Exercise: Working to a brief

These are extracts from briefs set as part of a student competition. Your task is to read and analyse them.

Ask yourself:

1. What are you being asked to do?
2. How will the client judge a successful outcome to the brief?
3. What are the keywords?

Note: I will be swapping question 2 & 3 around as I feel you need to show a good understanding of the brief before you can answer how the client will judge a successful outcome.

In addition log any other questions you would want to ask the client.

Brief 1: Create Packaging

Create packaging for Quaker’s new ‘Chilled Creamy Oats’ product for young women looking for a truly delicious healthy snack. The target audience is young women juggling many jobs and priorities everyday. They like to eat well but also love treats and hate feeling hungry. They like the idea of oats for their natural goodness but find the idea of eating them bland and unappealing.

What am I being asked to do?

Create packaging for Quicker’s new product ‘Chilled Creamy Oats’ that will be appealing to busy young women that need an easy snack when feeling hungry during the day, the packaging needs to convince these women to try ‘Chilled Creamy Oats’ for their day time snack.

What are the keywords?

• Busy young women
• Healthy natural goodness
• Eat well
• Love treats
• Hate feeling hungry
• Bland and unappealing

Packaging must convey that this is a healthy treat that will satisfy the hunger but it also needs to show them that this snack is anything but bland and unappealing.

My analysis of the brief:

This is a new product so the packaging needs to be bold, exciting, relevant and stand out from the competition. I would need to do some market research on what the target audience is currently purchasing to snack on during their busy days and see what we can do differently to get them to move over to Quackers – Chilled Creamy Oats

We need to show the target audience that we understand their busy lifestyle and that we have their best interests in mind, a busy women needs a a healthy treat throughout her day to keep her going and the packaging needs to portray this understanding.

How will the client judge a successful outcome to the brief?

The client will judge a successful out come to the brief by me showing them how well I understand their vision, target audience, product and how I will go about designing the packaging to show this understanding.

Additional questions you would want to ask the client:

1. What time frame are we working with?
2. What flavors are we working with?
3. What season is this product launching in?
4. Do you want packaging that can relate to any other current products or can this stand on its own?
5. What mediums would you be using to launch the product? (TV, Billboards, Promotions, Newspapers)

Brief 2: Connections

Most of us have experienced a long rail journey – we witness the dramatic contrast of the changing landscape. the inter-connections at various points along the way; various people embark and disembark; the dynamic is ever-changing… finally we reach our destination.

This Brief challenges you to take a metaphorical journey that might link, among other things – people events, philosophies, theories, objects, movements, inventions, history, literature, etc. your journey is only limited to your own imagination and the quality of your research – surprise us with the juxtaposition of your selected themes but be sure to communicate to the view we the ‘connectedness’ of the thinking within your design. Define your market, and how you will target it.

What am I being asked to do?

Explore the theme of connections and come up with my own selected themes, I need to show how my themes ‘connect’ I also need to define who my target audience will be.

What are the keywords?

• Theme of Connections
• take us on a journey
• juxaposition of your selected themes
• communicate the ‘connectedness’ of selected themes
• Define market
• how you will target it

My analysis of the brief:

This is an extremely exciting topic and challenge as its not one that is explored often and shown to the public to get them to think about. The theme of connections is something that we face in your everyday life ALL THE TIME everything you do is connected and people never think about it until it is shown to them, it helps viewers step out of their bubble and appropriate what is constantly happening around them and maybe engage in conversation with people surrounding them.

How will the client judge a successful outcome to the brief?

You need to understand what the client wants and ensure that your selected theme is communicated clearly to your selected target audience.

I think this brief is relativity simple when it comes to having a successful outcome, the brief gives you a theme to work off of and it states that you are only imagination by your imagination so as long as you understand what the client needs, stay on track and execute the delivery well then the client will be satisfied.

Additional questions you would want to ask the client:

1. What time frame are we working with?
2. How will the final design be presented?
3. Is there any specific age group that you would like me to focus on?

Brief 3: Underage drinking

Raise awareness of the risk of underage drinking and contribute towards a cultural change in society’s attitude towards alcohol. The purpose of the Department fro Children, schools and Families is to make this the best place in the world for children and young people to grow up… to make children and young people happy and healthy and help them stay on track.

With a core proposition of ‘Alcohol leave you (or your children) vulnerable’, the campaign will urge parents to talk to their children before they consider drinking, to help avoid vulnerable situations. The message to young people will get them to think about the effects of drinking.

Creative ideas should use the campaign identity ‘why let drink decide?’ to extend the campaign’s reach and specifically target young people aged between 13 and 16. We are open to ideas about the media or format you think is most appropriate to reach the target audience.

What am I being asked to do?

Build on the existing campaign identity ‘why let drink decide’ to reach out to young children aged between 13 and 16 to warn them about under aged drinking and the risks that follow. Platforms that are relevant to this age group need to be used to get the message across

What are the keywords?

• under aged drinking awareness and risks
• make young people happy and healthy
• help young people stay on track
• urge parents to talk to their children
• get young people to think about the effects of drinking
• ‘why let drink decide’
• target 13 – 16 age group
• appropriate media format to reach target audience

My analysis of the brief:

I think we all often find ourselves saying “when I was younger I was too busy playing in the streets to think about drinking” but times have changed, parents do not want their kids on the streets because of crime, drugs and gang related activities so children have turned to technology to keep themselves busy and now days its ‘cooler’ then playing outside. X-box, Play station, YouTube, snap chat, Instagram and loads more media platforms have taken over entertain young people and that is exactly where the campaign needs to hit, YouTube stars will be perfect for ad campaigns and posters because they are who the young people want to follow and listen to. To appeal to the young people of today we would need to bring in some young people can get to know what is trending and hear about what they would like to see happening to get them and there friends back onto the right track or to stick to the right track.

This will definitively be a case of making sure you keeping it ‘cool’ and relevant young people can smell education and boundaries from a mile away and WILL run!!

How will the client judge a successful outcome to the brief?

This is something that will need a lot of research and work because you need to ensure you reach your audience quickly and effectively, you want young people talking about it and sharing it with their friends that is when you know you have successfully conveyed the message and made the impact the client desired.

Additional questions you would want to ask the client:

1. What time frame are we working with?
2. Please can any and all previous campaigns be forwarded to avoid overlapping them.
3. What is the budget, will it be possible to get celebrities on board?
4. What would you like to see in a campaign?

Notes: Questions & Answers

Questions:

1. Having analysed the briefs which one do you think you would most like to tackle?
2. Is it the one with the most restrictions or the one that is most open to interpretation?
3. What do you think the chosen brief would offer you?
4. In what way do you think it would stretch your skills and abilities?

Answers:

1. I would absolutely love to ‘tackle’ Brief 3, there is more then one dynamic to work with and it would be the most challenging.
2. Brief 3 gives you the best of both worlds you have some freedom to portray the message the way you think is best but there are restrictions to keep you on track. being new to graphic design this is where I would be most comfortable.
3. I think this brief is one where I would learn the most about design and fitting all the relevant pieces together to make one campaign, there would be more mediums to work with and be exposed to.
4. It would be beneficial to me to work on this brief as my skills and abilities are limited at the moment but this is the brief where I would learn the most and enhance all my skills as well as my abilities.

Pages 30-35 of Graphic Design Level 1: Core Concepts