Interviews

• The interviewer will word search your name (if owning a big company) or do a background check on you.
• Always interview your employee do a bit of background research onto them
• Research the funding of the company see if the have a good credit history
• Day before interview always read your application before you go in
• Keep current on what the studios design interests are
• Interview day- Dress smartly, Always be on time, Turn off any electrical appliances 

Body language

Send a Positive message

Things you should not do:

• Never scratch, rub your neck, touch your nose these gestures will make you come across as desatisfied.
• Rubbing your nose suggests your not being honest
• Sitting with arms crossed shows your coming across as being unfriendly
• Crossing your legs is distracting and shows your uncomfortable

Things you should do:

• Lean your body towards the door, shows your ready to make a dash for it!
• Always sit up straight and lean forward slightly shows your interested in what they are asking you to do.
• Always keep your enthusiasm by keeping on interested questions
• Establish a good amount of personal space
• Limit your perfumes and aftershaves as may cause allergies with the employer
• If an interruption occurs retain from taring at him and tell him you'll wait out in the hallway for him to finish. 

Cover Letter and CV

Creative CV

From a few of the Circular C Vs i saw, a few of there layouts and Designs attracted my eye. From that i started off by designing a rough template for my Creative CV. It isn't the best or most amazing CV in the world but i feel that it puts across my attitude and creative style. Very precise and neat and also got a little bit of a hand rendered feel to my work. I'm pleased with the overall outcome of my CV but i would of liked to have maybe spent a little more time on it and would have liked to have taken my design a lot further than what it already is. I feel as if on the right side of my skills icons i could have maybe added in another 3 skill sets that i have experience in just so that i get rid of the blank space and make my CV look a little more packed up. 

Which ways can you use interactive “self Promotion” in obtaining job opportunities?

I would say the best ways to obtain self promotion in job hunting to be:

• Posters or flyers 
• Website (For my portfolio)
• Social Networking
• Blogging
• Going around asking people 
• Phoning up design studios

BEING POSITIVE!

What other skills do you need to acquire? And what steps will you take in obtaining these skills?

I need to gain more of an understanding on these certain skills.

• Confidence
• Leadership 
• Time Keeping
• Concentration
• Typography - I want to have a more typographic approach to my work/ Every designer should have a good strong knowledge in typography.
•  I want to boost up my Dream Weaver and In Design software skills. I'm very interested in Website design so will need to take this next step in order to succeed. 

In order to obtain these skills i will need to spend more time working in the studio and at home doing my own person work. Also over the summer holiday i want to get a numerous amount of work experience in design studios to gain more of an understanding towards these chosen skills. So when i come back to start my 2nd year i will be ready to be more successful going onto my 3rd year.

Which skills do you have already?

I would say that i have the following skills:

• A good use of communication skills.
• Software

1. Illustrator- Strong
2. Photoshop- Medium
3. In Design- Strong
4. Dream Weaver- Low
5. Flash- Low
6. Zbrush- Medium

• Team Work - In groups or alone
• Listening skills
• Digital communication skills
• Very good document skills
• Research skills
• Design knowledge- Trends and styles

Im hoping to gain more of an understanding of certain skills yet to come my way and im hoping to develop my skills on the computer software to a very good level. 

Who are the top five design companies within the UK?

Top 5 Design Agencies in the UK (My prediction)
As i couldn't find on Google or any other place the top 5 i found a article on the top 50 Award winning Agencies in the UK.

1.Venture Three
Link Adres

2.Williams Murray Hamm
Link Adress

3.1HQ (formerly Vibrandt, Vibrandt Form and the Distillery)
Link Adress

4. True North
Link Adress

5. Engage
Link Adress

I have the Link Adress to the top 50 Design Award winning agenices just below but the 5 above in my eyes, i would say they are some of the best in the UK due to there designs. 

http://www.design-intellect.co.uk/top_50_design_agencies_list.html

What skill set’s are needed by a Graphic Designer.

A job in graphic design is likely to include some or all of the following tasks and functions:

• Learning about a clients business by researching them and finding out ts competitors and product range.
• Developing a Design Brief (So that the client will no what your wanting from him).
• Problem solving
• developing and presenting design ideas as sketches, mood boards and being able to pitch it to them.
• Understanding the print side of work and digital side.
• Working in collaboration with other designers such as photographers, Film artists, Game designers etc. 
• Managing your budgets and finances for specific projects.

The skill set that a designer would ideally need:

• Being able to understand a Brand and its identity
• Awareness of new trends and styles.
• An ability to use software's, such as:

1. Illustrator 
2. Photoshop
3. Dreamweaver
4. Flash
5. Z brush
6. In Design

• Being able to work in a team full of different designers with different professions and Alone in your studio.
• An excellent use of communication skills, so that you can put across your ideas to clients and eve bosses of other company's.

What job opportunities’ exist?

When i tried searching for this on Google and tried finding some information for it i came up with this. 

http://creativepool.com/jobs/graphic-design-jobs.php

Its basically just a list of jobs available online for Graphic Designers to apply for. I found that the majority of the time its either freelance work or commissioned Studio time work. Going into freelance you will get a numerous number of creative opportunities for doing jobs and design for people. Whereas if you was part of a creative studio or company you would get work through the work that they find customly through there ad visors and etc. 

Online there are competitions and clients willing to pay you for doing at home on the computer work for a piece of work as long as you provide them with a final file of the design, and a file of all the existing work in your design. Freelance is alot more tricky than Graphic studio based work, But in its ways it has more of a benefit on your work and getting your name out there. 

What is the role of the Graphic Designer?

The role of a Graphic Designer is to create design solutions that have a high visual impact to the viewing public. The role involves a lot of listening and doing for clients, So that there needs will be fulfilled when your commissioned to do some work for them. Our designs Influence many ways of producing work, such as websites, advertising, books, magazines, posters, computer games, product packaging and many more. 

For example:

• Visually creating a new brand identity for a company.
• Creating a poster for a new upcoming video game
• Maybe it could be the layout and positioning of text and pictures in a book your making for someone.
• Advertising a new product to the consumers

And many more possibility's. 

Being a Graphic Designer requires a great passion for design and layout, and also a wide knowledge of the graphic design world and its artists. This would also include the knowledge of software and keeping up to date with new trends and adobe products. 

Creative CV Research

Here are a thew examples of a Creative CV i found, they are purely stunning designs.

 
Link to chosen pictures

These are just a few of my favorite spotted cvs. I think they have a very modern and creative feel to them, Some of these images are outstanding and draw your eye immediately when you spot the curricula vitae. From order top to bottom are my most and least favorite, i'm not to fond of the one above because of the bright pink colour and retro look to the CV but overall that could have a good effect for her and finding herself a graphic job, hence why i chose to display this CV in my collection

Working in Teams

Why teams

Team Status

Project manager

User interface designer

Graphic designer

Copy editor

Application coder

Branding designer

Other: Photographer

 Illustrator

Positive teams

Demonstrates Reliability

Communicates Constructively

Listens actively

Functions as an active participant

Exhibits Flexibility

Works as a problem-solver

Treat others in a respectful and supportive manner

Negative teams

Aggressor

Blocker

With drawer

Recognition seeker

Dominator

Moaner 

The graphic Superman

The Graphic Superman

Job posting

2-5 years of graphic experience

Proficiency in adobe creative suit

Strong typographic skills

Solid understanding of html

Knowledge of the industry

Experience in

Print Publications

Packaging design

Etc.

This job would be fitted in with a Web designer

 The job market

The skill set

Location of work

Work experience?

Developing skills

Funding

We had a short presentation on funding (Notes!!)

• You can approach banks (which require a business plan)
• Banks now-ere days are not giving out as much money as you would require (due to the rescission) 
• Always keep a paper trail of your process (with the employer). Contracts, Invoices, Overstatements.
• Always keep your records (you will be taxed)
• Always finish with a thank you and ask them to thank you back.

Going freelance

As part of our PDP project we had to have a Freelance presentation. Where we learnt about the highs and lows of freelance work.

• With online technology your able to expand yourself all across the web
• Biggest downfall of going freelance is the whole marketing aspect- You will find it hard to market your work and budget your time.
• Always make business cards (Also any opportunity to get your name or logo put onto something do it).
• Never be afraid to ask,email or phone companies about work and possible future roles.
• 9% of the time its all based on the word of mouth. Getting yourself out there requires people to no your name and what you do.
• Take small jobs first gives you a lot more experience- Maybe it'll lead to bigger and more exciting jobs
• start by using social networking, blogs, websites etc. (Get yourself known)

Presentation (Geigy)

 Connor

Slide 5

The designers were encouraged to reject the tired design concepts and visuals present in much of the competition and were instead required to engage in aesthetic exploration. Geigy sold medical products, chemicals and pesticides all with a distinctive but diverse visual approach, their minimalist graphic design in the 40’s and 50’s harkens back to a time when product design, even medical packaging looked both aesthetically stylish, and utilised a kind of 'minimalist cool' seen much less frequently in most modern packaging design. The chemical products and scientific subject matter lent itself to a high degree of visual abstraction and clinical reduction. Geigy were known as unique because they completely melded design for products with product manufacturing

Presentation (Dyson)

Dyson Presentation

Introduction: Connor

Slide 1 

Dyson Ltd is a British technology company, founded in 1993 by James Dyson, who designs and manufactures vacuum cleaners, hand dryers and other electronical devices. Dyson machines can be found in over 45 different countries and it has always been a global company. At first Dyson struggled to find someone who wanted to buy the design of the hover DC01, companies such as Hoover didn’t want to license the design, probably because the vacuum bag market was worth $500m, so the Dyson (DC01) was a threat to their profits. But in 1983 there was a breakthrough, a Japanese company named Apex licensed James design and built the G-Force, which appeared on the front cover of Design Magazine the same year. After making a good amount of profit of the G force using the income from the Japanese licence, James Dyson set up his now known Company Dyson and he also opened a research centre and factory in Wiltshire, England in June 1993. Which now is Home to fewer than 650 engineers, the Dyson Research Design and Development Centre in Wiltshire was designed by architect Chris Wilkinson. It was also engineered to reduce environmental impact which means there's no air conditioning, displacement ventilation is used to blow cool air in at floor level while warm air naturally rises and is dispersed through vents in the roof. Dysons first production of a dual cyclone vacuum cleaner featuring constant suction was the DC01, sold for £200. The DC01 became the biggest selling vacuum cleaner in the UK in just 18months. After the introduction of the cylinder machine many more improved models of the DC01 where in action this then led onto air-powered technologies such as, the Air Blade hand drier, the Air Multiplier bladeless fan and Dyson Hot, the bladeless fan heater.