Concepting

Hey guys,

We're on the home stretch....For the next several classes, we're going to be using much of the class time as a lab for designing your concepts as well as working on technique and style. If you presented mood boards that expressed a spectrum such as a museum or art gallery, then you should do one concept for each mood board. If you presented mood boards with one that articulated or expressed the current brand and one that targeted the new brand, then you should base both your concepts on the future brand. Play with "volume." In the case museums, maybe one concept is more about the visitor and another is more about the museum and it's work - each with the "volume" turned up on and down on pictures, color, type, etc. You get the idea. Ask lots of questions over the next week.

2011 web techniques presentation

Lecture Deck PDF

Below are the assignments for this week, required reading and templates. Go get em!

Final Assignment #1:

Integrate and utilize all the materials (tools) you’ve developed over the course and develop 2 alternative homepage concepts that are on strategy, architecture and brand. As discussed, design your home pages for a 1024 x 786 screen resolution which means your PSD should be 990px X 768....

Final Assignement #2:

Pick one of your final home page designs and develop a simple 2 page style guide detailing typefaces, colors, links and other vital information for a smooth handoff.

Save both the your home page concepts as JPGS and style guide as PDF. These files should be uploaded to the class server/folder.

FOR CRITIQUE:

1. Web Pages - save as jpgs into your folder for projection
2. Wire Frame - Also save as jpg in your folder for projection
3. Style Guide - Save as PDF into your folder for possible projection

We will be reviewing all of the above deliverables for your final presentation.

If you're one of many that need more support in Photoshop, now is the time so ask questions, schedule time to meet with me or Yang and look at plenty of examples.


Adobe InDesign template provided.

Here's some elements of the MeetTheStreet PSD that might be useful with regards to plucking elements, icons, etc. We'll talk more about this next week.

Required Reading:

Read Visual Design and Testing

Another top 5 Sites:

www.k10k.com
www.lessrain.de
www.iht.com
www.metadesign.com
www.ourcommon.com

Flash Quickie

Good job last night. Here's some other cool examples of Flash to look at as well as the attached presentation from class.

A couple of date reminders:

Mood boards due next Thursday (10/20) - we'll be critiquing via projector

Flash assignment due following Thursday (10/27) - we'll be critiquing via projector

This is what's due for the Flash assignment - In your folder, there should be your .swf and index.html file. Flash will export both of these upon "Publishing." Once it does, rename that HTML file to "Index.html" and upload both (Index.html & your .swf file) to you hosting environment and test it out to ensure it's all working. Next week, I'll show you how to add a background color behind your Flash piece as well as how to center it within the browser window.

I'll start off next week's class answering questions and reviewing anything that you need more clarification on. ALSO, I typical hold a 1 hour Saturday lab class on the weekend before the Flash assignment is due. This will given you some additional time to ask questions and get more detail on techniques and bugs you may have questions about. I'll let you all let Erin and I know if you'd like to have the lab. It would be on Saturday 10/22. So start thinking about that if you run into trouble.

Attached presentation.

Required Reading - Love The Internet

Here's a link to a few past Flash examples that students completed for their assignment.

This is your chance to jump start your own portfolio site. Do a good job on this. I'm only requiring you to blow out the contact page...but use the time to go above and beyond...

50 most beautiful Flash sites

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Other Site examples. Keep in mind that these links sometimes change so there is a chance that the link is no longer valid or something else replaced it.

1996: GaboCorp

1998: NRG

2001: 2Advanced

2003: RoadRunner

2004: Bill Harvey

2006: NikeAir

OLA- Banners:

BannerBlog

• HP- Big Prints

• GTI Road Block

Flash Guys

Grant Skinner

Eric Natzke

Steps for setting up placeholder page.

This is due next week - sent URL to me and Erin.

1. Download Fetch- enter the information provided on the BU website for the serial number and user name.

2. Create a new connection by entering the FTP information provided by your server. It will either have been sent to you in an email, or for godaddy.com, enter into your account, go to the product section, and click on ‘Launch’, which will show your FTP info. In Fetch, make sure you are in the main folder, where the index.html file is located. Make sure to save it as a favorite so you don't have to reenter the info again.

3. Create your graphic in Photoshop. “Coming soon,” “Future home of www.domain.com,” etc. Save the image as a .jpg through “Save for Web & Devices.” Remember to make your page 990px X 765 PX.

4. In Dreamweaver, open a new html document- just a blank page with no layout applied to it. Don’t worry about the Doc Type- XHTML 1.0 Transitional or whatever shows up as the default is fine. Go to “Insert”, choose “Image”, and select your graphic that you created in Photoshop. Save the html document as index.html.

5. In Fetch, drag both documents you created- both your .jpg graphic and your index.html document- into the window/directory. Or, you can click on “Put” and select your documents from your computer.

6. In a web browser, go to www.yourdomain.com. Your image should be displayed. If it isn’t, try again and make sure your cache is cleared- either hold shift and press the refresh button, or in Firefox, go to Tools, Clear Recent History, select cache from the menu and hit Clear Now.

-Good luck.

Branding & Mood Boards

You made it to branding and everyone's doing a great job!

We now continue along the web design process and discover how brand and mood boards all play an important role in establishing the right brand voice and tone for your upcoming proposed site redesigns. Feel free to develop one mood board for the current site and one for the one you're redesigning based on your most primary audience(s) OR one board for one audience and one for another - many ways to do this so have fun with it.

Example on how to think about it:

1. One board for current site and one for future site

Lets say you're redesigning a museum site cause the current one is too busy and doesn't prominently feature artwork on the home page...maybe one board articulating how busy and plain the current site is and one that articulates clean, artwork-rich and text-light direction...maybe it feels aspirational and easy to scan..

2. One board for one audience and a second one for the secondary or other primary audience (you can have 2 primary audiences)

Lets say you're doing an airline site...maybe one board that feels more "tool" or resource=centric...where business people can easily interact with scheduling, tickets and other airline services. The other board might be for typical tourists or travelers...that might feel more destination and lifestyle-centric...

These should be 20 X 30 inches...we'll project instead of printing...this is my gift to you...

So what should be on your mood boards? Anything that g­­ets your creative point across. This can include colors, typography, imagery, illustrations, white space (or lack thereof), and messaging. If you were working with a content strategist or copywriter, you might include taglines, slogans, brand attributes (adjectives), or a vision statement. This helps the client to not only visualize the proposed style, but to see how the verbiage can support the overall experience.

Mood boards can be extremely helpful when you’re searching for an overall tone or visual language, but they can also expedite the approval of a creative direction before heading into interface design. In the past, we have noticed that separating initial creative ideas from the mechanics of the site allows the client to make clear and concise design decisions without impacting time or budget.

There are a few things to keep in mind when creating mood boards.

▪ Choose an orientation that best fits the subject matter.

▪ Take into account the audience and how you’ll be presenting to them. Your mood boards can be digital or printed (or both) depending on whether your meeting is virtual or in person.

▪ And finally, have fun. Creating mood boards is not a rigidly define activity. Use whatever pieces you can to express your vision, whether it is cutting and pasting magazine bits to Gatorboard or adding minute details and a custom polish to every serif. Do the research on mood boards...use a mixture of pictures, type, color, icons or non of those or all of those...the board as a whole should help articulate a vibe or mood for your intended direction....

Questions?


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Assignment:

Use stock photography/illustration, objects, colors, icons, type and/or anything else it takes to get your mood across and develop 2-mood boards (see different combinations of mood boards above) using pictures, brand attributes, color blocks, icons, etc. You can also use www.tonystone.com or www.gettyimages.com for other photo choices.

Guidelines:

- 20 x 30 format in illustrator

- save as PDF



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Class Lecture Deck
Example Mood Board from AT&T

A good example of an Organic Mood Board

A bad example of a picture collection Mood Board

Required Reading - 3 out of 4 visitors...

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Some Resources:

Marks of Excellence:

Finding the roots of trademarks in heraldry, potter's marks, monograms, and other such ancient devices, this book traces the history of the corporate visual lexicon and produces a taxonomy of the commercial age. An alphabetical section covers motifs from animals to waves, with short definitions and analyses beautifully complemented by daringly cropped and crisply photographed images. Pictures of this quality and interest would steal the show in most volumes, but the text stands up well to the challenge of images that gain force because of the familiarity of their subjects (corporate trademarks), and the unusual sense that the book's context lends to them. Marks of Excellence is a worthwhile exploration at the modern language of ownership.--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Designing Brand Identity:
From an interactive website to a business card, a brand must be recognizable, differentiated and help build customer loyalty. This indispensable resource presents brand identity fundamentals and a comprehensive dynamic process that help brands succeed. From researching the competition to translating the vision of the CEO to designing and implementing an integrated brand identity program, the meticulous development process is presented through a highly visible step by step approach in five phases: research and analysis, brand and identity strategy, brand identity design, brand identity applications and managing brand assets.

Site Mapping / Home Page Wire Frame

Couple of timely announcements to supplement our Site Mapping Lecture:

Please do your wire frames as 11 X 17 vs 8.5 X 11. These can be B&W and the reason for the larger size is so we can all see them during critique vs. having to use binoculars...

Erin will be emailing several of you and giving you the opportunity to tweak your competitive analysis documents. The tweaks include making sure the screen shots are large enough, have the key-line around them, having the numbers in the right place and just general tightening up so they look fantastic.

Please email me your domain name and address by next week or this will be considered late.

Erin will also be giving a pop quiz in the next couple of weeks so make sure you're doing al the required reading, etc.

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Welcome to the Site Mapping.

This week is all about Information Architecture, Site Mapping, Wireframing and Page Schematics. As we migrate from "Discovery" to "Design", we are learning essential practices, tools and deliverables that are invaluable while also ensuring you have a solid structure and flow to your site prior to applying graphics or "pixel-pushing."


COUPLE OF ANNOUNCEMENTS:

1. Make sure you read all your required reading. There might be a quiz in the next week or two...Erin will be administering the quiz.

2. When you're downloading MindManager to your account/computer in the lab, you're going to need one of the teach guys to type in a password so you can install it. I've spoken with them and they're fine with doing it. You can also download it to your personal computer. You won't need it for more than this one assignment.

Assignment 3:

Create a site map of the current taxonomy for the site you're about to redesign AND a home page paper wireframe/schematic of what you think your revised (home page) structure will end up looking like prior to comping.

For the site map:

Just follow the navigation. Don't worry about mapping promos or other links that live outside the navigation. Only follow this down to quaternary levels. Ensure you differentiate main nav from global/footer nav as well as any pages that go off the site or are orphan pages (pages that live outside the nav).

Take advantage of Mindjet's MindManager 9 30 day trial download. It's fairly new for the Mac platform and pretty intuitive. Don't forget to take the tutorial as well as check out the map gallery. **Also, for our presentation next week, if you're using MindManager, don't forget to save as PDF for projection presentation.

**LASTLY, DON'T PRESENT SOMETHING THAT IS UNREADABLE, SLOPPY OR TOO SMALL. THIS IS A PORTFOLIO PIECE FOR MOST OF YOU, SO PUT THE TIME IN. ** Your site map should be the size it NEEDS to be....more on that later...and in color.

Here's how to tell the actual size you should print this out at:

1. Do your thing in MindManager

2. Export as a PDF

3. Open in Acrobat (not preview)

4. Under "file", select "properties." That will tell you the size of the paper.

5. For most of you, this will be larger than 11X17 so you'll have to submit that PDF to the lab crew for printing

For the wire frame:

Just use gray boxes and simple type to describe what's going to be in that box or section - a rotating flash brand piece, news, updates, etc. ** Your wire frame should be 11 X 17 (Landscape) B&W (no color needed). Use PPT, InDesign or Illustrator to do this. No template provided.

Remember...just think structure & flow, not design.

Print both out and pin up for critique. Ensure both are in PDF format in your folder as well.

Both assignments due NEXT WEEK! Refer to syllabus.

Class Lecture Slides
Wk 2 Required Reading - Site Mapping

Wire Framing PPT - An Example

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Some Resources:

Information Architecture: Blueprints for the Web - If you want to learn how to structure and organise websites, then this is the book for you. From data chunking and card sorting to scenarios and task analysis, this book contains everything you ever wanted to know about information architecture for the web, and then some.

The Art and Science of Web Design: When it comes to Web design, style guides are often too boring and predictable to capture the attention of caffeine-riddled Web developers. But not The Art & Science of Web Design; this book strategically equips readers to design sites effectively.

Erin

Erin Wilkey

email: ewilkey@bu.edu

phone: 401-829-3857 - feel free to text or call with any questions

Domain Name and Hosting space is REQUIRED - DUE Sep 22.

Hey guys,

As discussed, I'm going to do things a bit different this year…with our Flash lecture coming up in the near future, it will be great to learn how to host it online so you can start sending people to your very own domain name/site. To prep for this, you have a bit of work to do. I've outlined the steps and a couple of choices below for hosting and domain names. Lets discuss next class.

1. First, you have think up a name to use for your site. This is called a Domain Name. You can go to godaddy.com or register.com and type in a potential name to see if it's available. There are numerous suffix choices - .com, .net, .biz, etc...I only register .com. Call me old fashion. I usually only register ".com" names but if it's not available as a .com, you can use a .net or a .info.

2. Second, if your name is available, you have to purchase it. Prices vary depending on the site you're at. Godaddy is pretty cheap, Register.com is a little more…go for the cheaper site for purchasing your domain name. They're usually between $5-$15/yr for use of a domain name.

3. Once you purchase, you have to have the name hosted somewhere AND have hosting storage for your files and site.…typically, the place where you purchase it will also offer to host the name.

4. You also need to purchase a hosting package for your site as mentioned above. Godaddy, Register and MediaTemple all offer hosting packages. Godaddy is pretty cheap but not sure how good their customer service is…Register and MediaTemple both have reps that answer phones and help people out..

5. Once you purchase a domain name and hosting package (be good to do it all with one provider), they will send you access information for uploading your files, etc…I usually don't use the web based tools for uploading files. I use a free program called Fetch for uploading and downloading files to my hosting space

6. Go and download Fetch for using to access your hosing space and files. They have a trial that you can start out with. We can configure in class if you have issues.

7. Don't get suckered into purchasing any design tools, templates, SEO services or anything else from them….all you want is a domain name and hosting package.

8. Get going on this right away…that way, we can start uploading your Flash files to your domain address and having fun bringing it to life.

9 You won't get much out of this unless you get this in advance…otherwise, you're just going to watch me doing in on the projector and it won't mean anything…

Here's some providers of both domain names and hosting solutions. Many of them have package deals…Just purchase the domain and hosting for a year….

http://www.register.com/index.rcmx

http://www.godaddy.com/default.aspx

http://mediatemple.net/

http://fetchsoftworks.com/

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Week 1 - Competitive Analysis & Creative Strategy

Welcome to the Class. Following are the assignments, handouts, required reading and templates for the first week. Please contact me with any questions.

Here is a PDF of the syllabus as well.

Class Lecture Notes
Required Reading - One Process fits all
Required Reading-Analyzing the Competition

NOT REQUIRED BUT GOOD BOOK TO HAVE

Web ReDesign 2.0: Workflow that Works

Assignment 1:

Get your feet wet...pick an industry from the list below and do an analysis of 6 competitive sites within that industry. Once you pick one, you will be playing designer/client and picking one of the six to redesign within our process:

Zoo/Aquarium
Automaker
Museum/Art gallery
Amusement Park/Recreation
Airline
Charity/Fund Raising

“Analysis Criteria”
What’s the mood of the site?
Site aesthetics (visuals)/on brand with messaging?
Any cool features/fuctionality/other?

A real Example
Analysis Illustrator template provided


Always save your assignments in both the native file format (the program you created it in) as well as a PDF or JPG and upload to class folder. Refer to syllabus for details on presenting formats and dates. Also, keep all your screen shots together for your competitive analysis or Illustrator won't be able to find them and open properly.

Assignment #2

Author a creative brief for your newly proposed site. A creative brief is a summary of the overall visual and conceptual goals for the site, identifying the target audience, proposed visual and brand styles as well as any executional considerations.

Weekly reading and Creative strategy template provided
A real Example

Save in both assignments in both native format and as a PDF and upload to class folder with your last name on the folder. Also, give your files a name that makes sense such as "stevenson_cs.pdf" (for creative strategy) and "stevenson_CompAnaly.pdf" for your competitive analysis...

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