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Creative Session Reflection

At the beginning of the course of final year project we had to Creative Sessions.

 

The sessions were different to what we usually do in labs or lectures.  There are many tasks that we were given in order to start design thinking.  The task such as : to create a wallet.  This was no an ordinary task, we had to do that as a group and to start just by having any idea an writing in on paper.  We were divided in teams and we had to think as a team.  We could not say that someone’s idea was not acceptable because at the end of session it sometimes might become the most creative idea.  There were discussions among two people as well, where we were given time to ask each other about what we are looking in wallet when we buy it.  The opinions were very different and clearly proved that what you think is not always what others need.  After all ideas were put on paper, we had to choose the most interesting ideas and create a perfect prototype for a wallet.  The prototype was creating just using paper, pens and markers, where it allowed us to have more creativity.

During this session we also had to play games where we had actually to stand up and pretend that we throw a basketball ball to each other, every time we do that we had to create a sound, this task probably was one of the tasks I would enjoy least, however it definitely was a great start before the session started.  What is more, during the session we had so many great ideas given by our supervisor as well as inspirations to become more confident to say your ideas to everyone and does not matter that sometimes your idea might sound not the best, but it might give another idea that is excellent or it could even be developed into idea that will be the best.

 

Design Thinking film

During this session we watched a movie about design thinking, were people were asked what does design thinking mean.  It was really nice to see different creative approaches by all the professionals who create a work that is really professional and how they do understand design.  Different people have different ideas about the same thing.  This session was very inspiring in the way that it allows you to start thinking about how you should go through the creative process. The idea does not come in a second, its is developed by thinking about something adding ideas on the paper, after all of this it could be developed into something that brings that one great idea.  This session really assisted me in my thinking of what I want to do in my final year project, just by understanding that I should go through process of thinking before trying to come up with solution before even analysis and going through important stages of creating.

Creating characters

During the last couple weeks, I was really concentrated on creating characters and thinking ideas for my game.  I was trying to visualise all ideas I had in my mind.  For this stage I used a pen and paper, since I am not looking for a complete design at this stage, just ideas and thoughts of how everything might look.

Creating everything on paper, with no colorus and have my audience in mind really helps to improve the idea of how my project has to look like.

There are two styles that I have applied in my design for different age children: for really small children who are 2-5 years old, and a bit older children 5-10 years old.  Having this in mind my characters look really different.  However, the came I am creating aims to children who are younger.  I have downloaded many games, that are for younger children to learn how to make puzzles and how to start applying colours and learn different shapes of animals.  This kind of game is what I want to create for kids.

There are all my sketches of characters and game designs combined into a one.

Downloading children games

As my project is based on children games, in order to make a successful project I have to learn all about it.  This was probably really fun at the start, but after downloading around 20-30 games for children and playing them at some stage it gets not that exciting.

Every time I downloaded a game the main things I paid attention to where as following:

• What characters are included in the game: are they cute, what colours, how detailed their features were, what sort of movement if any it had.

• What are the backgrounds of games: what type of colours are in the game, how many different shades are applied in objects, if there is any movement in the background, do backgrounds look natural or fairy – type.

• What types of games are included: what are the games for children, and if there is only one type of game that is repetitive or does it change, in the game? are all games the same in all games?

• What reaction and what happens if you are right or wrong: does it say that game over or does it allow you to continue, since audience is so young children, games should not make them upset.

• How complicated are the games: are they easy to play, are there any technical problems in the games, how important it is to know that games are based on tablets.

These were all the points I really paid attention to.  It is important to understand your audience and what they like.

 

 

 

educational game designs

All of the examples I have included are really inspiring and designed very well.  I have included screenshots to show one of the best examples I found:

There are more examples that are such a great ideas for games! and again designed very well!

more inspriation

While I was creating and designing my characters there were more examples I found that really inspired me to create my characters. I was really concentrating on creating characters that are very cute and fun to look at. Children like cute characters but with some detail that would be really “modern” and “cool” and in fashion. I was going through different examples and trying to create this.

There are examples of characters that I really liked:

Synthesis

What have I seen / observed?

During the inspiration stage there were so many ideas that came to my mind, that were not present before I started thinking of the idea for my main project. I was looking at examples that are really great and at examples that are not so great or even really badly presented.

What did I learn from inspiration process?

While looking at all examples that are available I was trying to choose the ones that really interested me: for instance are really good ones or opposite. I do believe that you can learn not from really good examples but from bad ones as well. I think sometimes just looking at good examples you get an idea, that might not look as good as you would think, by looking at examples that are bad, you can understand that certain things do not work well and should be avoided.

What did I think was relevant or influential to my work?

At the start of the research for inspiration, I was really concentrating on just characters design, by receiving some feedback I realized that it is very important to know what can be done using creative design approach, therefore what media can be presented. I was creating something that would teach children how to eat nutritional food instead of junk and fast food. I started by looking at examples that children like to learn from as well and how they are presented. Influential work that really got my attention was different learning games, nice songs for children. They are fun and catchy and teach children in the way that children are not forced to learn but enjoy the process of learning.

What did I change my opinion about?

Before the inspiration process, I wanted to concentrate more on technical part rather than design, after all the inspiration process I understood that I want to create something that inspires me, and to create a work that would really make me enjoy doing it, instead of forcing myself to do it. Creating something for children has to be really nicely presented, and if I do not enjoy the process I will not be able to create something really nice that would make children to enjoy it.

New thinking

I am very delighted that I went trough the process of inspiration. I was really not sure of what direction I want to go or what to create. After seeing all the amazing work, I became really inspired and understood that I really want to do want I always was doing: illustrate for children. Just seeing all these examples helps me to concentrate and become inspired to start the creation process. Now, after my inspiration process I have a pen and a notebook much more often in my hands, because I just cannot stop drawing and get my ideas on paper as I used to years ago. I do believe I just really needed to be inspired again.

Moving forward,

Once I am inspired and know more on what I want to do with my work, I really want to start create some storyboards of how learning can be presented as well as concentrate on designing characters.
What do I think my next step should be?
My next step is to concentrate and present all my ideas on paper, try them and see what I want to choose that later can become into a prototype. I really want to start creating cute characters as well as ideas how they will help children to learn more about nutrition.

why children love sweets?

Sweets, chocolates, jellies, soft drinks! They all looks so nice! they all have characters, all the different colours. For example kinder surprise even has different toys with each chocolate! Kid get excited, and who can blame them? Everytime I walk through all these sweets and chocolates, I always look for inspirations for designs! I never thought that if I get so inspired so does and children! Every design is created by all these talented best in the world designers! They are great and I do believe there is nothing wrong for children occasionally to enjoy a sweet or a chocolate as far as the amount of it is a moderate.   I was researching why children do not eat vegetables or fruits? have you seen their packaging? there is no children approach whats so ever! It says one of 5 a day? what does this say to kids??? all of the fruits and vegetables are aimed for adults, but how should adults make children to walk away from beautifully designed sweets and expect children to enjoy so boring vegetables? I do believe they have to be presented in a more fun way and that is what I am aiming for!

animations and know your audience

I was also looking at different animations, to see how they might be applied in my project.  The ones that I really noticed where with all the different and simple shapes. They are simple and colourful and at the same time they look clean.   I am very interested in how adults present songs such as “ABC” song.  Adults obviously do not think like children and I do believe that is the biggest mistake.  Creative adults should always ask for advice from kids.  After all they are aiming the media for younger generation not older.  Even if you want that created material would be suitable for parents as well, children should not be forgetten.  For instance animations such as Ice Age or Despicable me, are aimed for children but I can really say that adults enjoy it as much as well.  In my opinion, to include sense of humour that is aiming for all of the different age categories, just expands the audience, therefore more people are aware of the content that was created.  In my case if I aim to teach children how to eat healthy I should aim to attract their attention first, but not to forget about their parents as well!

 

 

Couu Fruit & Vegetable word card Launching Animation from Gust N Gale Couu on Vimeo.

JOBS : THE BAKER / LES METIERS : LE BOULANGER from lam le thanh on Vimeo.

 

A very nice example of promotion animation

Introducing Skype in the classroom from Skype in the classroom on Vimeo.

Nick Jr IDENTS from The DMCI on Vimeo.

 

Beautifully designed brands – creative thinking!

 
This project I create will be created digitally. I believe it should be easier to create than for print, but I constantly need more inspiration and ideas. I decided to get some ideas in packaging, because I do believe you need a lot of creativity to create something so from all bunch of available items in markets your designed item gets attention it needs! So I started researching, and for my surprise, there are so many ideas that are just out of the box! I really enjoyed them, by looking at each design I want to inspire mysylf to create something really different digitally, I do not want my design to be ordinary, i want to be chosen from all the digital shelves! there are so many options available on the internet, but there are always designs that just get your attention! 🙂