#1: ##20 My two cents on design and a little more...

I am taking the liberty to call this blogpost my "creation". It does fit all the criteria mentioned in the mission declaration. But this post is going to be different from my other ones. This is an essay about what I believe design is, what draws me to it and what part of it drives me.

My two cents on design..

If there has been a thought behind doing or building anything, I would call it design. Design is a response to a situation or a problem but it involves thinking. And if it is well-though of or given due attention, it is bound to be nicely done hence it is likely to be beautiful. It may or may not meet the layman's criteria of beauty but there is something about it that attracts attention, if not appreciation.

This is fascinating because it is so broad that you can categorize just about anything as design and apply it to just about anything. Art is just a facet of design but not design itself whereas all of engineering discipline could be called design. 

Time for a bad joke? -> .. hehehe...

So coming back to the topic...

What draws me to it?

I like design, especially the one which allows me to communicate, tell stories, express emotions in a way that it makes sense for someone on the receiving end. If they enjoy it, even better! Communication design is where all this can happen. What is communication design? Infographics? Branding? Storybooks? Training? I would like to believe, it is all of it! Communication design is about thinking how you want to convey your message. The message could be data, a piece of story, your introduction, your company's introduction, information in any form. But typically, communication design restricts itself to smaller bits of information and I think I can live with it. 

What excites me the most about communication? It is originally meant to be between human beings. That is what makes it awesome for me. The emotions, the way human brain scans data, receives it, stores it, recollects and relates to it. Without saying a word, you can make someone feel a certain emotion, sometimes an overwhelming one. It influences behaviour, gets people to do things they otherwise would not yet it is so ordinary and happens all so often. It is the closest thing to magic for me but so true that we think it is almost normal. Next time you are in a supermarket choosing something, ask yourself "why do I want this?". You know there is another product which might meet your requirement but you decided to go with what you chose. If your answer to yourself includes "feels" anywhere, you will know what I am talking about.

What drives me?

Advertisements, banners, email flyers, product packaging, half of the internet - they are talking to you, they are wanting your attention, they want you to do something - when you do as they want (sometimes without them even saying it) and think that is what you want, that is successful communication design right there! It is a powerful feeling and I want to experience that feeling everyday. I want to spend my life doing just that. 

#1: ##19 A wine bottle - empty or filled?

Hello again! Another instance of multiple posts in 24 hrs I guess.. but well, this was a long decided project, I just had to wait for an empty wine bottle, my previous projects to get over and some free time, which happened only a few hours ago so I jumped at the opportunity!.

I wanted to have a flower vase for my dining table and I wanted to create it. If it were in my control, I would actually build my house by myself, right from making the bricks to the interiors. I like creating things (have I said that already before?)

Anyway, so I decided to paint something inspirational on the bottle. Apart from the fact that I may not have the talent to create a very fine painting, I am not into that sort of beauty. Beauty lies in inspiration and in meaning for me. So I wanted to create something "beautiful".

Challenges?
1) Thanks to Google, finding a good quote was just a matter of "searching".
2) I had to experiment with the painting material for a bit. The sharpie did not work so well at the start so started out with acrylic colours which seemed quite risky at first but eventually the "miracle" happened, the sharpie worked fine and the paint wasn't as much of a disaster as I had expected it to be.
3) Writing on a bottle such that all the text can be visible from one angle was a challenge I failed. Maybe a faint line would have helped I guess.
4) I had sorted out the layout on a paper first so avoided space crunch.
5) It took a while for me to scratch some errors off the bottle but I am happy that it worked.

And as per the ritual, here is the picture of my creation. There are two pictures so that people can read the text completely. (Refer point 3 for explanation ;))

 

"Miracles start to happen when you give as much energy to your dreams as you do to your fears". (Please refer point 2 mentioned above)

#1: ##18 Another web design

Hello all. How have you been doing? Yeah, it's been a little long (once again) and the days I am not writing a post, time seems to fly faster! :D

So, here I am. For the past three days I have been working on a simple webpage for a live event organised by a NGO that is going to happen soon. It is about how couples can improve their relationships and a new perspective towards love.

What was the challenge? As always, took complete charge :D . I did the copywriting, the design (my favourite part) and the coding. I did a bit of research this time around about the current trends in web design, the fonts, the graphics and also how to write an effective copy. For copy I had to read some long copy myself but I think it was totally worth it. I think I like writing too amongst tens of other things ;).

Henceforth, I am going to use whatever I learnt even when I am writing a blogpost. So no more long drawn posts, here's the snyopsis..

1) I kept in mind what the audience is like, so kept the site simple, yet young and a little playful with the right blend of emotions.
2) Made the copy to draw attention to the problem, then mentioned the offering, followed by call to action and some reinforcement (testimonials). - I am personally quite happy with the work done.
3) A lot of photoshop editing and icons.
4) Simple code and almost scripting (yay!) which makes coding much more fun and allows you to focus on implementing the design.

With this, I present to you the link to my latest creation:
http://savingamarriage-savesafamily.com/website/home.html

P.S.: Still waiting for the approvals of the owner.... I hope they like it.

#1: ##17: Copywriting Template

I am writing this for yesterday as I completed my assignment only around 1:30 in the night. I have noticed I am at my best after 10 p.m when I am done entertaining all my distractions for the day and have no energy left to expend on something useless. I am still helping the NGO I mentioned earlier. I am involved in helping them with writing the content for their marketing material.

I have very little experience in copywriting but I have been reading up a lot and I have thoroughly enjoyed learning about it . (This activity is partly responsible for the delays of my experiments with felt.) I have come across a superb online resource to help anyone struggling with any topic related to online marketing called Quicksprout. You might have to search around to find what you are looking for but this might be a very helpful guide.

CAUTION: The following text might just seem boring and irrelevant if you are not working on your startup and if you have not spent more than 12 hours just trying to get start writing content which you are happy with. If that is you... Skip to "RESUME READ"...

Anyway so using this along with my own experience and style of working, I created a template for people who might be working on writing content for their startup. The purpose of this template is to:
1) Organise information in a systematic way especially when you are starting out and your offerings and your priorities are still being determined.
2) Maintain one working copy for everyone to use and rephrase the information as per requirement instead of rewriting the text differently for different purposes (like mails, brochures, proposals, websites) without having a coherent source of information.
3) Makes it simple to brainstorm because there is a guideline in place to determine the outcome of the brainstorming.
4) Makes sure all the team members are on the same page about their understanding of audience, offering and their company.

This is a hack! Such templates might need more thought but this might be a good starting point which can be customized as per your requirement!

RESUME READ
I know! I know! This is a very booooring subject for most of you because it reminds you of those useless documents you see at your workplace but somebody might find relief in this! And please don't tell me you did not know I was capable of doing something serious in my life!

See/download the file from google drive

#1:##16: Zentangle Art

Hello there!

After doing some heavy duty projects, I decided to relax my mind with some art. While surfing the internet a few days ago I came across a systematic way of doodling called zentangle art. What is so special about it? It allows you to relax and at the same time enhances focus and can be inspirational too. It has some simple rules to be followed but the possibilities of creating something new is limitless.

I happened to stumble upon this link and then did a wiki.

With just that amount of preparation, I was ready to create my first zentangle art. It was indeed very relaxing and somehow just repeating a pattern did some magic. I felt great after doing it and it was fun, especially because I love doodling anyway. If you remember, my first project too was a doodle, much different than this one though.

This is what I have created this time around...

#1:##15 - THE game

Hello again!

I feel so good to write the second blog on the same day after the lapse of seven days. Well, why is this creation no. 15 and not 14? The previous one was 13. If I had to skip a post, it should have been 13 instead of 14! But it's not about superstition. I started something as my 14th creation which is still to be completed. But I managed to complete something that I started after that so I am posting that first. For those who like stories may refer to my previous post and you will know what my soul has been through for the past one week. ;)

So let us begin the story of a new undertaking...

If you thought I was talking about something as awesome as "The" game of thrones - I am not. I am talking about a simple tic-tac-toe which has taught me a couple of interesting things. The idea was to create a base on which my plushie crosses and knots would lie. The base would be divided into 9 squares as usual. Ideally 9 plushies would be required to complete the game but since it is not fixed whether it begins with a cross or a knot, we have to consider all the cases and create 10 plushies. Instead I created 4 crosses and 4 knots would be sufficient to determine the outcome of the game. Pretty simple and organised so far. However with this idea, the concept of "quick and dirty" went right out of the window.

TLDR; The base needed some stitching and I optimized the number of plushie crossed and knots I would need.

I was considering fabric glue for making the 'X' and 'O's. But with that glue dying on me, I had to give it a pass and go the hard way - stitching :( ... Very boring, very tedious and very very long drawn (pun intended!).

Where were the real challenges? With plushies, there is no guarantee by how much the dimensions will change when you start stuffing it - all my plushies are slightly different despite of starting with the same dimensions. I had to do some functional prototyping to get the shapes and sizes right and created another 3-4 plushies to make what I had in mind.

Just to give you some idea of the kind of challenges I faced while preparing this game:
1) Threading the needle around twice for each plushie. Having long threads are difficult to manage.
2) Estimating the size of the plushies after they are stuffed. They contract by 1/2 an inch after stuffing them fully.
3) Trying to cut circular holes in felt because felt becomes very thick on folding and affects the symmetry of the shape.
4) Stitching from inside the holes for the inner circumference of 'O'.
5) Entangled threads! Especially if they would form a knot while you are taking your stitch.
6) Lots of stitching - The edges of the base, the 4 lines on the base to divide the area into 9 squares, 4 crosses and 4 knots.

(I am writing this to provide help to anyone who might want to do something similar to what I did.)

With this, I present to you, my simple little game that taught me patience and perseverance ;)

I have had a good experience creating these. This project has taken my quality of production one level up!

#1:##13 - Butterflies in my kitchen...

Oh it's still April ;) .. Happy to be back before I thought I could make it and much later than promised but what to do, such is life!

If you still remember, I shared a little story in my previous post about how I started three different things on a goddamned day and and it has taken me really long to get over the hurdles and complete the task I began. I had decided to experiment with felt on April, 5. It took me a while to collect the raw materials given my mobility constraints. After I collected the material I was almost sure of what I wanted to create. And I did start pretty confidently to create two felt butterflies for my kitchen shelf as decor.

Let me tell you it is absolutely human to presume this task is pretty straight forward and so it was, until... I decided to keep it clean and use glue to stick the parts of the butterfly together instead of simply stitching them. Stitching was not my strong suit but fast forward to today, I have had an extensive training in stitching and consider myself comfortable with the craft of stitching. (You have to check out my next "encounter" with stitching to know what I have been through). So coming back to the butterflies, here is the story...

I cut the stencil for the butterflies so that I could have two identical butterflies. I have a small wing, big wing and the body. Felt was feeling nice and I was pretty excited. While I was still cutting the fabric, I was thinking to myself that I will stick them together with glue and that should be it. However, just after I finished that thought, I was suddenly not very happy with my creation. And I decided to create something useful. The thought excited me so much that I left the butterflies mid-way (WHY??????) and started creating a cleaning rag which would have a lady bug on the top of it which can be used as a grip (REALLY??) and happily cut the base for the ladybug's body. But did not know how to cut the rest of the cloth to make one sided protrusion and decided to chuck that idea (more about it later) and create a "simple" tic-tac-toe game using felt. So now I guess you understand my emotions behind calling April, 5 a goddamned day - please, this is a very personal context so do not take offense if it happens to be your birthday or anniversary or the day of your first kiss and so on....

This all happened in a matter of two hours. At the end of it, I had started three projects and I was still nowhere with my creation for the day. Driven by child-like excitement led me to start something really long and tedious that I could not let go.

Many things happened all at once so I will have to breakdown the story to maintain relevance at this point. I will leave it to your imagination to draw the picture in your mind at the end of my third post from now.

So on April,5 I went to bed by starting to stitch the base for the tic-tac-toe and learnt a stitch called blanket stitch. I said starting because it took me around 2 hours on the next day just to finish hemming the edges of the base on which my cross and knots would lie and I was starting to become a little faster with the stitch.

On April 7 I decided that I would simply use the glue and complete the butterflies. But...... the glue (which I use to stick wooden objects) did not work! I tried another glue, that too would not work! So finally I decided to stitch the butterfly parts together and do it nicely. I did complete it on that day, but my inner voice had led me to take this as a challenge and I decided to write on this blog only after I finish all the three creations I had begun! :D ... How brave!

Anyway, so today is the day. Here is my first creation with felt.. the butterflies. While I began writing this sentence, I felt like giving the poor butterflies a bit of a finishing touch. I tried a different stitch for their eyes. The first eye turned out to be okay, the second one looked like it belonged to its baby! I had to redo it and while doing that, the butterfly's neck broke!! But I could fix it with a few stitches. Then I learnt my lessons and got the eyes right for the second butterfly. With this, I bury all my ideas of doing anything else on those butterflies and just completing this post and my creation (and the troubles that tagged along).

So proudly presenting to you... the butterflies in my kitchen..

Btw, those butterflies came off just after I took the snap :D ...

Update

Hello! I am fully aware that I am breaking my silence after five days almost but yes, we are still talking about habits here. And my silence on the blog does not mean I am not committed to my mission anymore. I would like to quickly explain to you what is up. Yes, I will pull off a classic me again!

So, I started experimenting with acrylic felt. And when you are creating something with cloth, the most evident thing is stitching (I know, tough guess!). And stitching manually takes some time. Besides, if it is upto you and if you are someone like me, keeping all the options open is almost a curse! I started out by making something, mid-way started disliking what I created, started something else and midway realise I could not execute it for technical reasons and started something else altogether which is now taking me really long to complete. I stepped out yesterday and got some fabric glue to make my life a little simpler but well, let us see where it takes us.

I am going to write a more thorough account of what happened because I found it pretty amusing but now that I have caused this delay I have decided to complete everything I started and posting it all together. Well, my blog, my rules! I love the flexibility of working for myself! :D

Please hang on till I write again, which should be sometime soon.
 

#1: ##12 - Brochure for my mom's business

Hi there! Today I had no idea what I would end up doing. Just before I could begin my work, I started chatting with my parents (as always). My mom is launching her own chocolate business at home. It is a small scale thing as of now but we really want to do it right. So everyday, we end up discussing and brain storming for at least an hour on Skype as I live far away from them.

Like most businesses need marketing as a primary function, especially the startups, we are trying to find means of marketing our product too. And we decided that we shall begin with the most basic thing - a pamphlet. So the whole day today, I was glued to my laptop designing away the pamphlet for our little baby! :)

Today's creation was pretty straight-forward in a way. I have done this kind of stuff earlier. I had to play around with the text, the background colour, the font colour etc. The intention of writing this pamphlet was make our audience imagine what it would feel like buying the chocolates we make. My mom is indeed trying to fill a gap in the market right now. Good stuff for an affordable price and creating an experience around gifting chocolates - not merely stepping into an expensive store and buying something off the shelf.

With that said, here is the brochure that is designed. Take a look!