Major Project: Inku
WEEK 01 - WEEK 14 (23/04/2024 - 09/08/2024)
Adena Tan Sue Lynn (0345769)
/ Bachelor of Design (Honours) in Creative Media
Major Project
Inku
DIRECTORY
LECTURES
Week 01 (23/04/2024)
During this week's lecture, Mr Asrizal and Mr Kannan spoke to us on what to expect this semester. Here are some of my notes:
- Major Project is consultation based. In first few weeks, come to class and propose your topics, finalised by Week 03. Something solid, workable proposal following the guidelines. Then, topic will lead to a mentor being assigned to you. Then, will need to set consultation weekly. Not neccessarily on class timing. Supervisor will then take attendance to put in (usually done Sat or Sunday). Can happen wtv time.
- Change of topic not advisable from Week 05 onwards. After this, it's hard to excel.
- Ensure you meet the rubrics in order to get a good mark. Not necessarily you do a lot, means you will get A.
- Pathways:
- Look back at dissertation topic, whether it is viable to pursue to become a major project.
- Find an actual life brief. Disclaimer: Client has to be approved by mentors.
- Find any topic, start from scratch. But that topic MUST have one or more of:
- Purpose (What?)
- Who benefits from this? (Who?)
- What problems are you solving? (Not just mental health, education problems. Problems can be simple.) (Blue Ocean Strat: creating a solution for a problem that doesn't exist [new market])
- Can have group or partner, cross specialisation. But the scale must reflect. Group wld be done as if you're a studio, but each person wld be graded accordingly.
INSTRUCTIONS
Week 01
Generally, this week was dedicated to preparing slides which would support my ideas. During my internship and semester breaks, I often thought what I wanted to do which definitely helped boost the start of this project.
For each of my ideas, I ensured that I tried my best to explain the reasons as to why I thought they would be valuable projects to work on. This was either supported by little bits of research or my very own critical thinking skills.
Week 02
During this week, I decided to team up with Alicia (UI/UX) as it made a lot of sense, with our similar work styles and enjoyment of tattoos! Before we agreed, she also provided me a document detailing how our outcomes could be by working together.
Thanks to Mr Asrizal's feedback, I tried to do more research, focusing more on the current market and competitors to provide a better idea on how well the current tattoo market is doing. This allowed me to improve on my idea, aiming to build a stronger idea overall.
Week 03
This week, during consultation with Mr Asrizal, he proceeded to transfer Alicia and I to Mr Zeon's supervision. Therefore, we set up a session with Mr Zeon to discuss our project and to obtain his feedback regarding our slides.
Week 04
This week consisted of Alicia and I's planning stages, which included creating a CJM on my side. I also sketched some logos, created a colour palette, and chose the brand typefaces to avoid wasting time. We also found some inspiration for our proposed mediums.
Week 05
This week, Alicia and I sent out a survey to conduct more research for the brand. Other than analysing the responses, I also renewed the colour palette and worked on justifying the typeface choices to Mr Zeon.
Week 06
This week, my main focus was creating a solid logo. Alicia and I reviewed my sketches again, and we discussed what might be the best for Inku's overall look.
Week 07
For this week, I focused mainly on Brand Guidelines as Mr Zeon suggested to build the document ASAP. I started on Sunday as we were going to be busy during this week due to the exhibition photoshoot and classes!
Firstly, I started by looking for inspiration:
Then, I was able to get two solid guides that I really liked. Thus, I tested some layouts (refer to Week 7 slides, pages 3-10), which I later showed to Alicia to get her input on which one was better suited for our brand overall.
This led to me building the layouts for the Brand Guidelines further with Layout 01 (see Week 07 slides, pages 12-15).
Week 08
This week was ILW. Therefore, I was determined to finish the Brand Guidelines and further solidify any remaining stuff that the brand's visual identity had been lacking. This means alongside PDW lectures, I also created brand graphical elements, edited brand imagery & the Inku logo and finalised the brand guidelines layout.
Week 09
This week, I made the labelling for Inku's soap & body butter, edited images for Inku's brand imagery & website, and tested some box dielines to see which one was most suitable for Inku's vision.
Week 10
This week, I worked on brand stationery, stickers, bundle box and the content planning for some of our mediums. I also researched some printing shops that did tote bags for better knowledge of how to proceed with my design later on.
Week 11
During the weekend, Alicia and I rushed to work on our slides in order to submit our slides. Whilst making the slides, I also created more stickers, the brand's tote bag, amended the name card and created the colour ways for body lotion & body butter.
On Monday, we practiced our slides, and did our best to ensure we were under the 7 minute timer that Mr Asrizal had set for the presenters. We practiced twice, and managed to achieve about 6 minutes 50 seconds for both times which means we had better chances of success for the actual presentation!
Below are the slides Alicia and I had presented to the panel on Tuesday.
After the presentation was settled and the panelists were okay with the design of the products, I moved onto printing the labels as Alicia and I needed to create visuals using the products. We only stuck on one set for the shoot.
Week 12
During Week 12, I worked on the Bundle Box, Social Media & Email.
Week 13
Alicia and I also moved on to order the our tote bag. We also did our best to settle the visuals for the exhibition. As for my GD side, I worked on social media and the artzine this week.
Week 14
Week 15
This week was definitely a struggle having to balance printing layouts and steadily progress in doing social media visuals. Here's the rundown of this week:
- Saturday & Sunday:
- Refined all AI files for printing.
- Monday:
- Sent in order to Mummy Printing for stickers
- Did social media posts
- Tuesday:
- Sent in order to Angel Prints for the bundle box
- Collected the stickers from Mummy Printing
- Compared prices for poster-artzine.
- Wednesday:
- Sent in order to Night Owl Printing for the poster-artzine and Inku name cards.
- Collected the bundle box from Angel Prints.
- Folded the Inku Bundle Box.
- Thursday:
- Did social media posts
- Friday:
- Collected the artzine-poster order from Night Owl Printing with Alicia.
- Did social media posts
Week 16
For this final week, I did the following to prepare for exhibition:
- Saturday & Sunday:
- Did social media posts
- Monday:
- Did social media posts & refined some elements
- Tuesday:
- Did a video for social media for exhibition purposes
- Wednesday:
- Started preparing the slides for submission
- Thursday:
- Prepared files for submission
- Finalised all prints for exhibition
- Packed our bags!!!
FINAL SUBMISSION
FEEDBACK
Week 02 (30/04/2024) - Mr Asrizal
Mr Asrizal told me to check out the Sneaker Cleaning brand, Crep. When describing my potential touch points, he noted that magazine might not be the best for information sharing. Overall, he had no problem with Idea #1, but he recommended for me to think how it can be integrated with tattoo parlours, which would make it acceptable to tattoo shop owners. Finally, he recommended for me to take inspiration from barbers and how they sell hair pomade, gels & combs in their stores, whereas info would just be used to attract and sell products towards consumers.
Week 03 (07/05/2024) - Mr Asrizal
Mr Asrizal recommended me and Alicia to base our SWOT Analysis on the tattoo aftercare industry, rather than if our brand were to come to the market. He also asked us to think what makes our brand different from other brands in this industry. Finally, he told us to avoid having "All-In-One" as our USP as no brand can cater to everyone.
Week 03 (10/05/2024) - Mr Zeon
During the consultation session with Mr Zeon, he advised us to improve on visualisations for our slides as it is currently very word heavy, with no imagery. He advised us to include more images in future slides for better comprehension for whoever is reading, especially for the planned outcomes slides. Furthermore, he advised us to try avoiding duplicating existing ideas from the current market, making us more unique to consumers. Next, he provided us some ideas as how we can improve our project direction as it felt like it was too much. He also suggested content and interactions to generate better traffic to our platforms. For my own personal feedback, he recommended to not focus too much on small certain things to ensure that I have enough time to complete the actual project.
Week 04 (17/05/2024) - Mr Zeon
Today's feedback with Mr Zeon started with him noting that Alicia and I seemed to know what we were doing and that we were making good progress. Generally, he felt that the brand's type is user-friendly but he questioned if the typeface itself were to reflect people who do have tattoos. He also noted that minimalism would not fit this project as it does not suit the brand identity. Thus, he suggested to be more creative and aim for a stronger identity.
Week 04 (21/05/2024) - Mr Zeon
Provided a few days later, Mr Zeon messaged Alicia after relooking at our slides. For Graphic Design side, he mentioned to consider adding more merchandise, such as doodle bags to increase brand awareness in the market. He also suggested for free trial kits to be used as a reward for those who fill in their information on the website.
Week 05 (24/05/2024) - Mr Zeon
Generally, Mr Zeon noted that we might be too focused on the "pre-tattoo" issues and not the during and aftercare stages as our initial issue explained. Thus, he advised us to look back on our Week 03 slides as they are precise in describing the issue with the tattoo market today. Furthermore, he mentioned that perhaps Alicia and I are too focused on the website/app's miscellaneous functions, but we should be prioritising a booking process for those who are potential tattoo customers. He also noted tattoo artists are not entirely reflected in the flowchart and the user journey since it was our initial idea to include both tattoo artists and clients. He recommended us to not stop at only products, but to consider our brand as a whole ecosystem and to improve the process. In the end, he recommended to focus more outside of the products and that the brand's main value is how the one stop solution and seamless process would give value to consumers.
For Graphic Design side, Mr Zeon agreed for us to maintain our typography as we had strong justifications behind our decision, but encouraged us to make our other graphical elements more creative. As for the colour palette, it is okay but there should be a reminder for the graphical elements to stand out.
Week 06 (31/05/2024) - Mr Zeon
Mr Zeon encouraged for the creation of brand guidelines as all designs should follow it. He also reminded us to justify our design choices, while also suggesting us to do something not so typical of design. For the logo, he asked us to discuss if the brand typography matches the logo.
Week 07 (08/06/2024) - Mr Zeon
Mr Zeon did not comment about the brand guidelines, but brought up the logo again with his concerns of the logo's typeface not reflecting the logo mark. He didn't really agree with our justification, so he advised to either find another type or further justify it as he was not convinced.
Week 09 (21/06/2024) - Mr Zeon
Logo is a lot better this time. As for the colour palette, the presentation would require an explanation of the brand colours for better understanding of why it was chosen. Try to rationalise and support the colours during the presentation.
As for packaging, Mr Zeon mentioned that the logo is very bright on the soap packaging, in comparison to the other parts of the design. He said that his eyes are drawn to it first, rather than anything else. As for the bundle box design, he suggested for me to be a bit more playful with the design, rather than it being just a regular box for consumers to use.
Generally, Mr Zeon asked Alicia and I to rethink our strategy for tattoo artists as they are not currently reflected in our systems. He also told us to refrain from trying to cater to people without tattoos, and to think of the statement, "If you don't have a tattoo, don't use my products," when designing for Inku. Overall, he reiterated not to forget tattoo artists, especially since Alicia brought up an important point how not all tattoo artists have enough time to handle so many messages, and Inku can help them solve this.
Week 10 (28/06/2024) - Mr Zeon
For this week, Mr Zeon only had worried for Inku's name card, and advised me to increase the logotype size and decrease the person's name size as they looked too similar. He also advised me to move the name down.
Week 11(02/07/2024) - Presentation Feedback with all supervisors
Mr Asrizal pointed out to think about the blue for the printing as it is very hard to make it very vibrant on print. He and Mr Kannan also pointed out some of the mediums for Alicia and I's worked lacked similarity, and that we should work on matching them better. Thankfully, the panelists said overall it is there and good.
Week 12 (12/07/2024) - Mr Zeon
For my email, Mr Zeon said that the graphics on the side are distracting, so he advised me to remove them for now. And as for my social media, he had nothing to say but did suggest to get AI to generate a video for one of our social media posts.
Week 13 (18/07/2024) - Mr Zeon
Mr Zeon's only concern is the artzine design is very plain for now. He prefers another one of my layouts but would need to see my final outcome for my current layout first.
Week 14 (26/07/2024) - Mr Zeon
For my poster graphics, Mr Zeon agreed that poster version 01 was best, and that he enjoyed the first one with the graphical elements best.
REFLECTION
I would definitely say that Major Project has been quite a journey, full of stress and hope. While I knew it was a big deal, I was quite surprised with myself as to how much I could do, and the amount of mediums I used after discussing with Alicia. I also was quite surprised at how we were able to group up this semester, as it had basically been unheard of. While I initially had zero plans to form a group, I am eternally grateful to have grouped with someone as talented as Alicia. I also think having had collaborated with a UI/UX individual brought more light to the project, and made it even better, than just having what I did now. I also got to learn a little bit more of how a brand can truly benefit from having a website and an app.
I also learnt a great deal about printing during this semester. I suffered a lot during Week 15, as I rushed to try and get things printed, and was immensely stressed throughout the entire process. While I would say this did require a lot of trial and error from my end, it proved to be highly beneficial. It definitely did make me wish we as students had other ways of learning print beforehand, rather than just having had experienced it in Publishing Design & Packaging & Merchandise Design. However, those two modules really did help me for the whole printing ordeal, as I was not entirely a lost sheep throughout the process.
To be honest, I am also glad to have done my internship before taking on this module. The skills and knowledge of how to better design and use Adobe software has surely played a big part into shaping this project, especially for the Graphic Design side! So, I would like to thank my mentor in Kingdom Digital (the company I interned at), Hwa Chien and some others. I definitely used so much of the items I learnt there for this, and I definitely wouldn't have created items that I enjoyed as much as I do without their teachings, (especially for social media wahoo!)
Overall, this semester has been a whirlwind of emotions. While I am forever grateful for this experience, I did encounter many issues which made me lose my marbles at certain points, which I am not entirely proud of... However, I would say this indeed has made me stronger as a designer, and having had such a rushed FYP, it has taught me many valuable lessons like time management, and proper balance between life and being stuck at the computer for most days.
