Studio Brief 02 - Business "card" design development

The aims of the business card is to inform the reader of my interest in editorial design as well as fashion. Therefore following on one of the ideas to make the business card, I researched the clothing tags of high fashion brands. 

It seems that high fashion brand labels choose to adopt and simple and minimal design direction in reflecting the brands professionalism and sense of exclusivity. The black and white colour scheme is throughout with the main brand being the main focus of the design. It is a less is more attitude that plays on the white space surrounding the brand name that brings the attention and makes the brand paramount to the appeal. This is a design decision that will be considered when designing the business card. However the problem about these tags is the colour scheme. Being black and white, it doesn't stand out from the rest of the selection and because business cards are usually black and white, a more engaging should be used to help stand out better in order to make my "brand" stick in the clients mind. 

A colour scheme that came to mind was that of FourTwoFour on Fairfax. They are a clothing brand that offers hip-hop-influenced clothing & in-house jewelry designs. What makes them recognisable is the bold red and black colour scheme they use on their clothing tag. It effectively stands out within the pieces of  clothing and it becomes a instant identifier for their brand. This is an aspect I want to incorporate within my "brand" to allow clients to recognise me easily. 

Based on this observation, these are some initial mock-ups of the first page of the tag. Experimenting with the size of the copy is to see what ratio of white space works best in displaying my name. The aim is to have a layout that shows a sense of character by being slightly different, hence the off centre preference of the copy. The choice for all capitals is to reflect the aesthetic of fashion labels where most have all capitals in their names. Ed Harland was chosen over Edward Harland because it is easier to say and it comes off too stiff in relation to how I am as a person. 

The final positioning of the name was chosen because of its off centre appeal that is atypical and creates a border of white space that draws the eye towards the name. Despite the choice to position the name as so, the front of the card still looks flat and uninspiring. Furthermore, it does not represent me. The black on red may be eye-catching however I feel that it is the design within the card itself that should speak louder than the superficial appearance. The card should represent the my design practice as well as be an identifier. Therefore I sought to include my past illustrations within the design to add my own personality to the card. 

The aim of these isn't to fully display the whole illustration on the cover but to focus on the details that create the illustrations unique look. However because of the variations in black and white tones, the white copy's legibility is reduced and becomes harder to read. 

After darkening the images, the legibility of the name becomes better as the white is able to stand out more. At this point the typeface still isn't appropriate.

The bleeding effect of the copy in this position makes the copy a little bit more obscure to read which relates to my reserved personality. This reserved and unassuming nature is also reflected in the all lowercase representation in my name. 

This post modern style on the type is to reflect the art direction I'm trying to incorporate into my practice, especially in editorial design. I want to design publications that break away from the typical way of how we read and interact with print having been inspired by the works of WERK magazine, DEAR magazine and Sneeze mag. However the feedback received on this design direction, suggested that the typeface composition took the attention away from the background illustration and was too playful. 

From the range of typographical choices of my name, these two are the most appropriate in representing my personality and how I want to portray myself. That specific back ground was chosen because of its visual balance and texture that is more appealing out of the selection. 

Moving on from this, some initial designs were done on the inside page of the tag which contains my details.

 
Because I am not a active professional yet, I have limited forms of contact, office address and a proper working job title. Editor was chosen as a representation of my aims to be involved in the field of editorial design. My illustrative website was added so that clients could have a chance to look at the work. The tight leading and right aligned type is to play on the limited information that I've provided. The lower case helvetica keeps consistency with the front tag. This initial design is unsuccessful in conveying an engaging visual layout and does not communicate my interest in experimenting in the field of editorial design. 

  
The enlargement of "editor" that bleeds over the edge and is flush against the bottom is meant to keep in line with the front covers type setting. The contrast between the all upper case of editor and the lower cased details is meant to increase the visual engagement with the reader. There is still a problem with the title "editor" however. Editor implies that I am a working editor in the field. What it should say is Editorial Designer. This implies the range of work I produce instead of a specific job title. 

The large and imposing type set grabs the readers attention and forcefully communicates my role. An effective contrast is established through the differentiating weights of helvetica bold and black which puts emphasis on each word. Being a similar visual style the display typeface, the contact details visually don't stand out enough to effectively communicate. 

Helvetica condensed provides a contrast to the rounded capitals of Helvetica bold and black used in the display. It is a subtle difference that allows for the copy to stand out a little bit more, this is also helped through the offset placement. 

These two are other options for the layout that will be chosen once the printing is done.