Its The End - A Reflection Of The Last 2 Years

Over the past 2 years on my course I have encountered progression both academically and professionally as a designer.

At the start of the 2 years for me it was quite daunting as I was the only one doing Graphics as a 1^st year so straight away I was knocked back a little – new college, new environment and I knew no one and no one else was starting with me as it was. Everyone else was doing a different subject so I didn’t have anyone else to relate to and work together with for projects. I felt that I didn’t at all connect with any other the other 1^st years as much in the first few months and all of the 2^nd years were already friends from their first year so I was somewhat an outsider but as the end of the 1^st year came to a close I definitely started to fit in and find my feet – it took a while but I then started to feel a lot more comfortable and became friends with particular members of the group. I have never found it so hard to make friends! It was strange now looking back at how quiet and closed I was around the others however it has all changed now and I feel that my 2^nd year brought me out of my shell so much that I feel totally comfortable around everyone and do not at all feel an “outsider” as much as I did when I started. I love having friends from similar creative fields and whom have similar interests as my friends outside of the college are not creative people and each have much different interests so it’s nice to have people I can relate to a lot more. I feel that over the past 2 years on this course I have made some strong friendships and connections which I will carry throughout both my future and career. It’s bizarre to say but I feel like the friends I have made in the past 2 years I have a stronger connection with than other friendships I have – this may be because we have similar interests and this course has made me grow up so much more and I have lost contact with old friends I’m not sure but I never thought I would gain such good friendships from this course which I have.

At the start of the course having little or no contact with clients I had no knowledge of how to approach, deal with and work alongside a client. Throughout the 2 years I have been studying on this course I have had many of opportunities to do so as it is a highly client work based course with many live and local briefs coming up weekly therefore I had the chance to meet clients, make contacts and work on their projects. Having this opportunity has enabled me to attain skills which will be transferrable when I have finished my studies and go into work whether it be freelance or in a studio. I now have the skills to approach clients in a professional manner, present my ideas to them and work alongside them efficiently on their projects – this is a valuable skills which I am pleased to have built upon and progressed with as the course has proceeded. By being able to work with clients from the start it has prepared me for when I go into work – I have learnt that working with clients is not a smooth process, they have their own opinions and can change their minds at any point which can set you back and make deadlines even closer with more to do in that time. I have definitely learnt that the client is always right and I am designing for them. Therefore what they say goes and if they change their minds or have changes then I just have to go with that.­ As well as my communication skills improving with clients I feel that it has also improved in general in terms of communicating with people – I feel lots more confident when talking to people and meeting new people. This for me is a huge achievement gaining self confidence in myself and also what I do.

As a designer I have developed my skills when it comes to adapting my work and being versatile with different types of software which I had little or no experience with before this course. I am now fully competent with a range of different software including Illustrator and InDesign which before this course I rarely used due to inexperience and lack in knowledge of how to use them. I have gained these skills through tutorials on my course and also self-taught through reading magazines and online tutorials also. These skills are vital for my development as a designer and will be skills which I can build upon through my further study and graphic design career after.

Although I am predominantly Graphic Design based I have had the chance to merge these skills into other areas such as textiles and just design as a whole. The facilities I have been exposed to on this course have allowed me to use mixed media and other elements within my designs other than purely computerized graphics. I have had the opportunity to use silk screen printing facilities which I have never had access to before, I have been taught how to mix the inks, how to prepare screens and do the prints. This is a great skill to have as it adds another dimension to my designs. I have also had the ability to work with others from other specialist areas to widen the skills used in my projects such as photography, fine art, textiles and many more. As I have been involved in a variety of different projects I have been able to grow and build my professional portfolio which includes many of my most successful projects. By having built a professional portfolio I will now be able to send this to prospective employers to showcase my skills and work to them. This in turn will help me to secure a job, placement or internship.

Even after studying for GCSE’s and A levels and having lots of academic work involved in these including evaluations I have always had a weakness in this area and my evaluations have always been small and not in any way as through as they should have been at that level – this was a weakness that I carried into this course also, not having done anything about it therefore with this being  a very reflection and evaluation orientated course this could have become a problem for me but as the course progressed so did my evaluations. I think that each evaluation that I have done has got better, longer and more thorough/in depth which is great. This is down to the support I have been given, the guidance received and evaluation/reflection methods which we have been taught. It has really helped and paid off. I feel that now I am more confident writing evaluations and that I can write a decent amount which is through and reflects on projects, experiences and skills which I have encountered and obtained. I feel that although I have built upon these skills I know there is still room for improvement in this area so this is something I will continue to work on and develop as my studies progress and I further on into a job.

I think that my most successful projects over the 2 years has been my 2^nd year self-promotion project and the First Steps Derbyshire project. I really enjoyed both of these projects however they are both my most recent projects so this may be why I have chosen them over projects which I did way back in year 1 but I am most pleased with them and they way that I executed them. I was extremely pleased with the 2^nd year self-promotion brief, considering that I started later than others and had a few setbacks it has turned out great! I can see myself using this promotional material as a young designer whereas with my previous branding from the 1^st year I did not like it so I think it is good that I actually like it and will want to keep it considering I usually dismiss my own work and pick fault with it. My new promo material doesn’t as such represent me in terms of imagery etc. as there is not imagery but I like the overall look, feel and consistency of the brand. It all fits together, uses the same font and doesn’t vary between each item. The First Steps eating disorder project was a challenging project as it took a lot of research and I had to make sure that all of the information I provided was legitimate and true to word. I didn’t want to offend anyone so my choice of language and content had to carefully be chosen in order to comply with this. It felt good to have such a responsibility and it was a good project to set me up to what work will be like in a job – there will be lots of briefs which rely on the sort of maturity and sensitivity which I have had to apply for that project. I think that one of my weaker projects was my earlier projects when we first started – I think this may have been because I was just finding my feet, creativity and only just getting into the subject properly. This transition from A level to was a big step therefore my earlier works struggled due to this. Also I think that the way that the course was structured back at the start may have impacted on this as it was a bit here and there for a while. However I can’t just blame it on that, obviously I am going to like my most recent works as now I have progressed, my skills have changed and grown and I have also found the way that I like to work and applied this to my work – I was only finding my feet at first and I hadn’t got the skills I walk away with today.

Overall the past 2 years have been a real learning curve both academically and emotionally as a designer and just as a person. I had no real thoughts as to how I thought it’d pan out when I first started – I never knew how it would shape me as a person, develop me as a designer and how it would make me so much mature. I am seriously surprised how much I have learnt and I honestly don’t feel I would have had the same experience at a university as it would have been a bigger group and probably less live projects and briefs. These are what has helped me through this course having smaller group sizes has allowed everyone to work as a  collaborative when needed and also it has allowed much more time with tutors and more support. The live projects have opened my eyes to working with clients – developing my communication skills extensively, I feel a lot less nervous when it comes to talking to people which now will hugely help me as I further my studies and start my design career. I have developed design skills which were non-existent when I started the course – I had never as such studied Graphic Design it was just something I liked to do and now I feel I come out after 2 years being competent in a majority of areas within the design field which will be of great help and use when it comes to my career whether it be in a studio or as a freelancer. I am really pleased with what I have achieved in 2 years which proves to me that a lot can happen in 2 years and hard work pays off! I am really looking forward to my final year and starting off my career in Graphic Design.