This week’s assignment was definitely much more difficult and also less fun than the first one, but that’s probably because Photoshop is way more complex in its function and tools than InDesign. Every time I managed to move a piece to the right spot or change something the right way I almost wanted to cry of happiness. I’m still very content with my work because it looks like something I’d actually want to read or look at.
My first stakeholder was pretty straightforward because I am an international student myself and can draw from experiences of my own application process. My second stakeholder is the donor base of OU that contributes to scholarships for international students. This was a little harder because I don’t think such a base exists in particular, apart from general donors. But I got a little creative and hopefully came up with a good design. I wanted to have the front side of the mailer resemble a post card or a framed picture with not much fuzz to it. Donors should be reminded of the beauty of OU and also get a use from the mailer, maybe by putting it up in their home.
For my second mailer, I used the old frame provided in the materials to create a small frame for the picture of the library. Overall, I did a lot of changes, especially to the fonts. Fonts are much harder to curate and change in PS than in InDesign and it took some playing around to get it done right. In the beginning, I tried to hard to create things with as many tools as possible to show all the things I learned thus far, but I realized that this can really overpower your design. I decided to stick to what looks good, even if that meant it would be a little simpler.
When I showed my friend my designs, his first response was silence and then “did you do that?” – definitely made my week. Picture manipulation is easier in Photoshop, e.g. changing colors and sizes, cut objects etc. BUT EVERYTHING ELSE IS MORE DIFFICULT. (Sorry, I felt the need to use caps.) Hopefully, it’s going to be easier over the next weeks.
