Research For Screen Based 2

After basically (apart from hosting the site) having finished this project I've come back to my sketchbook which looks pretty bare and have realised I don't really have a lot to put in it. I did some research into vis com related sites right at the start of this project which I documented in a previous post here but other than that I haven't really got much to show.

I guess the main reason is that at the core of this project was my own visual identity which sort of came together quite organically, meaning it is hard to dissect, record and justify. The research that informed this was all kind of from introspective thought about myself and my work which lead to a more instinctive way of working. The rationalisation of the aesthetic decisions behind the identity is too esoteric to allow any other explanation than that; they just looked and felt right- apart from the use of coloured paper that is simply just cos I use it in my work.

I am also going to cite alot of the last years' websites as being important in the development of my own. I looked at all of them but continually revisited a set few (Luke Bonner's, Gareth Sanger's and James Mcmorrow's were the ones I took most from) when I needed to find out what sort of things people had written in their about sections, how much work they had up and what sort of size this should be. This was an incredibly valuable resource during the project as these designers created their sites when they were in exactly the same situation as me and the ability to see how well some handled the task, creating original, personal and well designed sites (while also showing the pitfalls which some fell into, some sites were too personal, too gimmicky and hard to get around) made for a good reference point.

On the technical side, tutorials were a life saver during this project. I've bookmarked all the ones I used and the list is too long too put on here. If you've ever posted anything to do with flash on the internet than thank you, you probably helped me at some point during my project.

I guess after all that, that I have done a substantial amount of research, just a different kind which is less sketchbook-friendly than the billions of print outs of other designers work used in previous projects. I could go back and tart-up my sketchbook, pretend I was inspired by stuff I never looked at and probably get a few more marks in the process but thats not really the point of being on the course, besides I've got animal superheroes to draw.