PCF3 Design Team Meeting Wk1

Today was the first of our weekly Design Team meetings that will take place on Wednesday mornings leading up to the show. As none of the seconds have worked on a brochure before or are that familiar with InDesign, we discussed and planned a way forward.

We have decided that they will design and layout the brochure and that I will direct and mentor them during the process, as well as tackling the trickier bits. We will present their layout ideas following study week. One of the designs will then be selected by majority vote during the exhibition meeting. Following this we will be able to ascertain page sizes for advertising and printer quotes which will be obtained the following week.

The chosen design will be carried forward and rather than one person working on the brochure, pages will be split, which I will join together prior to going to print. I will oversee the production element as Art Director to ensure that everything is as it should be before the final proof is signed off and sent to print. Roles for the seconds can be described as; Graphic Designer, Graphic Art Worker, Layout Artist etc.

Mentoring the Seconds; Session 1

We went through some basic planning techniques by making up a small dummy booklet, (shown above). We then sat and analysed an old spread from last year’s brochure, to ascertain what elements they would need to take into consideration for their layouts and spread designs.

Following this, we spent the rest of the morning doing an InDesign tutorial. I showed them some basic InDesign tasks, which they then developed having bought in their own ideas for the design of the brochure.

They all did well and mastered setting up a page, setting text and placing pictures. Next week we will look at refining their designs for presentation to the exhibition meeting, setting up a proper grid and look at master pages, stylesheets and colour work in InDesign. My other task for this week as Art Director, is to look at dates to be added to the schedule for our deadlines for; text, photographs, artworks, final proofs etc.