OUGD603 - The Batsford Prize - Speaker Schedule Design Development

It was thought that typically attendees of an event will be made aware of the schedule of how the event will be running, therefore it was decided to make one also as a part of the branding material for this hypothetical event run by the BPS. Looking at how other events have used this piece of material, it was found that to make these more exciting and engaging, they produce them in interesting ways such as within a small zine-like publication, flyer or poster. It was decided in this case to produce the schedule and poster all-in-one, since this would allow to opportunity for me to feature my original poster design concept into this new direction for the brief.

Looking at the design of an existing schedule/poster I received at an event in the past, it was thought that this may work best at a size of A2, which could then be folded down into a manageable and transportable size of A5 making it easy for the attendees to carry around the event with them. Based on this, sketches of how the design would be formatted were drawn out in order to figure out where things will sit, the angles they need to be at, and their different sizes.

In addition, a couple of design ideas were sketched out for the schedule side. It was thought that potentially the times and speakers names could be contained within individual cells which feature on one of the patterns, and another with the times and names featuring within brain squiggles. However, it was thought that this would make the pattern of cells look too structured and therefore not accurately mimicking the more sporadic nature of human cells that has been utilised throughout all other elements of branding for this event.

Another initial idea which was developed digitally was to simply use a bordered pattern around the schedule with the speakers names and times within boxes in order to contain the information like found in some other elements of branding for this event. However, it was thought that this was not that engaging and perhaps needed a slight point of difference from the rest of the branding material which is all consistent but presented in different ways each time. It was also thought that this needed more information in order to fill in some of the negative space and make the schedule more detailed so that attendees can get a better sense of what each speaker will be discussing before the event starts.

Another design development therefore explored containing the patterned imagery within boxes themselves along with the written information overlayed onto these, and paired with a solid coloured background to make these box designs stand out. However, it was thought that perhaps the background also needed a small element of detail, so another variation was developed which featured a more minimalistic cell pattern in the top left-hand corner of the design so that this is overlayed with the 'day two' text in an attempt to make this not seem too isolated within the design, as well as to match the aesthetics of the original poster concepts and other branding material where the type is always slightly overlapping the imagery.

Although an interesting and playful idea, it was thought that perhaps in the developments above that the use of patterned imagery within the text boxes diminished the legibility of the type slightly simply due to its smaller size and use of colour. For this reason, further developments were produced exploring filling the text boxes with solid colours instead which match the colour scheme of the imagery.

It was thought that the design development above worked much more effectively in presenting clear communication of information, however the minimalistic background was also thought to make this design seem too plain and simple. Further design developments therefore reverted back to using the full patterned imagery as the background and filled the text boxes with the darker colour from the colour scheme in order to make the information stand out against this and make the overall design much more engaging, whilst the use of the full patterned imagery also links to the poster design which would be used on the opposite side of this schedule and creates an element of consistency between the two.

Additional refinements in this design looked at adding the BPS logo as well as highlighting the break with a lighter colour from the colour scheme so it is clearer to see at which times there are important discussions happening.

In starting to arrange this schedule into the appropriate format to work with the initial idea of having the poster on the opposite side which could be folded down into an easy A5 size, it was found this also needed separate designs which could feature on the front and back cover of the folded material. Different variations of this were produced, looking at how the pattern could potentially continue from the front to the back, as well as exploring more minimalistic designs that would allow the covers to be distinguishable from the schedule. However, it was thought that this did not necessarily matter since each individual part could be looked at whilst still folded and this side would not be typically looked at when completely unfolded since that's when the poster on the opposite side would come into play.

It was decided that additionally, the front cover should feature the name of the event, the day in which the schedule is relevant for, and on the back cover features the BPS logo to show that they are a part of the event along with a small passage of information on what the event is about, almost acting like a blurb of a book.