We were graced with the presence of Johnny Hardstaff, a director and designer. Hardstaff has directed and designed innovative moving image work across a broad spectrum of both commercial and non-commercial strands of the visual arts. Mass media clients include Sony, Philips, Radiohead, Toshiba, Sony PlayStation and the BBC. I personally was honoured to be working with him for the two days, meeting and talking to him made me really like him because at first you think 'ARGH a real designer is here! This is going to be brutal!' but when in fact it turned out to be a real nice experience which taught me quite a few things! And made me realise Johnny Hardstaff is even more amazing then I thought!
We were given a brief which he had been given in the past by Toshiba. The aim was that 'Toshiba' needed a new potential global way to capture the public's imaginations and position themselves as a brand that is hi-tech and cutting edge across all of their product range.
We had 24hours to think of a strong idea and then had to pitch it to the rest of the group as well as Johnny Hardstaff himself. This being the most daunting part!! The idea was to get the main concept rather than the 'how could we make it, and what would it be made into'. This however being the downfall for me...When I work I like to know what the end product will be. Whether it's a billboard, an advertisement on the TV or a radio advert etc. I can then at least visualise what it would actually look like! I guess this is the magic of being in business...you get a brief and you just have to run with it!
I found the two days really helpful! We started on the brief around 4ish in the afternoon and then was told it had to be presented 4pm the next day (or roughly around that time!), we also had the choice of working on your own or in a group of two. I chose to work with Sarah as two heads are better than one! Due to the student protests the 1st day was cut short but that was a good thing as sitting in that room was not helping me come up with ideas. It was waaaay too quiet! (plus I don't own a laptop!). After getting into another environment me and Sarah realised we could come up with more ideas and by the end of the night we had a few ideas!
10am. Early morning! We pitched our idea to Johnny Hardstaff, realising that the ideas were good but we needed a reason behind them! We then got told to make people into pixel and came up with a random idea...I will not explain because it might confuse you...!
However! There has been a lot of things that has come out of this experience. Working on a 24hour brief clearly is a hard thing to do. I need to get my brain into gear quicker and give it a kick up the backside because outside of university these things happen.
Lesson learned!
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| Johnny Hardstaff |
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| Ideas Wall |
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| Our Idea |
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| Best Idea Winner Russell! :) |
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