuals. However, this wasn’t available to download meaning I had to find as similar a font as possible. I found
two different Serif fonts that I’ll be able to use for the poster, and for the animations I chose two Sans Serif fonts that are more rounded and would look better in the
animations I am planning to make and the text effects I will use. Finally, I made a production schedule of the 5 weeks of production so I can make sure to manage my
time effectively and know what tasks I should be working on each day. I also started gathering images of various fan art that may inspire me for my own work on a
separate slide. Overall this week was successful. I was able to be productive and give a clear image on how my products are going to look. Over the weekend, I plan to
finish off any planning that is missing so that I am prepared to start production next week.
Week 7: Planning

9. This week was my first week of production. On the first day, following my planned schedule, I started working on the concert visuals. I started out using After Effects to
create the light beam animation for the introduction of the first song, this went quite well and I completed this on time for my schedule. After that, I started working
on the text animations following a tutorial as I wasn’t fully sure how to create the glitch transition. However, I had issues completing this as I needed to install a preset
for the animation to work and I didn’t have permission to do this on the college computers. But I made sure all of my work has been saved onto OneDrive so that I
could finish off these animations at home. Alternatively, I decided to start working on poster ideas for the main tour poster. I started out by trying to create a trippy eye
melting effect but I ended up not liking how it turned out. I am now working on another concept where the image has a 3D eye effect instead. On Thursday, I had
issues with loading the 3D tools on the college computers as it made the whole software freeze up so I couldn't fix anything. To resolve this, that evening I made the 3D
eye on my computer at home on a separate file and uploaded it onto OneDrive ready to add to my image on Friday. Friday, I managed to finish off the album cover by
adding all the additional features such as logo, album title, etc. I am happy with the way this turned out and felt that this week was quite productive. During the
holidays, I plan to find mock-ups for my CD cover and will put these together once I return to college after Easter. Although I had some technical issues which
negatively impacted my schedule and time, I was able to resolve this by doing extra work at home and also deciding to focus on the print aspect of my project first.
Week 8: Production Week 1

10. Returning to college after the Easter break, I started off my second week of production. Since I had found the mock-ups I wanted to use over the holidays, I had to
make some extra pieces for it such as a back cover, inside cover, and CD design- this is what I worked through on Wednesday. For these designs, I wanted to maintain
consistency and make them fit my front cover as much as possible. For the inside cover, I used a different image from the Anton Tammi photoshoot to ensure that
there was similar lighting and style of photo that I could edit. I was creative with different text effects for this cover as I had some of my text with an inner glow look,
and the rest as a glitch effect made by altering the RGB settings that appear when double clicking on the layers. For the CD design, I was consistent with the eyes
feature and made that my design for the disk. I also added a red to green gradient over this to mimic the vibrant coloured lighting on the album cover. For my back
cover, I made it more minimalistic. At first, I attempted to include a photo of The Weeknd on this, but it didn't fit right and wasn't visually appealing with how the text
was placed. The track list text has a bevel and emboss effect to make it stand out and give a 3D look amongst the dark background. I also included elements of green
throughout to ensure that I included all the colours in my planned colour scheme without focusing primarily on red tones like the 'After Hours' logo. When these were
all complete, I was able to export all the images and place straight onto my mock-ups, I finished it off by adjusting the brightness and contrast within the Camera Raw
filter to make sure the images still stand out amongst a brighter backdrop. Throughout the rest of the week, I made both the front and back cover of my zine in
Photoshop. As I had finished off working on my album cover and completing planning throughout the holidays, I had more of an idea on how I wanted my products to
look. For my front cover, I had taken inspiration from a collage that I saw online and then made it more my own with images of The Weeknd. This cover has a comic
style look due to the halftone pattern and how the photos are displayed in front of the cover image. During this process, I had issues with warping the pattern to create
the background. Issues with the smudge tool caused Photoshop to shut down and I lost my current progress. However, following screenshots I was able to recreate the
work, the smudge tool was working properly and I was able to warp the background. During the second half of the week, I made the back cover which is an
advertisement for The Weeknd’s latest album ‘Dawn FM’. I combined some photos from his album photoshoot to create a motion blur effect and then inserted his
slogan ‘The Dawn Is Coming’. When creating the main image, I had issues with the motion blur where the photos were overlapping too much. To resolve this, I
changed the blending mode and lowered the opacity. I also erased the rest of the image so only the faces were shown. This style is quite different to the style of the
front cover as The Weeknd has different aesthetics for each album. Overall, I think these went well and I am happy with the final result. During the weekend, I plan to
write the articles in advance for the magazine. If these aren’t finished in time, I will make the tour poster and tickets next week.
Week 9: Production Week 2

11. For the third week of production, I worked on some of the double pages for my zine. The purpose of making this zine is for it to be a collector's edition product that
will be sold with the merchandise at each show, it features a double page spread with a poster style page about each of the albums The Weeknd has released up until
After Hours. The articles tells the reader about themes within each album and how the lyricism and visuals in each era tells a story. When making these double pages, I
decided to go in order of album release as it is also the order of the magazine pages. During the four days, I was able to write out all the articles for each of my pages
so they are ready to add straight away once I have made them all. I started out with Trilogy on Wednesday. Using my subject research, I was able to have an
understanding of what each album was like visually and general themes within the promotional content. For Trilogy, I made the style mostly monochrome with a film
photograph print for the images, there were small pops of colour within this double page to make reference to the Thursday and Echoes of Silence mixtapes which has
yellow and red as part of their colour scheme. On Thursday, I created the Kiss Land double page. Similar to The Weeknd, I was inspired by the Japanese style street
signs and wanted to make aspects of my double page to look brightly lit with neon green and pink shades. Friday, I completed my Beauty Behind The Madness double
page and made a start on the Starboy page. For Beauty Behind The Madness, it also had a monochrome colour scheme, with a paper torn collage style and splashes of
yellow to contrast. Similar to its album cover, I wanted to create a collage poster so, using photos from that era I found on Pinterest, I desaturated the images and
placed them together to create this monochrome newspaper collage style image. At the end of the day, I started working on the article page for Starboy. I created a
bright space scenery using a combination of textures and gradients for a futuristic space style look that I think fits the Starboy aesthetic well.
This week was productive. However, I have found that the zine is a lot more time consuming than I thought as it takes about a day to make each double page. To make
sure everything is done on time, I aim to complete making my magazine over the weekend so I can spend the final week focusing on my tour poster and merchandise.
Week 10: Production Week 3

12. Over the weekend, I managed to complete the rest of my zine. I finished off my Starboy page by adding the article to the page, and then a photo slideshow style image
for the second half of the page. With My Dear Melancholy, I followed more of a darker film grain style with a colour scheme of orange and black to match the
corresponding album cover. Finally, on the last double page After Hours I wanted to follow a similar style to my album cover. For this, I added the 3D eyes to my poster
image and created a glitch effect like I plan to do for my tour poster so that this final page could combine all the aspects of the different products I’ve made. Once this
was complete, I made a pdf file and uploaded it onto Issuu.
For the beginning of this final week, I started out struggling with inspiration and ideas and was unsure on if I wanted to create the glitch effect for the tour poster. To
try spark inspiration, I started the week by working on creating a vintage style letterpress music poster. I started out by following a tutorial on YouTube but had issues
as the textures I downloaded weren’t giving the same effect. So, I created my own style of this poster without the tutorial and experimented with layer styles and
gradient maps to create the different colour overlays of the artist. I switched between a variation of different images of the artist that I thought would fit best but
ended up sticking with a concert photo. After experimenting and not being happy with how my image was turning out, I decided to go through with my original poster
idea. For the rest of Wednesday, I created the glitch image effect, and then was inspired to create a fisheye look. I edited The Weeknds arms to appear as though they
are reaching out to him and warped it all into a fisheye lense. On Thursday, I added the final pieces such as the title logo and tour dates to complete my poster. After
that, I incorporated elements from the poster to create a concert ticket design that I think matches the look and aesthetic of the rest of the products well. For the final
day of production, I completed my ticket design and added the Ticketmaster logo, after that I made my hoodie design which is a heatmap style blurred image of The
Weeknd, along with a logo for the tour on the front of the hoodie, and placed it onto a mock-up.
This final week, although it started out with setbacks from me lacking inspiration, I was able to complete all my print products in time for production finishing.
Unfortunately, because I underestimated how long my magazine was going to take, I ran out of time to make and finish off the concert visuals. This means that this will
just be a print based project, and I should hopefully have enough products made for my FMP to submit.
Week 11: Production Week 4

13. Now that production is all completed, I have to spend the final two weeks of this project evaluating my work and creating a presentation to showcase my work. But
first, I had received feedback about all my planning a few weeks back and haven’t had the time to resolve any of the issues until now. My main issue was that my FMP
research wasn’t at pass level because I forgot to include audience research and production method research. This was the first thing I worked onto resolve to make
sure that none of my work was going to cause me to fail. After that, I added more detail to my pagination about my magazine as it was a lot briefer before. Now that I
have made it, I was able to expand my pagination and describe how each of the pages look from a planning perspective. Since my main problem was resolved, I just
had to fix small details throughout different areas of planning and research and add extra detail. I decided to keep my planning for my concert visuals so that I could
show my original plan for the tour package, and what I ended up creating instead due to time. After resolving any issues, I was able to make a start on my evaluation.
For the evaluation, I used a pro forma PowerPoint that had questions on the slides so I knew what to talk about within my evaluation. Within this, I was able to
complete the project overview section where I spoke about the overall project, personal response where I wrote about how I felt, and the action plan in which I wrote
about what I would do differently in the future.
Next week, I aim to finish off the evaluation PowerPoint before the deadline, complete my presentation, and add all these to my Wix site.
Week 12: Resolving Issues and Evaluation

14. For the final week of FMP, I started the first half of the week by completing my evaluation. Firstly, following the pro forma, I completed the evaluation and analysis
sections so that the general PowerPoint was completed and I had evaluated my project as a whole. After this, I additionally added extra slides and evaluated and
analysed each of my products separately and wrote about how I felt about them and if there were any issues. Now that this was complete, I started working on my
presentation. I had decided that I would show screenshots of my work and my process and then have a voiceover explaining the images and different aspects of my
projects. In preparation for this I made a PowerPoint presentation where I grouped together all the photos I wanted to yours and displayed them in a way that was
more visually appealing than just a PowerPoint slideshow. Next, I wrote a small piece of writing about each section that I wanted to cover from my target audience to
my production process, these were helpful to give me a general idea on what to say in my voiceover as I had to shorten it from the amount I had wrote in some
sections. To create the video, I recorded the voiceover first and added it to my editing software, then I added my photo elements and made sure everything lined up
correctly with what I was saying in the voiceover and then exported it. Finally, I added everything to my Wix site and updated the layout to look more presentable as it
appeared quite empty looking before.
Now that FMP is complete I feel accomplished and relieved that I was able to submit everything in time. Because I was struggling to focus and get everything in on
time I was concerned that I wouldn’t meet the deadline so I’m glad that everything is submitted in time.
Week 13: Evaluation and Presentation