Screen Shot

This screen shot took me roughly an hour to complete. I made it in illustrator because I couldn't figure out how to get the exact shapes that I wanted for each character in photoshop. It took a decent amount of time for just this one shot so I think the animations themselves will be very time consuming, and I will probably need to think of a way of minimizing the characters' motions.

Commercial Ideas

SmartText Commercial
1. Two students discussing how to get out of class. First says honesty works best and sends a text to the teacher saying he didn't do the didn't do the homework so he's going to stay home and work on it. Teacher marks him absent. Second sends a SmartText that says he's not feeling well but when he's up to it he'll send  an email with it attached. Teacher responds with an accepting message.

2. Person driving a car really fast through traffic pulls up the app and quickly types in contact name and the type of text to send. Puts phone down and looks up and continues to swerve through traffic easily.

3. Hostage negotiator is stuck outside a building and expresses concern to another officer about how to get the hostages out of the building. He pulls out his phone and sends a SmartText of "kindness" to the criminal. When he receives it he just smiles and walks out of the building.

4. Two guys talking. One has his phone out and is complaining about how he doesn't know how to ask a girl out. The friend shows him SmartText app and walks him through how to do it. V.O. says slogan and text comes up on top of the guy and a girl sitting at a restaurant laughing and talking.

5. All text runs across to describe the App in "smarttext" phrases

Commercial Evaluations

Pepsi Commercial

This is a live-action commercial that is going for a sort of nostalgic-comedy tone. They are selling Pepsi, but make it unique by appearing to sell Coke. The target audience is very wide on this commercial. Perhaps an older crowd of both male and females, because it seems to take place in either a less-developed country or in a poorer neighborhood. The problem that the product is solving is thirst. The problem is addressed by the character drinking the Pepsi at the end, and I believe that it is successful because, although it is not too well-known, it does a great job of originality.

Pepsi Soccer Commercial

This is a live-action commercial that is both happy and comedic that is selling Pepsi. The target audience would be any soccer fans. The problem would be being too giving, and it talks about the problem by having the players all come past and grab the drinks while the man paying for them just nods. I think it is a good commercial because it shows plenty of the product and combines soccer and comedy all into the short video.

Pepsi Japan Soccer Team
This is a live-action commercial that combines cultural differences, soccer, and comedy all into one. The target audience is again soccer fans. The problem that is being addressed is a difficult play in soccer and/or cultural differences in Japan. These problems are addressed by putting a player in this position and having him learn from a past experience with the product. It's slightly less successful than the other commercials because it is somewhat reminiscent of the Joe Green Coke commercials. Also it may alienate any Japanese Pepsi-drinkers.

Pepsi music Commercial
This is another live-action commercial that has a nostalgic tone to it. The target audience is music fans. The problem that is addressed is which is better, Coke or Pepsi. And the problem is addressed by making the boy choose between the two sides of the street. There is an off-screen narrator for just a quick mention of the slogan. I think it is a good commercial because it suggests the importance of their product to the cultural world of America.

Coke GTA Commercial
This is an animated (computer animation) commercial that has a feel-good, comedic tone to it. The target audience is video-game fans, because it plays off of the video game Grand Theft Auto, which is generally considered violent. The product they are selling is CocaCola. The problem that the commercial is solving is that the world is too negative or violent, and it addresses this by having the main character walk around doing good deeds and making people happy. I think it's a successful commercial because it is very happy, and the song gets stuck in your head quite quickly, which will constantly remind you of Coke.

Brochure

I kept the same background color and text as that of my business card to try and keep a consistency throughout all of my company's products. As for the layout I tried to use pictures wherever there was dead-space and I put in any information that seemed important about the company for promotional purposes (testimonials, intros, etc.) The most difficult part is trying to find ways of keeping the brochure interesting with such small amounts of space in each panel and so much information to include.

Letterhead

I started off with the bits of information that I knew would need to be included, such as my name, company name, and logo. Then I filled in the contact info as there was room for it and, because the majority of the letterheads that I have seen usually have the logo centered on the page (sometimes as a watermark), I decided to keep with this pattern as well.

Business Card Final

I knew the basic information that needed to be included so I placed that around the card as it fit. Then I wanted the logo to be centered so that it would be a recognizable business card, with my name being the second largest item on the page.

Business card sketches

I tried to pick colors that were simple, and lowered the opacity so that if there were some kind of reflective paper used for the card then that shine could be seen. For the logo, I simplified it from what was originally turned in from having "Smart Text" fully written out to now just the letters. As far as the layouts themselves go, I based the first few off of business cards I had seen in the past, and then tweaked those to try and create something original. It's possible that some of them are too plain or chaotic with their spacing, however.

Questionnaire

1) What is your business?

Texting company

2) Describe your business in one sentence

Provides original texts and phrases to the customer

3) Who is your target audience?

Middle school through college students.

4) Who are your competitors?

Apple, Go Pro SMS

5) What makes them better/worse than your product/service?

More widely used and accepted as established organizations

6) Do you currently have an identity? (This is more for companies that are already established and you’re just revamping the logo/corporate identity. If you have a new company or product, skip this question.)

7) (If your answer to #6 is no, skip this question) What do you like about it and what don’t you like about it?

8) How do you want your image to be seen in two years?

As a service that is used widely enough to be considered its own verb (i.e. google it/smart text them)

These following questions might seem silly, but their purpose is to help generate ideas.

9) If your company was an animal, what animal would it be and why?

Owl because it's wise(cracking) and somewhat secretive, like the owl that only comes out at night

10) If your company/brand was a person, who would it be and why?

Benjamin Franklin. It puts together phrases in catchy and unique ways

11) If your company/brand was an object, what would it be?

A talk bubble

12) If your customer was a cartoon character, who would it be?

Cartman from South Park

Lyrical Collage

For my collage I used the song lyrics "Take a red-eye flight to New Orleans, and the Greyhound bus back to Pennsylvania."I was trying to find a way of combining the two city skylines, but there was no visible difference when I put New Orleans architecture into Philadelphia. This is why I decided to take the approach of putting the New Orleans Saints" logo as though it was a part of the moon using the warp transform tool. After everything was put into place, the sky still looked very empty on the top left side. This is why I used the cloud filter to try and give it some activity. I think the most difficult part of this project was trying to get the color-tones of the bus to match the orange glow of the background photograph.

Photoshop

Photograph Illustration

For my illustration of the Roman Colosseum, I tried to keep with the original color-scheme of the photograph. However, due to the building's complex design, I found it very difficult to match the colors of each brick in the structure. The many angles of the rounded building created a very difficult challenge for the shadows involved. I used the pen tool and the pencil tool for all of the shapes and highlights of the illustration.

Logo Sketches

Smart Text Logo

This is my final logo design for the Smart Text Company. I decided to keep the logo simple and to the point with the talk-bubble and the company name. I chose the color scheme, gray and silver, because I was trying to keep it looking like platinum or as a futuristic design. I chose the font style because of its easy legibility and it has what I think is a very clean look. As far as changes that were made from the original design, the only detail that was adjusted was the color. Originally, I was going to leave it as an all-black and white logo. However, seeing it as a finished product it looked very bland, so I tried to give it a little bit of appeal with the future-looking colors. Also, I did not put in a fill. I did this because I think it would make for a more interesting icon on the cell-phone's screen so that the user can see their own background instead of the one for the app.

Logo critiques

1. NFL Logo: I think this is a very solid version of the National Football League's logo. The most recent change that I am aware of was the lessening of the stars on the shield. I think this is a good move because it makes it a simpler image. With this simplified version, there are fewer similarities between the logo and the American flag, which results in better visibility, memorability, and universality because it may be less considered an American-only sport. 

2. Saab Logo: This logo, similar to Apple's, contains an image of something that is not actually a product of the company's. It does, however, work well as a simple image that reminds the consumer of one of their slogans, "Born from jets." Also, it makes good use of the Usability-factor. The text is large enough and the image is simple enough that if it is shrunk down or blown up, there will be little difficulty understanding the meaning. Because of this, I think it is a strong logo.

 3. MTV Logo: This is a logo that I believe is clearly targeted towards teens/young adults because of it's disorganized style. The background is a splatter of paint with objects such as a bottle popping out from behind it. The designers used a very bright and strong orange against the black and white background to make the brand really stand-out against the rest of the logo. While it is a good design, it has little usability if it were to be shrunken down for a business card or something of that nature- the details of the background would be completely lost.

4. Poland Spring Logo: While this logo uses a very appealing image to illustrate the freshness of their water, there is, I believe, far too much text. A full two lines of text that are written at the bottom would be completely lost if the logo were to be made smaller for a business card of flyer. This amount of text and complicated illustrations works against the product in terms of memorability. It does, however, have a certain level of timelessness. 

 5. Under Armor Logo: I think this company did a great job with their logo- it's simple, usable, easy to learn, and has meaning (the two curves make a U and an A). While it is not a terribly old company (1996), they have, as far as I know, kept the same logo for all of those years. I think this speaks well to the logo's durability, as it has also become an incredibly recognizable brand.

5 Ideas

1. Company holds on to your spare keys for when you lose one.
2. Company charges 50cents per song, downloads it and gives the file to the customer.
3. Company handles and automates your online dating schedule (dates, times, locations, what to wear).
4. Company that sends text messages to the person you like/don't like with creative comments.
5. Company puts a digital readout of your car's current speed on the rear bumper so cars behind you won't tailgate.

Class day 1

My name is David Fox. I'm taking this class as a Film&Media Arts major, though it is not required, I feel as though it is very relevant and applicable to the "real world." My interests are primarily in production oriented classes, but as graduation gets closer and closer, I'm trying to expand my expectations past getting the exact job that I want, and hope that this class gives me skills that will allow me to stay involved in the creative-end of the film industry.